>Yeah, I'm looking for some programming guidelines and interface standards that I can give to a couple VB developers that are doing a mammoth system for us, connecting to a SQL 7.0 backbone. The problem so far is, that these guys so far are doing the connection alright but as far as interface goes, there's no consistency. The buttons are of different sizes on several screens, the same thing with fonts sizes and types, textbox alignment and so on.
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>Wayne & Bruce, we discussed initially about it, but that was basically throwing dust in the wind since what we have now we don't like, and our client has already seen some of it and he doesn't like it either, specially because all the screens look so different (good thing is just a beta).

I understand this very well :) In my large vfp system, we worked closely together and constantly discussed design with running prototypes, so different developers may have had slightly different code, but all screens and objects were done with a very similar look & feel (button height = 25, for example). The MS guidelines can only tell you so much, like where to position buttons (bottom, right, etc), but they can't tell you everything. You (as a team) will have to make some decisions and document them for the programmers as needed.

The other large new system we have was done in PB, and it was a disaster for a long while (and still is, to some degree). Every programmer's screens looked completely different, even though they also used the Interface Guide. They didn't get a working prototype up until very late, and by then everyone could see there was a huge problem with inconsistency. It took them months to redesign and standardize things.

So the moral of my story, I guess, is work closely together, develop any standards that the Guidelines don't cover as you go, document them, and frequently review a working prototype.

But the MS Guidelines can give you a good start for design philosophy, just by looking at the GUI images they have. And a visit to the Interface Hall of Shame doesn't hurt, to see what bad design looks like, either < s >