3 - Jake Van Schouwen

I had selected the YouTube search bar for the second Blog Assignment.

If I had been a part of the design team, I feel that the motivation behind the YouTube search bar was to provide a fast and efficient way to access the videos stored in its archives.

However, at YouTube's creation, the founders had to have been nearly clairvoyant to predict how massive YouTube would become.  Stemming off of Hoekman, the fact that their search bar's design has stayed nearly the same since its creation shows that YouTube, as an early company, had great foresight for its product.

YouTube also cares deeply about it's search bar, often decorating it to coincide with various events and milestones (Couldn't find any pictures online but I distinctly remember its "Comedy Week" and the 2012 Presidential Election decor and I'm speculating here, but be on the lookout for a Winter Olympics theme).

After watching the Sinek TED Talk, I believe the reason why YouTube cares about its search bar is because of the pivotal role it plays in the website.  Those spur of the moment urges to search a video is why YouTube puts so much effort in to their search bar.  They knew that they had to have a fast and easy way to satisfy those urges.

Now, with millions and millions of videos to siphon through, any video could be right there in front of you if you just know the right things to type.

Week 03 Blog Assignment

Very nice posts so far! But are you reading your peer's posts too? It would be nice if you left some people your comments on what they wrote; hopefully someone will do the same for you too. You don't have to read everyone's post — just a couple each week and maybe leave a response to one of them.

By now you should have read Chapter 2 of the book Designing the Obvious (if you haven't, do so now!). Hoekman says something very provocative in this chapter: "...most companies suffer not from a lack of talent or skill or passion or ambition, but a lack of vision. And most of the time, this is the cause of all their other problems." It's as if people are playing the whole game of HCI design without understanding why they are playing the game. For every business, the answer has to be more than "to make money." Simply put, we need to start with why, not what. Listen to Simon Sinek's TED talk (even if just for the first 8 minutes):

http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action.html

"What is a thing. Why is a belief."

So return to the product you pointed to in your second blog post. Tell us again what it is and show us an image of it, along with its link.

Although you were not a part of the design team, try to infer what you believe to be the motivation for the application or feature. Talk about the why, not the what.

(If you'd like to change to a different example, that's fine too.)

Unrelated - Jake Van Schouwen

Hey everyone,

Now that we are close to completing our 2nd project, I get the feeling that we will have the option to work a partner of our choice on every upcoming project.

I also know that I want to work with a partner every opportunity I get.

That being said, if you find yourself without a partner and wanting one, email me at jvanscho@indiana.edu. There's a good chance that I will also be looking for a partner.

This also avoids the awkward, end-of-class, meet & greet :)

Thanks,
Jake Van Schouwen

2-Donald MacLeod

1. I chose the eBay header that is accessible throughout the site and that allows navigation to the website's core functions.
   
2. A visitor to the site can accomplish the core functionality of the site through this menu bar.  The cursor automatically focuses on the search bar for buying.  There are clearly marked areas for buying, selling, managing your account, and customer support.   The different functions of the website are grouped together.  Buying tasks are located in the lower portion that is tinted gray.   Where as all other functions are grouped at the top.  The buying portion is more prominent, but more eBayers are most likely buyers only.  There is even spacing and constant font size with the exception of bolded text and arrows to denote drop down menus.  Because of this main functions of the website are prominent and easily accessible.

2 - Hayden Mills

YouVersion (Bible app)
https://www.bible.com/

I chose the YouVersion Bible app because the navigation when reading a verse is so intuitive and second nature to use. On the page where you read verses the layout and options are obvious and simple. The navigation menu bar across the top that allows users to easily choose the book, chapter, verse, and version of the Bible to read. The user is able to scroll down or up to read more verses using the swipe of their finger or scroll of the mouse. By swiping side to side the user is able to "flip" to the next page just like you would do with a real book. Finally, the bottom navigation bar allows users to search, bookmark, navigate to different pages, listen to the audio book, and enlarge or minimize the text of the verses. All of these options are easily accessible at all times on the page and the icons and colors chosen make it easy to distinguish between areas of the page.

