Victor Lombardi of Smart Experience and I begin DAKISSA, a podcast that looks at innovations in interface design. In the first episode we look back at the way Kayak.com provided rich filtering controls and results visualization. I first saw Kayak's search interface in 2005. The interface has not changed much from when it was introduced, and still remains an excellent example of the type of AJAX interaction that is so valuable to the customer's experience that you cannot imagine the site without it.
Episode:
1
URL:
http://blip.tv/file/980356
06/17/08 15:29
[...] New videoblog about user interface by good men Michael and Victor. Check it out! [...]
06/18/08 19:21
I love Kayak for the AJAX interactions and ability to filter in real-time. Old news but a good site.
They totally misunderstood the graphs presented in Kayak. The graph doesn't show different travel dates, it shows historical prices for the dates requested.
06/18/08 21:59
Thanks, Dave, for pointing that out. That was a feature I had never used so I was looking at it for the first time while Victor pointed it out to me. I can see the value of seeing the fare history in the past.
I don't see any reason why the fares can't be depicted in this way to see where prices change in the future as well, if that information is available.
08/04/08 17:08
wow,
im sold on kayak. this can really help people visiting your site to stay longer and interact more.
09/17/08 15:18
anyone know what technologies (other than AJAX) is used to create this interface?
10/04/08 22:11
Kayak is great. I feel like I still have more to learn, but this was one more example as to why I want to learn more. Thanks for sharing!!
All the best.
11/15/08 17:44
The interface is great and useful! It's the best I've seen in any website to book low cost flights online! Programming this must've been a very complex task!
01/23/09 13:43
I really love Kayak but don't know enough about it yet actually. I also want to know if this is a fully AJAX application?
I'm also surprised I haven't heard much buzz about it recently? Am I just looking in the wrong places?
Thanks,
Chris.
01/23/09 13:56
@Chris: Kayak has been around since 2004. The AJAX behaviors we refer to in this video have to do with results filtering.
02/11/09 16:36
Yeah, Kayak is very cool. It has been around for several years now as stated - I think I first heard about it about three years ago when radio talk show host Clark Howard mentioned it as one of his favorite travel booking sites.
04/07/09 10:59
I first saw these slider controls on Elance and found the site so much easier to use than its competitors. From your post I understand that Elance is not unique in using them, and I wonder why theyu are not used more often.
05/14/09 16:36
The key is that users should be able to perform AJAX actions without the need for AJAX. Done the right way this should solve most and accessibility issues.
I’ve seen with my own eyes that Product Managers are not interested in understanding this and just want a Web 2.0 AJAX driven site. I’m pleased to say though that after heavy lobbying a couple of these sites are now recoding to use progressive enhancement and less AJAX not more
05/15/09 11:16
Kayak is too good