Archive for June, 2009The Vision – (close to) final proposalJune 30th, 2009 by Elin WaagenTeam project planning: We are creating a web site with intuitive navigation, easy access to services and resources, inviting interfaces, and a workflow that allows simple maintenance. Curricular Tech Team's blogJune 30th, 2009 by Bryan CarsonHi everyone. I put this up here to give us a discussion forum and to collect links and ideas. Team Vision – yet another proposalJune 26th, 2009 by Elin WaagenWe are creating a dynamic and interactive web presence with intuitive navigation, easy access to services and resources, inviting interfaces, and a workflow that allows simple maintenance. LIS Web Presence Team – Charge and DeliverablesJune 26th, 2009 by Elin WaagenSome clarification on the charge after talking with Jeff this afternoon. THE CHARGE: THE DELIVERABLES/PRIORITIES Develop LIS staff work flow and content management, protocol procedures – apply to new web presence Asses/evaluate new LIS web presence (end-users) Develop “site-refresh” strategies Team Vision StatementJune 25th, 2009 by Jess IslerTo fulfill the LIS vision, “We bring knowledge to you,” we are creating a stronger presence for LIS within the College website. With intuitive navigation and inviting interfaces, and a workflow that allows simple maintenance, we will provide easy access to our resources and services. The community will gain a dynamic website that enables interaction, knowledge sharing, and communication about the great work we do. Vision – JimJune 25th, 2009 by James BeaucheminTo deliver quality information in a timely manner using a clear and intuitive user interface. To incorporate tools and structures in web form for ease of navigation and search capabilities. Vision Statement Ideas: LizJune 25th, 2009 by Elizabeth Whitaker-FreitasWe are working to redevelop the LIS web presence to make it easier for people to find useful and helpful information about our services and resources. Our goal is to make the LIS website more intuitive, inviting and simple to navigate in order to help our end users become more self-sufficient. We hope to make it simpler and quicker for users to fine the tools and resources they need. LIS Website Project WIKIJune 25th, 2009 by Barbara MerzFor completeness, here’s the link to the WIKI where minutes etc. are posted: How to get blog updatesJune 25th, 2009 by Ian McBrideElin suggested we add in a way to subscribe by email, so you can now do that at through the email subscription form, or even using the form in this post. There are also the entries RSS and comments RSS feeds. I personally use Google Reader to collect all my feeds. LIS Website Team BlogJune 25th, 2009 by Ian McBrideI tweeted a bit earlier about how I’m now a member of the LIS Website Team. We’re still in the very early stages of this project, but we’ll be firming up our vision and charge in a meeting later today. The concept of teams is also the topic of the next LIS Staff Meeting in July. I have to say, as someone who is typically very cynical about these types of activities, I’m actually feeling good about how this project will work out and hope the Team model is one we repeat in future LIS projects. You can follow all of our team’s updates through our team blog and keep informed of our notes and documentation through the team wiki page. We’ve also enabled email subscription to the blog, for those who would prefer to receive updates using that rather than RSS. Web Team charge on WordleJune 24th, 2009 by Elin WaagenHere is the web team charge as seen on Wordle. Should hyperlinks be underlined?June 24th, 2009 by Ian McBrideWe’ve had some back-and-forth discussion this afternoon in both the Design/IA committee meeting as well as on Twitter over whether hyperlinks should be underlined on a site design, or if we were far enough along with this whole “web” thing that this was no longer a usability requirement. The party line in usability (from the stodgiest usability expert on the block) has been for a long time that hyperlinks should be underlined and set in a color that distinguishes them from page text. And so, when asked in the Design/IA meeting whether I thought we should remove some underlined hyperlinks from the page, I suggested that we should keep them… and that it’d be great to have the rest of the links underlined as well. Later, when asked whether adding underlines on mouseover (like the New York Times does) would work in place of having them there all the time, I said:
But Jakob’s usability advice was written in 2004 (though he does mention at the end that he echoed his advice at a conference this year). Has the reality of links on the web changed since then? It’s hard to say. Most of the usability guides out there simply echo Jakob, usually with a link back to him. Most mention that, at the very least, links need to be set in a different color than text and that this color should be consistent on the page. Another site advises that hyperlinks don’t necessarily need to be underlined, but they should have a style (other than just color) that sets them apart:
