‘User Experience’ Blog Entries
Alerting users in a non-intrusive but informative way requires a bit of finesse. It is about providing information when it is needed but also not disrupting the work flow. When done right, it’s almost a natural assumed experience–seamless.
I was reminded of this in an unassuming place, not on a computer but at the grocery store. There are far more interactions at play in grocery stores than is often realized. In particular, in a grocer’s produce section where they seek to provide customers with fresh from the farm vegetables, the produce is kept clean and fresh by misting water on the produce–hopefully when a customer is not picking out vegetables.
In the past there used to be a person who would mist the produce with a water hose but today this process is mostly automated. But with the grocery store employee gone, customers don’t know when this misting is going to occur. The method employed to alert these customers of the misting, to possibly stand clear for a moment, is subtle but maps to a metaphor which requires no language, just an understanding of nature. Moments before the misting occurs the noise of a thunder storm rolls through. Thus informing the customer of the approaching rain showers, or mist in this case.
There are no spinning lights, bells, or muffled voices from a speaker to harshly grab the customer’s attention. Those are the obvious, thoughtless, and likely distracting methods. The thunder storm alert masterfully achieves its purpose unobtrusively of informing the customer but also plays into the whole experience of fresh produce, by pulling in other elements of nature.
12.03.07 — Design, User Experience
I have often felt that a great user experience can be defined by the little things. They’re the elements of an interface which pop up just when you need them and disappear when you don’t.
A nice example of this, is one I noticed today while using Google’s News Reader application. There is a subtle feature which by clicking a little arrow, minimizes the navigation pane to allow for more screen space for news content. It’s easy to miss, but it’s really a minor feature I think only a few people will truly take advantage but certainly a useful one to have.
Its subtly unfortunately can open a door to confusion, if a user were to accidentally click the little arrow. The user unaware of what has occurred, is left with an interface missing a major navigational element. But Google handled this issue with a little thing–a simple speech bubble informing the user upon the first time they use the feature that it is in minimized mode. And from then on, it disappears–there just when you need it and gone when you don’t.
What We Can Lean From This Example
Examples such as these display the difference between simply meeting a set of functional requirements and making a great user experience. When it comes to timelines and budgets, sadly these little things are the first to go. It can certainly be a battle to get the little things included, but as this example shows, it is a battle worth taking on.
11.29.07 — User Experience
I can’t tell if I have a predisposition to sitting with walls to my right, but I seem to consistently find myself in that awkward position of trying to overextend my MacBook’s power cable to connect it the left side of my MacBook. Often the power cable is just too short or gets disconnected due to the MagSafe connector detaching as I pull it tight in an attempt to compute comfortably.
My first inclination was that due to the annoyance of this situation, I was perceiving it to occur more frequently than it actually was. But when I began to keep this mind, I was noticing this issue each time I plugged in: at the office or on my couch. Maybe I’ve set up all the spaces I work within backwards. I think it seems to come down to MacBook Feng Shui.
11.16.07 — Design, User Experience
Earlier I had discussed the topic of only solving the surface problem instead of digging deeper into the real problem. The “Reply to All” solution has now been accompanied with other surface solutions to ’solve’ more email problems.
As an organization that deals with sensitive information, the leaking of such information even if accidental is a major concern. And one of the possible ways this information can be leaked is via email to external addresses. In an effort to thwart this issue, a design change has been made to the email software (shown below), which requires users to specify whether their email is being sent to internal recipients or internal and external recipients. If the user fails to select that his email is being sent to external recipients, he will not receive any indication that the email was not delivered.
I cannot ascertain whether additional screening measures are performed on emails which are defined as being for external recipients, but based on communications about the changes, it appears they exist as a means of reinforcing how to properly handle sensitive information (i.e., it most likely shouldn’t be sent to external people). Certainly an odd way of communicating of this though, as users can simply always just select internal / external e-mail just to feel safe that their email will be sent. This is especially due to that by default users will be given the impression their email is being sent when in fact it essentially may have never made it past their outbox.
As an aside, the changes are having an interesting side-effect: as emailing becomes more of a pain to do, alternatives such as IM are becoming a seemingly easier option.