The YouVersion Bible app is definitely a obvious design because of many reasons. The design clearly and effectively carries out the purpose and intent of the application, which is to provide a easy-to-use mobile way of reading the Bible. The design also supports the way users already are used to using apps and functions that go along with mobile design. For example, the three horizontal bars is the universal button to inform the user that there is more navigation and buttons available off the mobile view of the current screen. The design also allows users to get started easily and quickly reading the Bible. The strategic design of this app also keeps users from making mistakes and has a simple interface that allows users to only see whats absolutely needed to perform the specific task of navigating and reading the Bible. YouVersion is a great example of "obvious design".

2-Ying Yu Hong

The website I chose is Hulu.com. It's a website providing various TV shows and movies. The front page is simple and informative. There are updates of latest episode with brief summary to remind audience to watch. The user interface is easy to approach and the website's navigation system is straightforward. In the top left side, Users have choices of TV, movies, originals, and kids to select. After clicking the TV button, the website will provide different categories of search method, from popular, new, genres, staff pick, to networks. This classification can guide users make the selection easier and faster. All those features work well and make the website obvious.

2-Adam Johnson

1) The web site I chose is Amazon More specifically, the part of the website that is a drop-down menu under your account (See attached screenshot). After going to the homepage, this "Hello (your name), Your Account) tab is one of the first things you see on the page and is located on the top right portion of the site.  Of course, this is assuming you have an Amazon account (but who doesn't?!).

2) I think this part of the website is a perfect example of designing the obvious for a multitude of reasons.  I think it truly possesses all nine qualities that make an obvious design.  It is definitely the product of intent because it the label "Your Account" clearly takes you to the features of your account, which is the intent of the drop-down menu.  It conforms to the way users interact with the web, meaning if one is to see a big down arrow they are accustomed to believing a menu will drop once clicked.  Amazon has a wide variety of features, and all of the necessary features that it supports are listed in the drop-down menu (although some are irrelevant depending on the individual's needs).  It definitely conforms to the user's mental model of what it does, simply looking at it tells you that's where to go to manage your account.  After making a new account, you can quickly go here to see what all the features you can do with your account making you an intermediate user quickly.  The gray coloring that differs from the standard white and the good placement and bold lettering of the words draws your attention to it and persuades you to go there before anywhere else.  It is hard to make a mistake with this feature because it is so black/white as to what you can do (and it doesn't move upon navigating the site).  All the elements in the menu uniformly defined and separated and somewhat seems to be sorted in levels of importance.  Lastly, there is no clutter as it only lists features available to your specific account.  Amazon is definitely an obvious design, and the part where you manage your account is no exception.

2- Emily Gries

An example that I thought of to be an obvious design is the ESPN Sports Center application on my Iphone. I use this app a lot to catch up on scores when I am unable to watch the games (more specifically when I am on the go and do not have access to a television or computer to stream). An obvious design is, as referred to Robert Hoekman Jr. in Designing the Obvious: Second Edition, “simple to understand, easy to learn, well organized… intuitive, streamlines, uniform” (Hoekman 7). This application fits this definition. It is simple and easy to understand because it is not over the top. It is well organized; separating the app by sports (profession and college are separate) and conference and ranking. It is very intuitive and can be easily figured out without having to read any instructions.

2 - Nicholas Barker

The Site I chose is www.ESPN.com
As you can see from the photo I have attached, this is a segment from the ESPN.com home page. I believe that from looking at this it is easy to see what the obvious design is. You have the black header that sticks out well on the Red background, which makes it easy for you to navigate to your favorite sport section.  Also from the big picture thrown right in front of you, you are able to see what the biggest thing in sports is currently happening.

