On Jul 29, 2008, at 8:55 PM, Mary Deaton wrote:
I have been using Morae for over two years and have never had any of
the problems you report with patches or video corruption. It is not
necessary to edit video in Morae, you can export it and edit in
anything you want. However, you lose the ability to search on
specific markers and tell it to make a highlight of only the marked
items.
The issue with video corruption is a known problem with Morea. They
even have tech notes on it. Additionally, they have a document file
size limit (something like 2 hours), but I can't recall as it's been a
while since I spoke with their tech group. Also, they have a known
problem with not being able to record video of video. So, if you're
testing something like YouTube, Morea will not work — the video gets
corrupted. This is a known issue with Morea according to TechSmith.
I transferred my research framework into the marker system and have
created my own markers, finding Morae's too general. As for setup,
it takes me only the time required to set up the participant machine
if I go to a client's site and use their machine. That is usually
less than 20 minutes. My biggest problem has been client networks,
not the Morae software.
We've never ever seen it setup in less than 20 minutes. Seriously. I'm
measuring time from the point I walk in the door and touch the power
button on the computer to the point when I've run a test recording and
it works okay. The quickest we've ever seen was over an hour. Not to
mention if you're taking your own machine, then you've got cables to
plug in, boot time for Windows (that alone takes 5-10 minutes), giving
Morea machines access to each other, etc. I've never seen this done in
under 20 minutes when you have two machines — one for testing, one for
viewing.
Just two weeks ago, we were testing at a client's facility, using
their equipment w/Morea. They had done some tests the previous week.
It still took over an hour to get everything working properly. Much of
this was do to Windows, but that's still a factor in the system.
I use a small Web cam for the participant machine if using a
client's machine. If I use my own machine, it has a built in Web
cam. I am not very fond of using multiple video cameras for testing
someone sitting at a computer typing, especially since my policy is
to never include a participants face in material given to a client
for reasons of
privacy.
We only use 1 video camera pointed at the participant.
I also never do testing on Macs.
While it's only 10-20% of our participants, we prefer to provide the
most accurate data possible. So, if a participant is a Mac/FF person,
it's not going to provide the same experience putting them on Win/FF.
We prefer to filter out any bias that could be contributed to OS
differences/experience.
Additionally, we don't intentionally rule out Mac participants because
our system won't support it. It's our job to have a system that
supports the customers of our clients and the systems we test. While I
realize other companies don't take the same approach we do, as a
researcher, I feel I'm not doing my job if I use a system that doesn't
support the customer's native environment. And yes, when possible, we
go to people's homes/offices. When not possible, we do our best to
simulate the same (similar) environment at our space.
Cheers!
Todd Zaki Warfel
President, Design Researcher
Messagefirst | Designing Information. Beautifully.
----------------------------------
Contact Info
Voice: (215) 825-7423
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
AIM: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Blog: http://toddwarfel.com
Twitter: zakiwarfel
----------------------------------
In theory, theory and practice are the same.
In practice, they are not.
________________________________________________________________
Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)!
To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe
List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines
List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
