Principle of least astonishment
From Wiki @ Karl Jones dot com
The principle of least astonishment (POLA) (alternatively "principle/law/rule of least astonishment/surprise") applies to user interface and software design, from the ergonomics standpoint.
A typical formulation of the principle is: "If a necessary feature has a high astonishment factor, it may be necessary to redesign the feature."
In general engineering design contexts, the principle can be taken to mean that a component of a system should behave in a manner consistent with how users of that component are likely to expect it to behave; that is, users should not be astonished at the way it behaves.
See also
- DWIM (Do What I Mean)
- Convention over configuration
- Human interface guidelines
- List of software development philosophies
- Look and feel
- Occam's razor
- WYSIWYG
