Thanks for writing this up Jeffrey. I have yet to see the video of
the usability tests, but didn't want to block on that, so responding
with some initial thoughts while I wait to see the actual tests.
I've done a quick pass at addressing some of the issues discussed
below. http://chandlerproject.org/Notes/CosmoFloss
* Connection between sidebar collection selection and summary pane
* Connection between view selector buttons and summary pane contents
* Connection between pagination widgets and triage table (not
mentioned below, but has been brought up as an issue before)
* Overlay widgets (simplified version of what we have on the
desktop)
* Add/Remove collections
* Collection details icon
* Task icon in the Triage Table
mde and Jeffrey: See questions / responses in-line.
On Nov 7, 2007, at 3:20 PM, Jeffrey Harris wrote:
A few takeaways:
- Neither person seemed to have any difficulty with the concept of
stamping, which was gratifying
- Both testers were repeatedly confused about what the active
collection was,
Yup. I think we need to do better than the default browser selection
highlight. A darker selector with gradient and inverted 'white' text
will make a stronger impression I think.
and wanted to be able to move or copy items between collections
I've logged a bug for this. https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/
show_bug.cgi?id=11340 Context menu options for Add/Move would be a
good start towards satisfying this.
EXCERPTS FROM NOTES
http://chandlerproject.org/bin/edit/Notes/FlossSprint2007?t=1194908123
* Is it really important to distinguish between overlaid-because-
selected and normal overlay? Most people not involved in the
sprint seemed to think not
* If overlaying many calendars, why not mimic Outlook's UI for
availability?
It's important to allow distinguish between overlaid versus selected
collections because oftentimes, users overlay 'their personal
calendar' on top of FYI calendars like:
+ U.S. Holidays
+ Office Calendar
+ Their boss's calendar
+ Shared home calendar
Without a 'selected' collection, there's no way to specify which
events have 'priority' over other events. (More concretely, when
there are overlapping events, which events appear on top?) Having the
notion of a selected collection allows users to keep more calendars
overlayed without losing sight of the events they really care about.
General
The view switcher in the Web UI is fairly non-obvious. Bigger
buttons, more central placement, use of color, use of tooltips --
all these things would steer the user to using them.
Jeffrey, were the test subjects asked to find the Calendar? I have a
feeling that one of the reasons why web UIs generally have text-
buttons is that text-buttons 'test' better. The downside of text
buttons is that they take up more space and take longer to parse.
Imagine all road signs as text.
+ Go
+ Prepare to Stop
+ Stop
+ Right Lane Merging Into Your Lane
+ Left 2 Lanes to 101S. Right 2 Lanes to 280S.
I have some ideas for simple ways to make the view selector buttons
more clearly 'tabs' that control what you see in the summary pane.
I'd like to re-test this by giving people 3-5 minutes to just explore
the UI on their own time...and see if they discover the calendar view
by themselves.
Orange and Green colors on the web ui almost match NOW and LATER
colors, probably want them different, since they're very separate
concepts
Yes, the colors are off right now. We could also get rid of the
colors in the Triage Table View and only display them in the
Calendar, which would minimize confusion.
There's a bug in the web UI that confirmation doesn't come up when
creating a new event or switching viewed collection. When that
dialog does come up, it should say the name of the item, and the
dialog text should be larger than it currently is.
I'm not following this. Which dialog are you referring to? The Save
edits dialog? Is this bug already logged?
The use of 'note' versus 'item' was confusing. The distinction that
everything is an item, and that all items start off with a default
note stamp might be unnecessarily subtle. Consider just "Create a
new item" prompt for quick item-entry.
Logged bug: https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11341
The areas of the minical that are clickable and non-clickable are
not obvious. Small indicators like cursor changes don't provide
enough guidance.
I think I need to see the video to get a better handle on this issue.
One of the test users found the use of super-saturated colors for
UI elements (collection icons, triage indicators) distracting from
the data.
Hmm, the collection icons and triage status colors are some of the
most important metadata we need to convey. I need to watch video to
understand this better.
Collection selector
Discoverability of sharing a collection: maybe change icon to down
triangle/pop-up-menu, use context menu?
Logged bugs:
+ Change collection details icon to be a down arrow - https://
bugzilla.osafoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11342
+ Add context menu support for sidebar collections - https://
bugzilla.osafoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11343
Users didn't perceive the "i" icon as obviously a letter "i," nor
did they understand what the button did. One of the test users
popped up the Info dialog, and reflexively and immediately closed it.
Use of checkboxes to indicate overlay state was confusing due to
the fact that checkbox often means something is selected. This is
compounded by the fact that the selection indicator in the Web UI
is way too lightweight.
Is there any reason why we don't use the same convention we do on the
desktop?
Detail view
Suggestion of auto-saving in web-UI. Google Docs auto-saves. Auto-
save, disable save button, leave text by save button with last auto-
save time. Keep a "feel good" save button, it's the final action,
make sure I'm not going to lose my data. Noted that Google auto-
saves after keystrokes end.
Yup, targeted to .11. Luckily, we've already discussed this issue in
great detail.
Light gray label text over active form inputs gave the impression
that the input was disabled. Large, disabled text inputs were
assumed to be active. Consider a different strategy for disabling
form sections.