11.15.07 — User Experience, Work
I have a pre-paid 30 day subway MetroCard, which means for 30 days I can swipe my MetroCard and never think about it until that 31st day rolls around and the turnstile tells me “insufficient fare”. You hate being that guy holding up the line and hate being behind the guy that that happens to. It slows the entire process down, especially when it’s the morning rush hour and there are only two turnstiles.
What is surprising is that the turnstiles, shown below, do provide the user with some information, but not much. Although, if you use a Pay-Per-Ride MetroCard, turnstiles actually do give you some useful information–how much money is left on your MetroCard.
Which makes it odd, due to that the turnstiles could provide meaningful information to 30 day MetroCard holders–when their MetroCard will expire. The display has the space and it obviously does know this information. Instead, users must find out the hard way on that 31st day or swipe their MetroCard at designated card checkers.
Due to that your 30 day MetroCard can start on any day of the month, having that reminder of its expiration every time you swipe at a turnstile, could save you the embarrassment or having to wait in a long line for nothing.
11.07.07 — User Experience
Sweeping the dirt under the rug, putting a new coat of paint on an old car, opting for a diet coke and calling it healthy living are all solutions to surface problems that never truly solve anything. They’re the easy and quick things that we think can actually make a difference. Just like in any other space, in software design we see solutions to surface problems passed off as answers to greater issues.
Are You Sure…
My workplace has a culture of excessive email CCing, which I’m sure exists at many other people’s companies as well. As a result, many people complain of bloated inboxes with emails which may only indirectly involve them. The probelm is the culture of blindly CCing–a result of people wanting to cover their bases, an irrelevant email to someone is easier to deal with than a missed email to someone important. And as such, an email propagates, recipients “Reply to All”–resulting in an exponential increase in email that may be irrelevant to a fair amount of people. Often this fact is made apparent by the amount of people who reply to all, pleading to be removed from the email chain. Chain is probably a good word for this too, as users literally feel they become chained to email.
So how does one solve this issue? For the IT staff it was by creating a new dialog box which prompts the user to confirm whether he truly wants to “Reply to All”. Sadly, this only attempts to solve the surface problem [people simply replying to all], as opposed to delving into the true root of the problem; that of the email culture of CCing a swath of people without regard for taking into consideration if all people need to be included. Instead, users are now left with an additional step, that solves nothing, in order to reply to an email, even if replying to all consists of only two people.
[note: The email protocol as an effective collaboration tool can be debated as a greater root problem.]
Forgot Your Password, Forget About Calling
The previous example is mostly a minor annoyance and for the most part, people will get on with their activities without much of a hiccup. A more pertinent example, which ultimately had greater consequences, involves the often challenging user authentication process. If a user who should have access can not get access, it is a major problem, one which as time elapses grows even greater. The issue at hand was that a “Forgot Password” function was taking an excessively long time to email the user the link to reset their password. As such, users, after waiting hours, assumed something was wrong and that they should call tech support. This resulted in an excessive amount of calls to the tech support call center.
What is interesting is that the call volume was perceived as the problem. First, they needed to figure out how to stop users from calling about forgotten passwords. The solution was a quick fix, a message was put in place next to the tech support telephone number:
Not for forgotten passwords
It was a very out of sight, out of mind solution. It took care of the surface problem, calls reduced, but the true problem still persisted. Users now had little recourse in finding a way to get back on track. Worse still, was that now, the people who should care don’t even hear the users since they’ve turned off that avenue of communication. Luckily, many people refused to follow the directions provided and called anyways.
Digging Below the Surface
During a user interview, a user may describe what they don’t like or why they don’t think it works. And while observing a user in a usability test it can be easy to identify what they get caught up on. The natural instinct is to “ease the pain where it hurts”, but often in software or product usability the problem’s cause could come from an array of different areas.
This isn’t news, but when design decisions such as the ones I described keep occurring it is good to remind ourselves about spending that extra time to think deeper about what we are solving.
