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In conclusion, since we used a web app, much of the complicated overhead of mobile apps wasn't necessary to consider. We used the most basic tools available to us and built up from them, which proved difficult in some cases (especially text editing). If we were to do it again, we might try to use a few more sophisticated tools to minimize the headache of reinventing the wheel (or, in our case, most of the functionality of TinyMCE).
User Testing:
User 1 (JW, Course 6-3 and 18)
- User tried to position text in relation to whitespace so that it would be below an image. Eventually figured out how to move around images to create the desired layout effect.
- User originally tried to drag images into the page from the drawer which is not currently supported, but then tried clicking, which did work.
- Other than that, had a fairly successful time interacting with the software, managed to produce a fairly good-looking article with good organization and sections
- Used features such as section titles naturally
- Primarily hand-typed text rather than using copy/paste
- Used images that were providedFinished screenshot for user 1:
User 2 (AK, Course 6-1)
- Noted that design of the interface was appealing, said it was “pretty”
- Had some trouble figuring out how to create text and paragraphs - first tried clicking below the title, then pasted text into the title; eventually tried to press enter which made a new text section below, then understood that the large text section was meant to be a title
- Tried to drag an image into the page just like the previous user
- Initially copied the URL of the wikipedia page that contained an image instead of the direct url to the image
- Had kind of a tough time adjusting to the differences from other editors - just seemed a bit disoriented in generalFinished screenshot for user 2:
User 3 (JW, Course 2)
- Immediately discovered, upon making a new section, that pressing “tab” didn’t indent, as user had intended, but rather just scrolled the page down.
- User noted that the browser default spellcheck disappeared when you clicked out of a text section. User also suggested that we might want to implement more comprehensive automatic punctuation behavior, like automatic capitalization.
- Similar to other users, JW tried to begin a section after the title by clicking on the page beneath it (instead of pressing enter or clicking “add a text section”).
- Also, like all user testers, JW tried to drag the images into the document instead of clicking them. This clearly indicates a critical implementation flaw.
- User discovered that it’s not possible to delete pictures with “delete” or “backspace” key, only by clicking on the ‘x’.
- User
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- noted that pressing enter doesn’t always position the new text in the right place, especially when the previous box is right above an image.
- Finally, user showed us a cool video of Kingdom Hearts, which most of his blog post was about.
Finished screenshot for user 3:
Future Work
Functionality Required from User Testing
- Definitely implement dragging images into the text. All the users had trouble with clicking initially, so that is something that we would want to add for sure.
- Adding more keyboard shortcuts, and make keyboard input do more (such as deleting entire boxes that are highlighted with delete/backspace key).
- Fix some bugs that came out, like pressing enter in the middle of a text box or pressing enter in a text box that is right above an image.
- Make spelling suggestions/punctuation suggestions more automatic or at least consistent when text box is/isn’t in edit mode.
- Make some of the keys that people normally use in word processing, like tab, have the expected behavior (indent instead of page down).
- Allow users to click on the page in order to add new sections in addition to clicking on the “add x section” button.
- Have some way for first time users to realize they need to use the buttons on the side bar.
Other Ideas
- More text formatting options such as colors and highlighting