Where in my response did I say he absolutely should not do it? Remember...I said IMO...and gave reasons why. I've also seen lots of things that people want to do with their UI that flat out are bad ideas. These mostly have come from customers, but once educated to a "better way", see the light. But, I have seen horrible UI designs because a developer does things his way. In my Essential Fox session last year, we tore apart the UI in several applications, one of them a commercial application from a regular UT poster.

In addition, how much have you spent on researching user interfaces? I dare say that Microsoft has spent lots, lots more. Now, I'm not saying that MS proposes the best way to create a UI, but their recommendations have merit. Most people don't see the hidden training costs when you have to teach someone how to use a non-standard UI. Most users use Microsoft Office and Internet Explorer. If you use a similar paradigm in your UI development the users will be much more at home with your application as it will be familiar to them.

Finally, too many computer consultants just blindly do things because it's "what the customer wants". This is not consulting...it's coding. I've got news for you...the customer is not always right. If you bill yourself as a consultant, you should consult...just as a doctor, laywer, or accountant will give advice or consultation. What we say as consultants may not be accepted by the customer, just as we don't have to follow the advice of our doctor, attorney, or accountant. Once you've explained the options to the customer and he still wants things his way, you can decide to do it the way he wants or to walk away and let someone else be the coder.


>We have no idea what he wants to use it for. And does it really matter? I recall a similar response when I wanted to know how to make objects flash in succession. It was for a theatre application and made perfect sense in the context. Not everything is bad just because it sounds bad.
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