Consistent and easy-to-follow navigation through a complex application is hard to attain but doing it well can lead to dramatically improved user experience. A typical application has a core set of functionality—which should always be easy to access—and a larger set of additional tools and helpful features that are used less frequently. Keeping the balance between core features and additional functionality is something that many applications haven't yet solved. Overcrowded toolbars and very long menus are problems we encounter on a regular basis:

Finding ways to limit the various options onscreen should lead to less user confusion. It's the responsibility of an application designer to make a clear and easy-to-use interface, not to present all of the options and expect users to learn how to navigate. There are various methods for adjusting a user interface to focus on the essential or most useful features; we'll explore them in the following sections.