Is this the Firefox bug again? I think we should just hide disabled
fields the way we do on Desktop. Saves space as well.
Logged bug: https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11344
Blowing away data in form elements when removing a stamp is bad,
bad, bad. The user might re-add the stamp, and would then have to
re-enter all the stamp data from square one.
Ya. mde are there technical issues here?
Logged bug: https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11345
The date-entry in the Web UI really is horrible. (We know this.)
Multiple people asked about a date-picker.
Yup, we have several bugs for this:
Mini-cal - https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=8396
Interim improvenment - https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/
show_bug.cgi?id=10962
The timezone selector is also horrible. One test user picked the
"Pacific" region (Australia-Pacific), and naturally assumed she'd
picked the Pacific timezone.
mde, bobby: What's preventing us from moving to
There were strong opinions in favor of, and against, making the
text of stamp labels clickable. Arguments in favor are that it
expands the click space and is standard behavior in some OSes,
arguments against were that the label isn't obviously clickable,
and it's a large change that could accidentally be made.
Well it's a change that's easily un-done :)
The Desktop's approach to stamping (using a toolbar) doesn't have
the same problem because the stamping toolbar is separate from
areas that might be accidentally clicked.
Yes, I think we need to revisit the stamping affordances in a more
holistic way.
List canvas
Placement of newly created items in the list view in the Web UI
seemed mysterious to a couple of people. Although once we started
to discuss all the potential ways to handle it, everyone started to
see it was a difficult problem, and is compounded by paging in the
Web UI. No one could agree on what would be the ideal approach.
Same for editing, where the edit would take the item out of view.
Did the test subjects have trouble finding newly created items?
The checkbox icon for tasks suggested "this is done" to many
people, neither of the tested users using the Web UI could figure
out that it indicated that the item had been stamped as a task.
Yes. I think using the "checkmark in a circle" icon that we use on
the Desktop might help. Also making sure that we have corresponding
icons in the detail view for stamping would help as well.
Desktop
Greyed out collection icons in desktop suggests overlays are
possible, there's no feedback about why it's disabled. Also not
clear that they're greyed out until you shift between calendar and
list view
Until we support overlays in the Table View, we could get rid of of
the overlay icons in the non-calendar views. I think this made more
sense when the overlays in the Calendar were preserved when you
switched to the other App Areas. Somehow, that functionality got lost
along the way.
Chandler's use of drag-to-add instead of drag-to-move confused
various UX people. Perhaps pop up a dialog when dragging items to
a new collection for the first time, to alert new users that drag
adds?
I think adding Add to>> and Move to>> context menus might be a good
idea.
+ Cosmo: https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11348
+ Desktop: https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11347
After creating an account, background subscribe automatically
downloads collections, but there's a pause, and no text describing
what's about to happen. After bringing down server collections,
confused about whether existing or future desktop collections will
automatically get pushed to the server. Prefer to have a dialog
choosing whether to sync which collections from the server.
Yes, this is being addressed here https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/
show_bug.cgi?id=11237
The word Triage is potentially problematic, since it's specialist
vocabulary from either the medical field, or specific to GTD.
Consider using a different word. On the other hand, if it's such a
central concept, considering it a 'branded' term, and adding some
UI affordance for first-time users to educate on what the concept
means.
I think we're intentionally borrowing the concept from medical
triage. It's a metaphor :) This would be one argument for keeping the
Triage button as Triage.
The Triage icon looks exactly like the icon for 'recycle,' which
confused several people, who associated it with the Windows Recycle
Bin. They thought it would trash the selected item.
Yea. Have been waiting for somebody to bring that up. Not sure about
"actually" being afraid that the Triage button = Delete. But point
taken and will keep on the look out for more feedback on this.
The concept of "delete" versus "remove" was confusing. The words
have very similar meanings in normal English vernacular. Consider
"Remove from all collections" instead of "delete" (setting aside
the fact that technically the Trash is a collection).
Yes. Targeted for 0.7.3: https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/
show_bug.cgi?id=9583
Having a non-drag-drop way to add items to multiple collections --
even via a contextual menu on the item -- would be helpful, as drag-
drop is not necessarily discoverable.
I think this is more true of web apps than desktop apps.
Both Web UI and Desktop
Several people said they'd try to keep Web UI and Desktop UI as
consistent as possible to avoid confusion when users switch between
the two UIs.
I think we need to re-consider this in the context of 'usage
scenarios'. What are people using the web UI versus desktop client for?
I agree though that we should keep visual syntax and vocabulary as
consistent as possible.
"Call out" active collection more, in Web and Desktop the selected
collection isn't immediately obvious. Ideally, tie sidebar
selection to main view more clearly.
I think a more robust collection selection highlight would go a long
way towards this. Implementing 'Show collection name in the window-
title' might also help as well: https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/
show_bug.cgi?id=10604
Use of a labels for UI elements -- like "Collections" for the
collection selector -- would guide new users both in using the UI
and in the name of Chandler-specific vocabulary, without taking up
copious amounts of space.
I'm not sure about this yet. Not sure if it warrants the loss in
screen real estate.
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