Murphy's Law in Human Interface by M. Yasumura
2004. 5. 26 updated.
Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.
No help is available when one needs help.
It is harder to find an item in a well structured menu.
Important things are written in smaller letters in manual.
GUI is well designed for the part where everydody knows well.
You cannot help doing what you are not allowed to do.
Undo operation is not available when you are doing so complicated operation that needs undo.
You can't find the book at the moment when you want to know something described in it.
The more sophisticated in design, the less understandable.
It looks very easy to use it before you actually touch the new computer.
Just after you are completely accustomed to a system, the system will be completely changed its version.
When you use a high-technology machine with many buttons, you simply use only limited number of buttons.
The following is the Original law by Murphy:
Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.
Nothing is as easy as it looks.
Everything takes longer than you think.
If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong.
If anything simply cannot go wrong, it will anyway.
If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which a procedure can go wrong, and circumvent these, then a fifth way, unprepared for, will promptly develop.
Left to themselves, things tend to go from bad to worse.
If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something.
Nature always sides with the hidden flaw.
Mother nature is a bitch.
It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so ingenious.
Whenever you set out to do something, something else must be done first.
Every solution breeds new problems.