2 - Trevor Corradin

I choose the Jimmy Johns ordering website. It is easily found at jimmyjohns.com, and is used to order food for either delivery or pickup. Users can pay with cash or card, and can access a variety of customization for their order (such as removing or including ingredients, drinks, sides, etc).
The site is very easy to use, and will guide the user throughout the entire ordering process. It moves step by step so that there is little confusion by the user. Ordering is very easy to start on the site, and users can decide whether or not they would like to create an account for future orders. This makes the design even better for the user, because in future orders they can easily repeat or modify their past orders to order even faster.

2 - Jon Burris

The site I chose is Pandora. Pandora is a free internet radio service that many teens and young adults use today to listen to music. Functionality of Pandora is great. It allows its users to create a nearly custom internet radio station that plays songs that the user wants to hear. It has an easy to use interface, granting users the ability enter a station (artist, genre or composer) for the type of music they want to hear. Also, users can thumbs up or down a song giving them the ability of customization of that station. The overall design of Pandora is obvious. It uses a dark blue in the background that is soft yet easy on the users eyes. The layout of the main interface is compacted mainly to the left side, but it isn't compacted too much. The lists of your radio stations are on your left and the song that is currently playing is directly in front of the user. The play, pause, and skip buttons are directly on the album cover and on Pandora's tool bar. The thumbs up and down buttons are placed alongside the other buttons so the users are reminded to rate the song if they want to hear more or less of a song or style of a song. The overall design of Pandora is great, straightforward, and easy to use.

2-Nicholas Fields

The image to the right is part of BCG's (The Boston Consulting Group) website that I think portrays many aspects of obvious design.  The entire webpage can be accessed at http://www.bcg.com/.  I think this portion of the website (shown in the picture to the right) represents obvious design because it reflects the intent of the company as a whole.  BCG knew what to build because it adequately addresses the needs and desires of people that will be accessing this webpage.  The design is extremely intuitive and seamlessly fulfills all of the users desires and needs without any excess or confusing information.  The design is straight-forward and easy to use for whatever purpose you are visiting this company's website.  The homepage (in the image shown) quickly and intelligently portrays the companies values, accomplishments, goals, visions, purposes, and invites people to want more information.  After the initial hook of the homepage, the user can easily navigate to find out more about BCG and/or their expertise, survey the possible careers/apply to join the company if seeking employment, and view its media center.  The website intuitively represents the unified company vision and is tailored to every need/desire of its prospective users whether looking for services or seeking employment.  All of this is why I think BCGs website and particularly their homepage is a perfect example of designing the obvious.

2 - Kristi Starling

As far as an obvious design is concerned, I think Netflix has accomplished it quite well with its profile selection screen (to be clear, I'm referring to the screen that prompts you to choose or add a profile, not the screen that prompts you to set up the initial profile before any have been created).  Robert Hoekman, Jr., the author of our book, lists as one of his qualifications that an obvious design is "the product of intent.  It has a clear purpose, a compelling benefit, straightforward usage, and a cohesive design".  The purpose and benefit of profiles on Netflix is immediately apparent to anyone who has a family account.  Speaking from personal experience, it's much easier to find the shows I'm looking for when Netflix is making suggestions and remembering shows based only upon what I personally have watched, and I'm sure my dad is quite happy to Disney movies and "Say Yes to the Dress" suggested on my page instead of his.  It no doubt makes his suggested movies a bit more accurate.  

When you sign into Netflix, it immediately takes you to the profile selection page.  You must select a profile before continuing.  The page is dark with a white dialog box in the center that simply asks "Who's watching?"  and displays each profile with a picture either set by the user or selected by the computer.  Pictures selected by default are all different from one another, making the distinctions between the profiles easy to see.  At the end of the list is an option to create a new profile.  The design is clean and simple.  A user simply clicks on his/her name or picture and is immediately redirected to his/her page with viewing history and suggestions.  If a user clicks the wrong profile by accident, a click of the back button on the browser window will return you to the profile selection screen, or hovering over the user's picture in the upper-right corner of the screen will display a list of the other profiles, which you can click to change profiles. 

