Microsoft.com Usability broken.

What you gonna talk about Scott?
A grab bag of ideas on evaluating design & principles that govern them.

UI?
User Interface?

What is a good user interface?
A good user interface design encourages an easy, natural, and engaging interaction between user and a system, and it allows users to carry out their required tasks.

What is Usability
Usability can be defined as “the extend to which a product can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction in a specified context”

What is Context
The setting in which an item of information appears

Chapter 1
THE WHY…
Why do we bother with design?

HUMANS
You know they are bloody annoying

Mental Models.
We humans have models of ourselves, others, the environment and the things with which we interact. Humans form mental models through experience, training and instruction

Habitual
Any change scares most humans. Humans are by nature habitual creatures.. we all have our daily rituals that when disturbed can really upset us

Emotional
Emotion plays a role with UI today. A poorly designed solution can increase stress levels of employees which can actually be linked to sick days and/or under performance.
Rage Against the machine (Compaq 1999), found that, for one reason or another, stress and frustration levels with workplace technology are rising.
Oct 2002. Research for British Telecom (BT) Home Computing found that 70% of personal computer users suffered from “PC Rage” – that is, the users surveyed admitted to shouting, swearing, or being violent to their computers when problems occurred.

The story?
How design begins…

Well…we need to rebuild our pipelines a lot, given plans have changed…

“..That sounds expensive.. Can’t we just upgrade / patch it a bit more?..”
NO!

We need tostopputting band-aids on broken limbs.
We need long-term vision and synchronization.
Stop gaps aren’t helping the ecosystems roles & skills out…
It’s not expensive..

Chapter 2
THE WHAT…

Let’s look at WHAT we own
Let’s work with those WHO
own them
Let’s BEGIN..
Where do we start?

What do all of these have in common?
They require you to think in multiple personalities and roles..
They can be quite frustrating to discover and use..
they all try and be different, but the end user is usually the same…
They require unnecessary persistence…
They echo the same data at times.. at a rate that
makes your head spin..

Question:
Are these sites serving OUR needs or the CUSTOMERS?

Answer:
Well..that’s not fair…not all customers are the same!!
e.g. Designers and Developers are different from one another,
So therefore the content and approach is likely to always require different tactics.

Where we are today, doesn’t mean we’ll still be here tomorrow

Each role or skill we cater for is different, this is true.
Building multiple sites isn’t the answer to solving this. It just makes them more confused and helpless.
However, Contextual Synchronization is a possible answer…

CONTEXT?
(The setting in which an item of information appears)

Let’s use Zune as an example of context working..

You can explore based on taxonomy…
Or.. You can Search…
You can browse based on visuals...…
You can explore based on recommendations..

A: It’s always reminding you of the chosen context in which you are searching..
Context is when your answer will always come back in a manner that suites your end users needs…
Q: Do you notice how the zune results shows “The Fray” in black, and the rest of the words in gray?

How long do you think it will be before a new site is added here?
POINT?
We aren’t being contextually sensitive to our online consumers needs. Instead we’re separating context into their own branded existence. The problem is the answer is never obvious, it instead requires HUNTING….

Question:
What’s the difference between an ASP.NET developer and a SilverlightDeveloper is?

Time to play the role of innovator..
Not follower..

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Microsoft.com Usability broken.

by Scott Barnes

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