The Meat and Potatoes
Which one of these is not like the other?
I’m a huge Google Reader fan but they lost a brownie point with this little UI blunder. I’ve been complaining (to myself) about the lack of a “Mark as Unread” link for some time. This frustration was further amplified when I noticed one on the iPhone version. Why would they put one in the iPhone version and not the standard version? Well, today I decided to look a little closer (again) to make sure that I hadn’t missed it. Here’s what I saw…
Nope, just a bunch of other link/icon pairs. Or are they? Turns out (as you may already know), the icon next to the “Mark as Read” link is not an icon at all. It’s a checkbox! Sure it seems obvious now, however a little square with a check in it makes for a very convincing “Mark as Read” icon especially if not in standard HTML form styling. Now I’ve become a believer in context over consistency, but this is a prime example of what can happen when you follow a convention then throw a curve ball. (I still love you Google!)