Comments on: What Verna Taught Me

By: Jesse Farmer

Jesse Farmer — Sat, 09 May 2009 04:00:47 +0000

That's a good story. You should write about it w.r.t. your work on OpenID!

By: Luke Shepard

Luke Shepard — Sat, 09 May 2009 02:15:19 +0000

This is a great anecdote and totally true. I think the real dangerous territory comes when you actually use your own product - because you then think "well, I'm a user, so I'll understand what's needed." At least with Chopin, you didn't use it so didn't have any illusions about whether you needed to observe a user.

Last summer, before we launched Connect, one of the most humbling experiences was watching user testing. We put the users in one room and asked them to use The Run Around (since we didn't have any partners up yet). The developers sat in another room watching a video. We pulled our hair out while the user looked for the button to login ... we were like "it's right in front of you!" Eventually the analyst pointed it out and the user said "oh, I thought that looked like an ad." We fixed it to look like a button.

So yeah, definitely humbling and it takes a good software developer to not get defensive when given honest criticism.

BTW I second Martin's book recommendation, it's chock full of great examples and ideas.

By: Martin

Martin — Fri, 08 May 2009 09:44:14 +0000

Good post I did the same mistake sort of but then I read Bill Buxton's awesome book and I saw the light. The problem in software development seems to be the collected experience only goes so far back, and think because the product cost is small compared to the product cost of for say a car, prototype research gets low priority.

http://www.amazon.com/Sketching-User-Experience...

By: baxter

baxter — Thu, 07 May 2009 10:35:26 +0000

Great post, it really highlights the importance of communication in systems development. Too many people forget that there is more involved than just technical skills.

By: Jesse Farmer

Jesse Farmer — Thu, 07 May 2009 02:43:14 +0000

It's a story, mate. Names have been changed to protect the innocent and all that.

By: mitcho

mitcho — Thu, 07 May 2009 01:21:16 +0000

Hm? Verna was swiping cards at the dining hall—she wasn't a front desk lady!

By: Jesse Farmer

Jesse Farmer — Wed, 06 May 2009 19:16:56 +0000

Haha. Chopin was huge, so it was more about the process than any specific problem.

I changed how I approached it and spent more time talking with the front desk clerks to see what they needed before I started coding away. Since then that's what I've always done, because otherwise I run the risk of wasting my effort and my customers' time (and possibly money).

By: Chris Ryland

Chris Ryland — Wed, 06 May 2009 18:36:25 +0000

So, did you fix it?