Reading: Designing Interfaces

I think this calls for a duck.
signposts are features that help the users figure out their immediate surroundings. wayfinding is what people do as they find their way toward their goal. animated transitions help users stay oriented as they move from one place to another. an escape hatch allows users to always get back to a familiar page. clear entry points present only a few entry points into an interface. they are descriptive and task-oriented. global navigation on every page, shows a consistent set of links to easily find key sections. hub and spoke isolates sections of the app into mini-applications. it has one way in and one way out. a pyramid links a sequence of pages with back/next links. modal panels show only one page, with no other navigation options, until user solves problem. sequence map on each page in sequence, shows a map of all of the pages in order. breadcrumbs on each page in a hierarchy, show a map of all parent pages, up to the main page. an annotated scrollbar serves double-duty as map of content and color-coded sections use color to identify which section of site that page belongs to. animated transitions smooth out a startling or dislocating transition with an animation.