10.29.07 — User Experience, Work
All too often, exiting a subway station and getting your bearings can be a bit disorienting, especially in New York City’s grid. Gothamist.com reports on a new wayfinding system, developed by New York City’s Department of Transportation and the Grand Central Partnership, to assist people on finding the right way upon exiting a subway station. It is about to be tested around the MTA’s Grand Central Station subway exits. The sidewalk decals feature a compass image displaying which street is in what direction.
It’s interesting to see that the decals will not be placed in actual N,S,W,E orientation (Manhattan actually points Northeast), but placed according to what New Yorkers correlate to North and South (i.e., Uptown and Downtown).
It’s a great start, but now we just need the subway map, local street map, and “Next Train” notifications posted at street level. Not too mention the one shortcoming of the MTA’s subway map, depicting which trains are express and which are local. Even I still have a bit of trouble remembering which of the N,R,W,Q trains are express.
10.16.07 — Design, User Experience
Earlier I had spoken about what I had thought about the state of current user experience books and that if I am seeking to find new knowledge I would have to look elsewhere. Oddly enough that elsewhere may be in the past. Which as I write this, seems utterly obvious but I think Alex Wright sums it up nicely in his book Glut:
“For all the barrels of ink and billions of pixels spent chronicling the rise of the Internet in recent years, however, surprisingly few writers seem disposed to look in any direction but forward.”
We owe a lot to those who came before us and I’ll be perfectly honest, I cannot say I know a great deal about those who laid down the path, which is the basis for my career today. The work of these visionaries or futurists when looked at today, the hits are amazingly accurate and the misses well, while amazingly interesting have yet to come to fruition.
But this makes me wonder, are we more caught up in the day after today? As opposed to, who is laying the ground work for that true tomorrow? Yes, working day to day is an iterative process and you’ll get anywhere one step at a time. Some of the works of earlier futurists describe ideas which are far beyond anything they ever had, and I’m not talking about looking at a bird and envisioning all humans in flying cars. So where are today’s futurists? I assume it is only negligence on my behalf to find them, hopefully.
09.28.07 — Books, Design, Ideas, Technology, User Experience
Dragging and dropping files on a Macintosh has almost always felt limitless–drag a file onto an application in the dock, over a folder, onto a window, and things just work as you’d expect.
Living the dual life that I have–Mac at home, Windows at work–I often run into oddities between the two operating systems. While a long time Mac user I use my Windows computer more frequently so we can rule out the idea that I’m just too used to the Mac.
I recently attempted to take an action which I expected no resistance, dragging a JPG onto the Photoshop icon in my task bar. My thinking was that I wanted to open this file in Photoshop and what better a way than to simply drag and drop. Certainly would save me the time of clicking on Photoshop, selecting Open from the File menu and then navigating to the file’s location.
The error message I received was odd in that its tone came off almost as if they knew what I was doing was certainly what any normal person would try to do. So instead of doing what I needed, it gave me some instructions on their way of doing it. It’s strange due to that the only action which could take place, would be to open the file. Had I wished to drop the file into a particular window I would have done so.
09.26.07 — Design, Technology, User Experience
Often I check out what some of the latest UX books have got to offer, always on the lookout to learn more. Unfortunately, recently I’ve noticed a lot of the same. I picked up Robert Hoekman’s Designing the Obvious and while well written and containing an abundance of relevant examples, I found that, like many other books on the shelves today, it seemed to be a regurgitation of everyone else’s books.
I can only take so much of half page pull quotes from the likes of Alan Cooper, Don Norman, Jakob Nielsen, and Steve Krug. They’ve all had very insightful things to say, and that is the issue; I’ve already read their books. Where am I took to indulge my learning desire?
Looking for Inspiration
The bookshelves seem to be a little too much about The Now or more appropriately, The Yesterday. I won’t lie, I miss the days of doing research and reading about ideas in their infancy–at the time questioning their relevance. That is why I was happy to come across a little feature in iTunes called, iTunes U. It is an area in iTunes dedicated solely for universities and the content they want to share with their students and, in my case, the curious public.
Most interestingly are Stanford and MIT’s offerings. Video lectures on topics ranging from HCI to Brain Structure and its Origins. Best of all, they’re cheaper and more accessible than any book.
09.18.07 — Books, User Experience