Hi All!
Thanks for all of the feedback, comments, and support. I just wanted to let you know that our full report (including highlight videos!!) is now up our the Usability Initiative's project wiki:
http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/UX_and_Usability_Study
- The Usability Team
Parul Vora wrote:
Hi all!
The Wikipedia Usability Initiative conducted a user research study with SF based Bolt Peters in late March to uncover barriers new editors face. We are in the process of completing a full report on our methodology, process and analysis, but wanted to share with you some of the major themes and findings in the meantime....
Some quotes from our participants that illustrate these findings:
“Usually it’s the most information in the easiest spot to access. It always looks very well put together….it boggles my mind how many people can contribute and it still looks like an encyclopedia.” – ‘Galen’
“I like Wikipedia because it’s plain text and nothing flashes” – ‘Claudia’
“Rather than making a mess, I’d rather take some time to figure out how to do it right." (later) "There sure is a lot of stuff to read.” – ‘Dan’
“ [I felt] kind of stupid.” – ‘Galen’
“It’d be nice to have a GUI, so you could see what you’re editing. You’ve made these changes and you’re looking at it, and you don’t know how it’s going to look on the page. It’s a little clumsy to see how it’s going to look.” – ‘Bryan’
“[This is] where I’d give up.” – ‘Shaun’
Check out the full post on the foundation blog: http://blog.wikimedia.org/2009/04/24/usability-study-results-sneak-preview/
We would love to hear any initial thoughts, opinions, and reactions. If you have any similar or dissimilar experiences - either personally or in your own work/research, we'd love to hear about that too!
Always on your side, The Usability Team
Fuck U
On 5/7/09, Parul Vora pvora@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hi All!
Thanks for all of the feedback, comments, and support. I just wanted to let you know that our full report (including highlight videos!!) is now up our the Usability Initiative's project wiki:
http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/UX_and_Usability_Study
- The Usability Team
Parul Vora wrote:
Hi all!
The Wikipedia Usability Initiative conducted a user research study with SF based Bolt Peters in late March to uncover barriers new editors face. We are in the process of completing a full report on our methodology, process and analysis, but wanted to share with you some of the major themes and findings in the meantime....
Some quotes from our participants that illustrate these findings:
“Usually it’s the most information in the easiest spot to access. It always looks very well put together….it boggles my mind how many people can contribute and it still looks like an encyclopedia.” – ‘Galen’
“I like Wikipedia because it’s plain text and nothing flashes” – ‘Claudia’
“Rather than making a mess, I’d rather take some time to figure out how to do it right." (later) "There sure is a lot of stuff to read.” – ‘Dan’
“ [I felt] kind of stupid.” – ‘Galen’
“It’d be nice to have a GUI, so you could see what you’re editing. You’ve made these changes and you’re looking at it, and you don’t know how it’s going to look on the page. It’s a little clumsy to see how it’s going to look.” – ‘Bryan’
“[This is] where I’d give up.” – ‘Shaun’
Check out the full post on the foundation blog: http://blog.wikimedia.org/2009/04/24/usability-study-results-sneak-preview/
We would love to hear any initial thoughts, opinions, and reactions. If you have any similar or dissimilar experiences - either personally or in your own work/research, we'd love to hear about that too!
Always on your side, The Usability Team
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
On 08/05/2009, Parul Vora pvora@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hi All!
Thanks for all of the feedback, comments, and support. I just wanted to let you know that our full report (including highlight videos!!) is now up our the Usability Initiative's project wiki:
http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/UX_and_Usability_Study
- The Usability Team
Interesting!
I think that my take home message from this is:
a) Markup isn't very popular, everyone prefers WYSIWYG in theory (but I know how very difficult it is)
b) Need more cheat sheet type stuff, in-your-face, practically everywhere. When you create an article and when you edit- you need a cheat sheet showing you how to do stuff, it *seems* to be how most people work. Probably there should be a non blank create template with examples of commented out references and a few headings
c) References are probably the hardest bit, and ultimately the most important bit for the wikipedia. Anything that gets in the way of that for new users is probably very bad.
d) The view button is probably more important than the save button, and new editors should be pointed at it, because it shows/reassures them whether they're doing it right.
2009/5/8 Ian Woollard ian.woollard@gmail.com:
b) Need more cheat sheet type stuff, in-your-face, practically everywhere. When you create an article and when you edit- you need a cheat sheet showing you how to do stuff, it *seems* to be how most people work. Probably there should be a non blank create template with examples of commented out references and a few headings
I have suggested this repeatedly. The usual response has been FIGHT THE POWAH!
- d.
