The UC Berkeley Calendar Network

Final Master’s ProjectAllison Bloodworth

Nadine Fiebrich

Myra Liu

Zhanna Shamis

Presentation Overview Intro to UC Berkeley Calendar Network &

Calendar Management tool Heuristic Evaluation Compare current design to 1st interactive

prototype Demo of the current design Pilot Usability Study Results Plans for the last iteration Lessons Learned

What is the UC Berkeley Calendar Network? A way to allow the many calendars on the

Berkeley campus to share event information Events may be stored:

In a centralized repository provided by the campus In individual department repositories

These entities can either use, or map to, the comprehensive “event” data model our team has created

What is the BCN Calendar Management Tool? An application that allows calendar owners to:

Create and format a calendar that can be “plugged in” to their website

Manage the events displayed on their calendar

It is useful for calendar owners who: Do not need their own repository Do not have special web

development needs

Heuristic Evaluation Main Points

Navigation still could use improvement The “Filter By” options in the Event Manager are

overwhelming It is sometimes confusing to allow actions to be

executed in multiple ways Confirmation messages should stand out “Deleting” events is too strong a word “Cancel” & “Back” needed on Add form confirmation Need to standardize button locations

Thank you SIMS Corpus!

Event Manager - PostedFirst Interactive Prototype

Smaller top Nav

No Date

Filter By

Add Event

View/EditButtons & links

Event Manager - Posted Second Interactive Prototype

Date

Larger Top Nav

Search w/Advanced Options

Create Event

Link & EditButton only

Advanced Search Second Interactive Prototype

Event Posting Confirmation First Interactive Prototype

Event Posting Confirmation Second Interactive Prototype

Event Detail First Interactive Prototype

Event Detail Second Interactive Prototype

Demo of our current prototypehttp://dream.berkeley.edu/EventCalend

ar/MyraTestFolder/ThirdInteractivePrototype/login.php

Pilot Usability Study Goals

Ensure that participants can find and use the various functions in the interface

Determine whether the functionality provided is valuable

Determine whether the interaction flow is natural and intuitive and matches current user workflow

Determine whether the application will meet the needs of these calendar administrators

Participants Two calendar administrator and one calendar content

manager, all of high-level calendars

Pilot Usability Study Results Users found the system relatively easy to use,

though more explanatory text and help is needed in many areas

Users thought the system would be valuable to their department as well as other campus departments One high-level calendar owner even thought she could

use it to send events to other departments Users thought the functionality provided was valuable, but some functions more than others depending on their needs

Plans for the next iteration Event Manager

Change navigation so Event Manager includes a “Department Name” Calendar Events section which will encompass the Pending/Posted/ Archived tabbed section

Put search functionality on all three tabs and change label to “Search Posted Events” etc

Add red background to confirmation messages

Create Event Form Change “Event Status” to “Event Sharing Status” Add explanatory text to “Event Listing Contact”

Navigation Change “Calendar” on nav to “View Live Calendar”

Format Calendar Add explanatory text to “Preview Calendar” Remove “Restore Default Settings”

Event Details Change “Cancel” button to “Back”

Subscription Remove “Event Date” from the options offered

Plans for the next iteration

Lessons learned Navigation is tricky, and it can require multiple

iterations to get it right Craft the language used in task scenarios for

user testing carefully, as unclear language can cause unnecessary user confusion

It is sometimes better to provide users with less functionality if using all available options would be confusing

You can iterate a lot longer than you might think and continue to improve your design