This installment of the Champions series features Mark Asher, Adobe’s chief Web design expert. As senior product manager for GoLive, Asher is responsible for setting the product direction for Adobe's preeminent Web authoring/design tool. Asher sat down with Publish recently to offer his insights into what constitutes good Web design – and a good Web design tool.

Publish: What is your background? How did you find yourself here, as product manager for GoLive?
Mark Asher: I have been in product development for 13 years. Before coming to Adobe, I was director of product management for a Web site hosting services start-up, and previous to that, I was a principal consultant with Price Waterhouse, advising hi-tech companies on product management strategy and process. I have been with Adobe for almost 3 years now.

Publish: What are the biggest differences between publishing for print and publishing for the Web? What do you see people struggling with as they make the move?
MA: First are platform characteristics. Print designers create for a static medium that is often created as a one-time output. Web designers create for a dynamic medium that is constantly updated, maintained and re-deployed. In addition, print designers create for a single, paper-based platform, while Web designers must consider many different browsers and devices when conceiving a project. Second, Web technology moves more quickly than print technology, so Web designers face the additional task of having to stay current. I believe the biggest struggle that traditional print-based creatives face is how to adjust their workflow to include digital content delivery without having to become programmers. This area is where visual authoring tools like GoLive fit best because they provide a bridge between print and the Web that emphasizes creativity while doing the programming 'behind the scenes.'

-Adobe's Mark Asher

Publish: How do you know when site designers really know their stuff? Can you tell from just visiting their site?
MA: Sure. The first clue is stylistic, and the current best practice is to structure a Web site using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). Pages built with tables or frames are now considered ‘old school.’ The same is true with animated introductions to Web sites. While these animations showcase a lot of creativity, they actually end up confusing end users and preventing them from accomplishing what they came to the Web site for easily and efficiently. A good Web site doesn't contain these distractions. And finally, the use of pop-ups has become very popular, but it creates a very poor user experience. Good design means finding other ways to pay the bills.

Publish: What are some of the best features of your favorite sites? Why?
MA: First, simple and recurring navigation, including breadcrumb trails that constantly provide users with feedback about where they are in the site, no matter how deep they are. Secondly, the ‘two-click’ approach, whereby information is never more than two clicks away from the user. Finally, the limited use of color and other visual feedback mechanisms so that Web pages can be accessible to everyone, including disabled users. Basically the theme here is easy-to-use.

Publish: What are some common errors you see in Web design and publishing?
MA: I guess it comes down to knowing your audience. A very creative Web site may include many high-resolution images, but if the target audience for the project is mostly on dial-up, how can the designer expect these users to have a good experience while they wait 10 minutes for the page to download? Also, the misuse of dynamic connections to databases is a problem. Designers need to work closely with their programming counterparts to ensure that the business logic created for a Web site provides the right user experience. Otherwise, the result is either a beautiful Web site with poor database integration, or worse, a great database integration with a terrible user experience.

Publish: How important is the tool you use when publishing for the Web? What are some key features it should have?
MA: The tool is very important, especially if you are a creative professional who is trying to deliver a quality user experience. The best tools for Web design combine an intuitive, object-based approach to layout and design, while creating valid, lean HTML in the background. The best tools also should provide a way to edit native content inside the Web authoring tool, thus preventing a lot of workflow breakdown waiting for others to edit and re-edit assets. Finally, the best tools should be scalable based on the user's abilities – they should provide a customizable user interface that can be altered for novices as well as for experts.

Publish: What do you think is the most important new feature in GoLive CS? Why?
MA: Actually it's a tie between two features. The first is our innovative visual authoring for CSS. Our unique handling of CSS provides Web designers with simple, icon-driven dialogs to set up and apply stylesheet elements, and best of all, GoLive CS provides real-time preview of styles BEFORE they are applied, making it easy to preview content before committing to a style element. Second is the Package for GoLive/Import from InDesign, which allows print designers to ‘package’ their projects up so a Web designer can repurpose text, images and other assets for a Web project quickly. Once again, GoLive uses a highly intuitive, drag-and-drop visual interface to do this.

Publish: If you were speaking to a faithful Dreamweaver user right now and had a chance to get them to take a look at GoLive, what would you say?
MA: I think both tools are great, and they all do a great job of visual design. I think where GoLive has an advantage is in optimizing for the creative experience with features that emphasize design rather than programming. More importantly, GoLive CS is optimized to take full advantage of unparalleled integration between other Adobe products (Photoshop CS, Illustrator CS, Acrobat 6.0, InDesign CS). This saves creative professionals hours of asset rework during a project and allows designers to get more done in less time.

Publish: What technology, innovation or development could take Web design to the next level? Where do you see the market heading?
MA: Oh, to have the ultimate crystal ball - I'd be a very wealthy man! Seriously though, there are a lot of potentially disruptive technologies out there – certainly wireless is one of the big ones. The rest of the world is years ahead in using wireless technology to provide rich data-based experiences. Just look at what's happening in Japan with 3G technology, and Europe with multimedia messaging service (MMS) and it makes you wonder why the U.S. is still focused on just voice. Other prototype technologies like digital ink and digital paper have the potential to change how and where content and advertising is delivered and targeted.

Publish: What is your motto when it comes to good site design? Any final words of wisdom?
MA: Know your end-user. I can't emphasize that enough. If your end users want to purchase a product from you, then focus on that experience and don't clutter the site up with a bunch of fancy animations or other distractions. If your end users want information, then focus on making that experience the best and simplest possible. Keep navigation simple and ubiquitous so that users don't get lost, no matter where they are in the site. And finally, give users a reason to come back by keeping content relevant and up-to-date. The Web is a powerful way to connect with end users, but you should always remember, they are one click away from going somewhere else.