Even where a particular page answers someone's need, it is rarely possible to find it at the first attempt. This means that making navigation easy is one of the prime functions of a web page, and the popularity of lists of links reflects this. Navigation differs from reading a page of interest, and needs to be more immediate, to help people find the page, or information, they want as quickly and easily as possible. Here, first are principles for design independent of time, while the particular issues related to the dimension of time are in the following heading.
Every page needs to be considered from the point of view of navigation.
It will often make sense to provide many pages which are optimised for navigation only, separately from the pages which deliver the message or content desired. Dedicated navigation pages need to give the right amount of information for choosing the next link to follow. This means giving self-explanatory names, or phrases of explanation, for the contents of any pages linked to. Too little information, and the user will make more 'wrong' choices which are immediately cancelled. Too much information will clutter the page and make the decision process longer.