Error Message Guidelines

The guidelines presented here are intended to help you write clearer and more useful error messages.

In particular, these guidelines address three common problems:

• Users often misunderstand popup errors.
• Administrators cannot easily understand event log messages.
• Technical support receives many calls as a result of confusing error messages.

This overview contains the following topics:

• Basic Guidelines
• Searchable Messages
• Style Considerations
• Message Length
• Dialog Box and Popup Message Guidelines