(emphasis mine) Jason Pontius, the President of White Whale, the design firm handling our site mentioned on Twitter:
This seems to agree with other advice that begins by stating what the convention has been almost since the first web site appeared:
But then continues with advice I consider spot-on:
When the link text is close to other link text, underlining makes the text appear cluttered and hard to read, but when hyperlinks are set as part of a body of text or appear inline, adding the underline helps to distinguish them and set them apart. I always interested to hear what others think about stuff like this, so if you have any good resources that expand on this issue, send them my way. On a more practical issue, given the information I’ve linked to above, should I change this blog’s theme so that the hyperlinks on the right are not underlined by default? Vision Statement Ideas: ElinJune 24th, 2009 by Elin WaagenWhat: Create an interactive and dynamic web site that will enchant and engage our diverse community of users, a web site that will adapt to the needs of our users as they navigate a changing and rapidly evolving technology landscape. A web site that is adaptable to mobile platforms and allows for customization/personalization. Content that is relevant, current, and well-written – with a consistent LIS voice. Layout that is consistent in theme, format, content and navigation. Looks like I’ll be taking a loooong elevator ride… Vision Statement Ideas: DoreenJune 24th, 2009 by Elin WaagenFrom Doreen: Vision Statement Ideas: JessJune 24th, 2009 by Jess IslerWhat we want to accomplish: We are creating a presence for LIS within the College website. When we are finished users will easily navigate and use our web resources, and engage with library staff. When we are finished LIS staff will use the website to manage content and communicate with colleagues and users. Why: The College website redesign; LIS requires a stronger presence on the web, one that is easily navigable and intuitive to use. What’s in it for me: A website that allows users and staff to interact and connect with our resources and services. Vision Statement Ideas: CarrieJune 24th, 2009 by Carrie MacfarlaneWe will create a new LIS web site that’s easy to use and easy to maintain. We’ll do much of the work ourselves, but we’ll call on others when we need additional skills and expertise. We’ll determine not only the site’s appearance, but also a workflow for creation and maintenance of content. User testing and ongoing assessment will inform our decisions. Vision statement: BarbaraJune 24th, 2009 by Barbara MerzWeb team – vision statement. The Web team will design, test and implement a new LIS Web presence. The LIS web is used both to provide information about LIS and as a means to deliver services and provide access to resources. The product will be tied in with the new College web design. Our first priority will be usability. Other important considerations are ease of maintenance, and continued development. Vision Statement Ideas: IanJune 24th, 2009 by Ian McBrideWhat do we want to accomplish? A website that:
Why? From the LIS vision: “We bring knowledge to you.”
What’s in it for me?
My Response to the Digital Media Tutor's Search Interface FeedbackJune 19th, 2009 by Ian McBrideJoe Antonioli recently asked the DMTs to evalute the search interface prototype I blogged about in a previous post. The responses I received from the DMTs were extremely thoughtful and helpful. I want to take this opportunity to provide some additional information about the search service and respond to their suggestions. First, there are two things about the new search service that may not have been entirely clear in the assignment. 1. The interface choices (colors, fonts, placement, images) on the prototype were chosen for expedience rather than good design. I reused several elements of past design to make something that would functionally work. Several DMTs responded and said they liked aspects of the design, which I certainly appreciate. However, we’ll be receiving new font, color and framing suggestions from White Whale as part of the Web Redo Project and when we do those choices will overwrite what is currently displayed on the search prototype. 2. The search engine is purposefully stupid and minimal. There will very likely be a box in the upper right hand corner of our new website where you enter search terms, click a search button and then are taken to a page with search results. This field won’t have additional selection boxes or drop downs or anything. That’s not to say that there can’t be an advanced search as well, but that the search needs to do *something* with very little information. Those two things said, here are the main points I took from each of the DMT’s responses and my feedback on them.
