Hello,
An update on the work the design team's been doing in UI Options:
I. User testing
A few months ago, we completed a round of user testing on the demo
implementation of UI Options (Infusion 1.4). While testing revealed some areas
that could be tightened up, users found the experience generally useful and
usable.
Relevant links:
http://wiki.fluidproject.org/display/fluid/%28Floe%29+UI+Options+user+testing+results+%28March+2012%29
http://wiki.fluidproject.org/display/fluid/%28Floe%29+UI+Options+user+testing+report+%28April+2012%29
We had a few of concerns though:
1. It's challenging to design a testing protocol that teases out how users
might want the system to adapt to them. Many experienced users are already
attuned to adapting to the system, while less experienced users are unfamiliar
with the space of adaptations possible. (Or as Jobs might say: "A lot of times,
people don't know what they want until you show it to them.")
2. The current fat panel UIO has a couple of key flaws that this round of
testing didn't directly reveal: a) lack of responsive design (this problem is
particularly exacerbated when UIO size-related preferences are recursively
applied back to itself), and, on a related note, b) lack of expandability.
3. The current UIO is designed around a myopic scenario of a user visiting a
website, and adjusting its presentation and operation to match his/her
preferences. In this scenario, preferences are scoped tightly to the site and
browser session. Consequently, the current designs have limited consideration
for more realistic use cases (e.g., visiting a string of websites/webapps as
part of a larger workflow or browsing session; or multi-day use over multiple
machines or machines that are shared).
II. User research, literature review, brainstorming
To address concerns around #1, we conducted a literature review and a round of
user research. This was followed by sessions of brainstorming for ideas around
both the space of useful preferences, and the operationalization of those
preferences.
Relevant links:
http://wiki.fluidproject.org/display/fluid/%28Floe%29+UI+Options+brainstorming+resources
http://wiki.fluidproject.org/display/fluid/UI+Options+configurations+and+interactions
http://wiki.fluidproject.org/display/fluid/UI+Options+features+and+functionality+list
III. New design iteration
Along with a number of added preferences (see "Priority features and
functionality" at
http://wiki.fluidproject.org/display/fluid/UI+Options+features+and+functionality+list),
we are also working on addressing concerns #2 and #3 by reworking the UIO
configurations. Fat panel is getting attention to be responsive and address
expandability, and full page will receive a more substantial reworking to make
sense in a site-independent implementation (e.g., GPII/Cloud4All's user
selected parameters and profile management).
We're also working on another design for users to declare and manage
preferences, based around smart, predictive searching of
preferences/needs/problems/topics. This may become integrated with the two
other configurations, or act as an independent configuration option.
Relevant links:
http://wiki.fluidproject.org/display/fluid/User+Interface+Options+designs%2C+C.1
https://source.fluidproject.org/svn/design/floe/user-interface-options/
We've found that designing UIO has been an exciting experience. It's an odd
monkey with particular tensions between 1) simplicity (ease of identifying,
articulating, and managing preferences for users who may find their web
experience already challenging) and complexity (sufficient range and nuance of
preferences to cater to the diversity of users, particularly at the margins),
and 2) a user's need or preference (authorship control over the presentation
and operation) and design integrity (e.g., how one maintains the intent,
character, and virtue of the design).
As always, we're open to thoughts, questions, suggestions, and criticisms of
our designs.
Cheers,
James
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