3. Required and optional
Required and optional are the basic information of the form, which is used Number List to guide users to identify key information and make behavioral decisions.
Usually, when there are few required fields, an asterisk (*) is preferred to be displayed to better improve the efficiency of information identification. When there are many required fields, you can mark the optional items to avoid full screen asterisks and increase the amount of extra information.
However, it is recommended to use a unified marking method in the same system. Personally, I prefer the asterisk (*) method, which is less costly to users and less intrusive to the content.
4. Recognition is better than memory
This is one of Nielsen's ten usability principles, which requires that users can be given enough information in various ways to reduce the user's memory cost. In form design, various prompts are mainly used to assist users in completing form filling.
1) Proactive reminder
For input information that is open, complex, and beyond the user's cognition, proactive prompts are required.
For example, in Alibaba Cloud and Tencent Cloud, many name fields need to start with a letter. In order to facilitate the identification and memory of information, ordinary users are more accustomed to Chinese naming.
In this case, the form needs to give filling instructions by default to reduce the user's memory and the probability of errors.