Perhaps this is due to the increasing
popularity of visually oriented web design tools, leading designers to concentrate more
on visuals than usability. Maybe it??™s because designers have collectively forgotten that links
can be made anywhere and not just in navigation bars. In any case, links??”inline links in
particular??”are the main thing that differentiates the Web from other media, making it
unique. For instance, you can make specific words within a document link directly to
related content. A great example of this is Wikipedia (www.wikipedia.org), the free encyclopedia.
Site navigation
Wikipedia showcases navigation types other than inline. To the left, underneath the logo,
is a navigation bar that is present on every page of the site, allowing users to quickly access
each section. This kind of thing is essential for most websites??”long gone are the days
when users often expected to have to keep returning to a homepage to navigate to new
content.
As Wikipedia proves, just because you have a global navigation bar, that doesn??™t mean you
should skimp on inline navigation. In recent times, I??™ve seen a rash of sites that say things
like, ???Thank you for visiting our website. If you have any questions, you can contact us by
USING LINKS AND CREATING NAVIGATION
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clicking the contact details link on our navigation bar.??? Quite frankly, this is bizarre. A better
solution is to say, ???Thank you for visiting our website.
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