IBM OneUI - Creating structure, navigation and layout for applications
OneUI is about structure, navigation and layout and not so much about colors and fonts. Following its guidelines applications get a consistent look, which user studies show increase user confidence about their ability to use your web application. This translates into less help desk calls. Any consistent framework does that, the advantage of the OneUI is that your applications start looking consistent to the IBM software in use. Furthermore when IBM releases a new visual style, your application can adopt it in no time. It consists of the following structure:
Global Navigation: Branding (corporate and application logo), links to core applications, usern ame, login and help
Application Navigation: Typically a tab bar on the left and the search box on the right. Search, while potentially acting on the current page content is considered an application level function. You could use a dropdown to allow the user to define the search context
Place / Page Navigation: Contains the page title on the left and a series of page level actions on the right. A page would be the place where you conclude an entire interaction. This is different from the Notes client or classic web application model where view (selection of information to act on) and document (the instance of information) are usually on different pages. Some rethinking required (Partial page refresh is your friend!)
Main Content: The main content area has one to three columns where the left and right column are optional. If the main content needs navigation or filtering that would be displayed in the left column with navigation above filters. In the right column contextual information can be displayed (e.g. in a Claim form the right column would show the account summary)
Footer: The footer area contains logo, copyright and related links that are not frequently uses (e.g. Feedback, documentation, other software)
You can find out more about OneUI from here.
