Input Hints

Problem

Sometimes people don’t know what to put into fields on forms.

Solution

Add some explanation and/or examples of valid values near fields to give people hints at the kind of input they need to provide.

Context

• You have fields that can use extra clarification because either the field isn’t familiar to people or because you allow or expect values that people aren’t familiar with.
• You can’t or have a good reason not to constrain the values using a specific input control such as a Drop Down Chooser, Date Picker, etc.
• You don’t provide the hints in some other way such as input prompt or nearby, contextual help on the view the fields are in.

Rationale

It’s not uncommon to have fields on forms that require a little extra bit of explanation. Particularly for free text entry fields, unless people are very familiar with the kinds of values (such as first name, city, that sort of thing) that make sense, it is very helpful to add that little bit of extra guidance.

Also, keeping it close (right beneath or next to) to the field uses proximity to relate the input hints to the field they apply to, which helps keep people focused on getting through the form without having to guess or look up values elsewhere, so if you can provide the right guidance this way, without taking up a lot of space, it is generally preferred over supplemental help or docs.

Implementation

Compose a brief (no more than a sentence or two, max) explanation and, ideally, some examples that will help people put in the right kind of values. Put this explanation inline in the form near the field that it applies to. Often, putting it right below the field is ideal. Putting it next to the field on the right or just below or next to the label can also work. If you have dynamic capabilities, you could also dynamically show it as a sort of call out when the user is focused on the field, which can help reduce visual clutter of your form.

If it is in line, you should consider making it more part of the background by reducing its font size and/or mildly graying out the text. You don’t want this to be screaming for attention at the same level as your fields, labels, and actions, but it shouldn’t be hard to see either, especially when people are focusing on the fields in question.

You can also consider using Input Prompt as a direct alternative or if you can and it makes sense, consider constraining the values using an appropriate approach (such as Structured Format) that will implicitly guide people to provide appropriate values.

Finally, input hints are usually best for new or infrequent users, so if yours are expected to be mostly frequent users, this may not be appropriate, or at least consider having a way to hide them for those people.

Sources

Jennifer Tidwell, Input Hints

Tags

Data Entry, Help.