Boxes And Arrows : The Design Behind the Design

Article Idea:

Error Message Best Practices

suggested by Trevor Bollers on 2008/04/16

This may have already been done but it is what I am looking for and I think there needs to be more discuss about this topic.

In working on projects that are form intensive I have found the need to have very clear and consice error messages that accomplish these goals.

1) help my user identify where on the page the error is.
Now many of you are saying that there are visual cues such as arrows and images and Icons even color and font changes that can indicate this to a user. However, in many situations that I have been involved in the error is not caused by a single action on the page but a combination of mutual items and actions taken. So to highlight and point to them all even though it could be the sequence of them or some combination of them could be messy.

2) Help my user know why the error occured and what they can do about it. Now with simple actions like an incorrect password or missing input this is not bad. However, with some of the systems that I am designing there are combinations of selections that are required.

I would like to see an article on error messages. Focused on helping users find the error and understand what can be done to fix it. The article should also cover strategies for writing consistent error messages so that when a user encounters one of them it is unique enough to bring attention to the real problem but consisten enough to help them fix their issues painlessly.

In a perfect world the system would be simple enough so that very few errors would be possible. However, by taking away and locking down functionality to avoid errors we have caused frustration in the past for users that feel they need that level of freedom.