Now, for a quick comparison to Hoekman's list:  as discussed above, this page has purpose and intent.  With a service such as Netflix, it is common for a family to share an account but use it separately, so these profiles do in fact conform to how users interact with the web.  There are no unnecessary features or clutter, and it does exactly what users expect it to do: direct them to their personalized home page.  It persuades the user to choose his/her profile, as it is impossible to proceed without selecting one, but it is easy to switch profiles if you pick the wrong one by mistake.  The design of the page is clean and uniform, but the different pictures associated with each account make spotting the correct profile easy.  Thus, by comparison, I believe that Netflix's profile selection page is an excellent example of an obvious design.

https://movies.netflix.com/ProfilesGate?nextpage=http%3A%2F%2Fmovies.netflix.com%2FDefault

2-Grant Pendrey

Google.com is a website that exemplifies aspects of obvious design.

The home page is cleanly and clearly designed to direct the users attention to the center of the page and provides an empty text bar and two buttons. As well the search bar has a microphone button on the far right side suggesting an audio option. This microphone icon also reveals a text box with words "search by voice" when hovering over the icon quickly telling the user its intended purpose.

The search bar for the search engine is a very important aspect of the obvious design. The majority, if not all websites use a search bar somewhere on their website to search for a specific user input on their website. This creates a very intuitive feature of the site as the uses is likely to have used this same feature multiple times before and can quickly use the site without feeling the need to learn something new to use the site. Another feature that is intuitive and helps to fit the mental model of what a user expects it to do is the algorithms running the search engine results. There are many different words that the algorithm understands to help provide a more accurate search result for the user. For example if the user typed in the search box "define the word obvious" the search returns mostly results relating the the definition of the word obvious. This is crucial as many people like to type out a query in a sentence like format that they might ask another person as this is similar to how they are thinking. This idea of users being able to articulate to the search engine in a similar way as their mental model of the search query allows the user to quickly get started with the use of the site as well.

Another clear example of the site being a product of intent is the categories above the search results. It easily lets you customize your result further for different types of search results depending on your interests for each individualized search. These categories allow you to quickly sift through different search categories and use the engine for all sorts of different results with ease. It is clear that the intent of the google.com website is to allow for an easy way to get you to the internet information you are looking for in a quick manor.

There are many more aspects of the google website that exemplify the principles of obvious design. Some of the aspects I discussed are major aspects of the website and others are smaller but each one works with the others to create what I identify to be a good example of obvious design.

Do you think that any aspects of the website take away from its intended purpose or hurt the user experience in some way? All things can be improved but why do you think the google site developers have designed that specific aspect in that way?

2 - Kate L'Heureux

The site I chose as an example of obvious design was the gmail inbox run by Google.

(gmail.com)

The top pane of the gmail inbox is designed to be incredibly user friendly through its arrangement of organizational tabs and the search bar. The layout of tabs divide mail into categories of primary, social, and promotions. Alongside the small icons on each tab is also the text, making it as easy as possible to quickly decipher where a user's mail is located. Also, the search bar above these tabs is an obvious design because it manages to contain a few search options while keeping the design clear. The user can either type their search request in the box or click the small arrow pointed down on the right corner of the box which drops down to reveal an advanced search form. 

2 -Yousef Saead

https://squareup.com/

This is the menu bar for squareup.com. I think this design is very goal oriented and full of purpose. Not only is the design cohesive and sharp but it also reflects the company's goals in a straight forward manner. All the features that are necessary for a user to complete an activity are there. There is no need to waste time in finding what the user wants. Everything is found on the same page which enables the user to take specific actions. The most important, I think, is that the page isn't cluttered with information and unnecessary hyperlinks in addition to the fact that the more important hyperlinks are larger in font.

2 - Baiyan Zhang

I choose grubhub website which is an online food order website as an example of obvious design.   (http://www.grubhub.com)

The reason why I choose this is the user can easily know how to use it. At the top of the website, there are two search bars which can gain you information directly. Also, you can select the kind of food you want and method you get food at the filter it provides. These are well-marked at prominent positions which can lead customers to get what they need easily. Therefore, I think this is an obvious design.