Assessing the usability of a user interface standard
Henrik Thovtrup, Jakob Nielsen · 1991
User interface standards can be hard to use for developers.In a laboratory experiment, 26 students achieved only 71 % compliance with a two page standard; many violations were due to influence from previous experience with nonstandard systems.In a study of a real company's standard, developers were only able to find 4 of 12 actual deviations in a sample system, and three real products broke between 7 and 12 of the 22 mandatory rules in the standard.Designers were found to rely heavily on the examples in the standard and their experience with other user interfaces.