Posted by Harlan Messinger on 11/01/07 11:32

Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
> Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:
>
>> I use FF. Which button would bring me to the top of a page? 'Home'
>> doesn't work,
>
> It works in typical situations.

If you mean the "Home" button on the typical browser toolbar, in typical
situations it takes you to whatever you have set up as your home page,
not to the top of the current page. If you mean the Home key on the
keyboard, the convenience of the "Top" link on a web page is that it
avoids one trip back to the keyboard for someone who is navigating
primarily by mouse. Especially on a page with a lot of sections and a
guide at the top consisting of links to the sections, such as a FAQ
page, a user can find this helpful for bouncing back and forth between
the guide and arbitrary page sections. In that case, the Back button on
the toolbar will work as well, but only if the user went down the page
by using one of the links in the guide; otherwise, he'll wind up on the
previous page.

Of course, the user can keep dragging the scrollbar back to the top, but
that takes more effort.

> If you have an untypical situation, you
> should find out what works there - if you think that it is important to
> be able to get to the start of a page quickly. After all, other sites
> don't have the same kind of button as yours,

That's the argument for not replacing a standard widget (such as a
scrollbar or a drop-down list) with one that more or less duplicates its
core functionality but looks or behaves differently from the standard
one: it can be confusing. In this case, there's no potential for
confusion. A user sees a link reading "Top" or "Back to Top", perhaps
with a graphic upward arrow and, by virtue of being literate, knows
instantly what it means, regardless of the details of its appearance; or
else the user doesn't notice it, but in that case the presence of the
link doesn't hinder the user from returning to the top of the page using
the usual built-in means.

[Back to original message]