Building a web app is, at least for me, far easier than building a native application. Having pre-made UI elements will make this so much faster and more effective.

jQuery Mobile won’t be out for another couple of months, but some of these designs shots are to good to not share.

Take a look at the cross platform designs:

Gmail is a great example of this. Labels and conversations go against everything you have learned about email up until this point. You’re telling me an email can be in two places at once? This doesn’t make sense to a user who can’t make the switch from folders, to labels. Even though labels are a far better way of organizing content.

So how does Gmail introduce these groundbreaking and possible confusing conventions? With an email:

They don’t waste any time telling you what is different about their product. It may turn off some users, but they wouldn’t be a great customer anyway. I know plenty of people who hate the conversations feature, and don’t use Gmail because of it. At least this way everyone is clear up front.

Also notice how short the email is, but each concept has a “Learn More” link. Users that get it can move on with the application. Anyone who is confused has an opportunity to get their questions answered.

My Solution

My solution is to group the all the comment related numbers visually. They are already grouped by placement, but in this case, with the strong horizontal lines, that isn’t enough to set them apart. Also we need to show hierarchy since the main comments number (88) is the total of the other three numbers.

Though I don’t think this is perfect visually, it adds much more differentiation between the comments group and the rest of the content. Let me know what you think and get involved with the discussion here on the WordPress UI blog.

It still needs work, but hopefully within a week or so this blog will be nicely dressed in this look. So, what do you think? I am looking for design feedback so that I can make this the best possible.

Also follow me on Twitter to hear when I launch the design on this site.

Though much later than promised, I am finally releasing the Emphasis Theme. The idea is to focus on the content, through a clean design, great formatting, and robust features. Hopefully it will be the first of many free themes to come. The theme is GPL, so use, modify, and redistribute as you please! Take a look through some of the features I designed in.

Clean, Effective Post Design

There is nothing to get in the way of your content. The theme uses a lot of white-space to give it a classy feel, while getting the user straight to the content. Simple shadows and contrasting text add a lot of style to the design.

Great Comment Layout & Gravatar Support

All comments are well designed and formatted making it easy to read. It also has full support for Gravatars, so you can recognize your commenters across multiple sites.

Widgetized sidebar and footer

Widgets make it easy to add your exact content in the sidebar and footer. Since two separate widget areas are defined you can fully customize your content.

Dynamic filter function on Archive and Search pages

With the use of a great jQuery plugin you can live filter all posts on the archive and search pages to find exactly what you want. You really have to see the functionality to see the benefits.

Enough talk, download the theme

Here’s the link: Download Emphasis Theme

I would love to hear in the comments how and where you are using the theme. Enjoy!

Follow me on Twitter @NathanBarry or @WPlimits.

Why is GoDaddy promoting Twitter?

Being told I should signup for Twitter did not fit my DNS modifying workflow plans. Though since GoDaddy is (supposedly) tailored to beginner users it may make more sense.

What is in this for GoDaddy?

On a side note: I really like Twitter’s About Page