Hi all - this is a topic near and dear to my heart so please forgive
the verbose answer.
Up front I should say that I think personas are a key component of good
UX, and without some kind of user definition you're going to run into
problems, including the elastic user problem. Which typically can lead
to scope creep, and project delays, and terrible, terrible things.
Personas can help - in the right situation.
I think personas are a very "modern" UX deliverable, but they're not
well used in industry, to be honest, and even less so in Open Source
projects (strictly from my experience so far). Many development shops
claim to want them, and then aren't sure what to do with them once they
have them. All they really wanted was a better understanding of their
users and their needs, and they aren't sure how personas gets them that
once they have them in their hands. This problem is compounded by the
fact that not everyone agrees on what personas are, nor what they should
contain.
If we're creating generic Gnome personas, how will they be used? Are we
looking for a tool that helps us publicize and market Gnome? If they're
intended to capture end user behaviour and needs - which Gnome project
will be using them? If we create them and nobody uses them, is that
OK? If someone uses them, we really should make sure they're as useful
as possible to those people. If we make them too generic then they will
simply be ignored as being unhelpful and unspecific.
We can consider the existing personas that have been drafted/created in
various Gnome projects [1, 2, 3, 4] and ask how we can improve upon them
(or even use them). Or look at some existing user observations [5] and
ask how they were used, and how to use them more.
These are just some of the thoughts popping into my head.
In this case it looks like there is a desire to better understand the
general Gnome user population. I'd suggest trying to focus the personas
on a market approach, rather than a software tool approach, as it seems
like they'll most likely be used as marketing tools. Or perhaps take
this opportunity to collect data on users and present it in a data-rich
way, rather than as stereotypical users.
If we're able to do a large dump of user data I'd love to look at some
ideas I was throwing around back in the early days of Gnome Shell [6] -
taking a look at existing Gnome desktops, how they're configured, and
how they're modified from the default setup There's a link on that page
to a presentation done at MIX09 by Microsoft [7] on how they gathered
data to retool the Windows taskbar for Windows 7. I think having this
kind of data would be greatly valuable for designers and usability
analysts alike in trying to figure out how to improve the user's experience.
Although on second thought the panels all go away with the next version
of Gnome, so this might require more thought in terms of what exactly we
want to gather data on.
Kirk
[1] Banter personas: http://live.gnome.org/Banter/Design/Personas
[2] Orca personas: http://live.gnome.org/Orca/Specification/Personas
[3] Gnome web personas: http://live.gnome.org/GnomeWeb/WebPersonas
[4] UTS personas: http://live.gnome.org/UTSPersonas
[5] GnomeShell user observations:
http://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell/UserObservationData
[6] Gnome Shell user analysis ideas:
http://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell/UserResearch
[7] Windows 7 user investigation video:
http://videos.visitmix.com/MIX09/C26F (Silverlight required of course
(boo!))
On 10/30/2010 09:29 PM, Allan Caeg wrote:
I'll add some more things to ask based on what I learned from my
profession.
Let's also ask them what they do when they're not using the computer,
what the usual scenarios in their lives are (being at work, playing
with their kids, ), types of computers where they use GNOME (netbook,
desktop, etc), what distro they use, and why they use GNOME.
These would help us characterize their mental models and how they
experience GNOME.
Comments?
On Sun, Oct 31, 2010 at 12:19 PM, Allan Caeg <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Hello,
Defining personas is very important for User-Centered Design. In
fact, it should be one of the first activities needed to build a
system with good UX, based on JJG's Elements of User Experience.
We need to know who we're designing for before we design, right?
There's an ongoing effort for this, but it's not gaining much
traction. Fortunately, GNOME.Asia is interested in helping out by
doing research in Asia. I hope you can help us do research in
other areas. We also found this GNOME Marketing User Survey
<http://live.gnome.org/GnomeMarketing/SurveyUsers> effort. We can
build on this existing work if it's fit.
Let's start by surveying GNOME users about their demographics,
computing habits, what they use GNOME for, and how much they use
GNOME. Would that do? If so, let's draft the questionnaire :)
--
Regards,
Allan
http://www.google.com/profiles/allancaeg#about
<http://www.google.com/profiles/AllanCaeg>
+63 918 948 2520
--
Regards,
Allan
http://www.google.com/profiles/allancaeg#about
<http://www.google.com/profiles/AllanCaeg>
+63 918 948 2520
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