SamePage Beta Feedback - Popdowns
Posted by Jim Garvin on May 13, 2008
Most of the feedback we’ve received during the beta has to do with the interface. Some good, some … not so good. In this post, I’m going to talk about Samepage’s “popdowns”, which are no longer.
What are popdowns?
Popdowns were the tabs that popped up (actually, down) when you moused-over a requirement. They showed up on the left and/or right side of the page depending on the context:
| Popdown on the left | Popdown on the right |
|---|---|
 |
 |
| If a user clicked on a popdown on the left, it would NOT trigger the sliding mechanism, but it would filter the current list by this item. | If a user clicked on a popdown on the right, it would trigger the sliding mechanism and filter the right-bound list by this item. |
Bad UI Mojo
There’s a few problems with the dropdowns.
- They communicated information poorly. The left popdown tab gave you the id of the parent item (“Base Requirement 1”), while the right tab gave you the child count (“Tasks: 1”).
- They didn’t invite you to click on them. “Oh you can click on those?” was one memorable statement.
- If you did figure out that they were clickable, the UI response wasn’t what you expected. Depending on whether you clicked left-justified tab or a right-justified tab, different things would happen.
- It conceals information about the row beneath it, which is kind of a hassle when scanning a list.
The Popdown tabs violated all kinds of UI principles that we try to adhere to. For instance, things that look the same should behave the same. Also, we agree with the principle of least surprise, but in some cases we opt for principle of pleasant surprise. “Oh you can click on that” does not qualify as pleasant surprise.
So, popdowns are out. Yesterday’s UI widget. Maybe we’ll find a use for them in the future, but for now they aren’t welcome in our town.
Enter the Nubbin
The left popdown tab was replaced by simply adding a column to the requirement list that has the parent item’s id in it. The id is colored and clickable. Since it’s a column, we can sort on it and it gives us extra information about our requirements. Bonus.
The right popdown tab was replaced by the newly introduced Nubbin. The nubbin reveals itself on mouse-over, just like the tab did, but it obscures information in the same row and only one column’s worth of info is obscured at that. The nubbin screams “CLICK ME!”, and it’s shaped with an arrow-esque point that hints “we are going that way”. The Nubbins are color coded to list type (like the tabs were), and we only show the child count in the Nubbin as opposed to the list type, then a colon, then the child count.
Evolution and the User Interface
Are Nubbins the best solution? For now, we think so. But hey, we also thought Popdowns were the bees knees when we implemented them. As time goes by we’ll see whether the nubbins get a sour taste to them, but we think they are definitely an improvement over the popdowns.
Thanks, everyone, for the feedback. As you can see we are obsessing appropriately. (Next up: feedback on SamePage’s bulk editing, a.k.a. batch updates)