On 08/05/2009, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/5/8 Ian Woollard ian.woollard@gmail.com:
b) Need more cheat sheet type stuff, in-your-face, practically everywhere. When you create an article and when you edit- you need a cheat sheet showing you how to do stuff, it *seems* to be how most people work. Probably there should be a non blank create template with examples of commented out references and a few headings
I have suggested this repeatedly. The usual response has been FIGHT THE POWAH!
Well, the wikipedia is big... google is big also.
One of the tricks google use is they try stuff out on victims... I mean users. They pick a small percentage of the internet and do something slightly different for them, and see if it works or not. The advantage of only doing it for a small number is that it means you can write the test with prototyping tools, rather than having to make it run fast, and you'll have a lot less complaints if it doesn't work very well. It also means you can do back-back comparisons stuff like: 'we tried this, and it showed a 23% improvement in referencing'.
I think if at all practical, the wikipedia needs to start doing stuff like that.
- d.
Cross posting to wikitech-l
2009/5/8 Ian Woollard ian.woollard@gmail.com:
Well, the wikipedia is big... google is big also.
One of the tricks google use is they try stuff out on victims... I mean users. They pick a small percentage of the internet and do something slightly different for them, and see if it works or not. The advantage of only doing it for a small number is that it means you can write the test with prototyping tools, rather than having to make it run fast, and you'll have a lot less complaints if it doesn't work very well. It also means you can do back-back comparisons stuff like: 'we tried this, and it showed a 23% improvement in referencing'.
I think if at all practical, the wikipedia needs to start doing stuff like that.
That sounds like an excellent idea to me. Is it achievable?
El 5/8/09 7:22 PM, Thomas Dalton escribió:
Cross posting to wikitech-l
2009/5/8 Ian Woollardian.woollard@gmail.com:
Well, the wikipedia is big... google is big also.
One of the tricks google use is they try stuff out on victims... I mean users. They pick a small percentage of the internet and do something slightly different for them, and see if it works or not. The advantage of only doing it for a small number is that it means you can write the test with prototyping tools, rather than having to make it run fast, and you'll have a lot less complaints if it doesn't work very well. It also means you can do back-back comparisons stuff like: 'we tried this, and it showed a 23% improvement in referencing'.
I think if at all practical, the wikipedia needs to start doing stuff like that.
That sounds like an excellent idea to me. Is it achievable?
Such A/B testing is planned for various things where feasible. Some things will be easier to do this way than others. :)
-- brion
Brion Vibber brion@wikimedia.org writes:
One of the tricks google use is they try stuff out on victims... I I think if at all practical, the wikipedia needs to start doing stuff like that.
That sounds like an excellent idea to me. Is it achievable?
Such A/B testing is planned for various things where feasible.
Speaking of Google tricks:
A friend of mine in his 80's knows not to click on the sponsored links, the right column of Google search results.
But when Google occasionally takes one of those sponsored links from its right column, and slips it in to its left column legitimate search results, with only background tint and fine print to distinguish it, well, the rest is http://groups.google.com/groups/search?as_umsgid=87eivk5lum.fsf%40jidanni.or...
---- Original Message ----- From: "Ian Woollard" ian.woollard@gmail.com
a) Markup isn't very popular, everyone prefers WYSIWYG in theory (but
I know how very difficult it is)
Other people - e.g. Wordpress - do a much better job at this than we do. While I'm at it, facebook and flickr also do much better jobs at file uploads and google does a much better job at email systems.
c) References are probably the hardest bit, and ultimately the most
important bit for the wikipedia. Anything that gets in the way of that for new users is probably very bad.
Personally, I also find tables the biggest pain in the neck. Always takes me ages to get the formatting right - can't someone design some kind of Java interface that does it for you??
d) The view button is probably more important than the save button,
and new editors should be pointed at it, because it shows/reassures them whether they're doing it right.
Well, yes and no. Pressing view means you have twice the chance of losing all your hard work - once when you view and once when you save. That's why I never preview edits when working on unstable connections - just save and re-edit if necessary.
Again, wordpress does this much better. Two tabs you can switch between, and you can add content direct within the WYSIWYG viewer.
Andrew
On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 9:41 AM, Parul Vora pvora@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hi All!
Thanks for all of the feedback, comments, and support. I just wanted to let you know that our full report (including highlight videos!!) is now up our the Usability Initiative's project wiki:
Fascinating. Is there a process in place to fix all this, I wonder.
One obvious thing: why is "preview on first edit" not on by default for all users? No wonder they're confused out of their brains.
Also sounds like we need a "IS THIS YOUR FIRST TIME EDITING?" message that gives them a very quick intro.
Also, we badly need separate references out. They kill normal editing, and "dumbfound" people who actually want to add refs.
Steve