Excellent observation. There were two suggestions for improving this: (1) have the search results from each search engine appear in different tabs or pages so that you only have to look at one at a time, and (2) allow the user to select which search engines they want to use. I definitely want to do (2) and then see if that improves the experience enough or if we need to do (1) as well. We can implement (2) by adding a set of checkboxes under the search box that allows the user to choose which engines they want to use as one of the DMTs suggested. There was also the suggestion that the labels of these selection checkboxes be hyperlinks that, when clicked, take you to the results from that engine. I would prefer not to do this because the suggested action for clicking on a checkbox label on a page is to check or uncheck the box associated with that label. This would break that design convention for sites. I’d rather add another row of labels under the selection area that act as these hyperlinks, if the navigation column on the left is insufficient to carry this action.
I agree that the Google results should list at least ten pages. I like the suggestion of limiting the results from the directories and the library by adding pagination to those results. I will not be able to effectively paginate the results from Google because their API only returns a small number of results to me – Google obviously doesn’t want you to be able to replicate their search engine on your site without displaying any of the ads they use to generate revenue. There are other restrictions with using results from Google: I cannot change the order of the results and I cannot intermix results from other search engines with results from Google. I will, however, change the script to show the top 10 results from Google, rather than the top 4.
As I said, the search is intentionally stupid. When you search for “Ian McBride” in the directory it doesn’t know if that’s a person’s name, job title, department, building location, or telephone number. So the directory search looks through an index of all those fields and spits back whatever it finds. Ideally, the directory search would list this information in order of relevence, so you’d see my entry at the top of the list, then the rest of the McBrides and then the rest of the Ians. This is really hard to do, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to do it.
The library search is really problematic. In order to search the current catalog system, I have to send a request to the catalog website with the search terms, parse the response looking for bibliography numbers and then send an additional request to the catalog for each bibliography number I found to get its author, title, etc. Our library staff has been looking at next generation library catalog front ends, like Scriblio, with the intention of providing a better search interface to the catalog. When we have a system like this set up that allows me greater programmatic access to the catalog information, I’ll be able to greatly improve the results from that system. I will change the current interface so that it only lists the first ten or so results, rather than the first 50.
Excellent suggestion. This should be handled by icons (with appropriate alt and tooltip text of course) for each file or media type.
Absolutely, but with the recognition that this will be part of an advanced search interface.
This is a usability issue which I need to correct. Clicking Back should bring you to the list of your last search results. There were also two questions asked by the DMTs that deserve answers. The first was a compliment from one who liked the graphic of the mountains in the title background of the search result bubbles and wanted to know who came up with that design. The answer is Mark Zelis, the Web Producer for College Communications. Mark developed that design for the News Portal. You might also recognize Mark’s work on the new Institutional Diversity site and many email campaigns for the College. The other question was, “I’m curious about Search. What is it, exactly? What search feature is in the works?” The answer to this can be found in the Strategic Recommendations Document from White Whale, which can be read by Middlebury community members at the Web Redo Blog. I want to again thank the Digital Media Tutors for their feedback and encourage them to continue to test our systems and provide feedback on them. The more eyes there are on these interfaces, the more we can improve them and make them easier to use. Getting to Know Drupal: the PresentationJune 15th, 2009 by Ian McBrideYou can listen to my nasally drone talk about Drupal from this afternoon’s session!
If you want to check out the presentation and are on campus, you can visit the site at: http://chisel.middlebury.edu/drupal/drupal And the video version is up at: http://muskrat.middlebury.edu/administration/lis/Accordant/DLA/IanMcBrideDrupal61509/f.htm |
