Based on the results of our first usability test, it is too early to say which design we would like to implement for our first interactive prototype. Instead, we need to perform additional tests on these initial designs with more participants to get a better sense of what is or isn't working. However, there are a few things in our prototype that we would like to change or vary for the next round of testing.
For design 1 ("blob" with direct manipulation), we would like to get rid of the modes completely, as our participants found them to be unintuitive. Instead, we would keep a navigation control window for panning and zooming common in most online maps. However, clicking on the map itself would not cause a panning/zooming effect. When a user hovers over the "blob," more cues would be used to indicate that this area could be manipulated, such as a change in color and a change in icon (such as a hand, to indicate that the blob could be dragged). We believe that the main reason why people felt that the sliders were easier to use is simply because there weren't enough cues to indicate that the blob could be changed.
For the design with categories, we would like test different types of categories when drilling down, such as price ranges.
We also want to be more careful about the way we word things. In order to help the apartment searchers know how to best start the task, we need to draw more attention to the initial form, so the apartment hunter knows right away how to begin finding apartments. Currently, some users of the system may want to begin playing around with the map by clicking on cities, versus entering in points of interest in the form. This doesn't help support the task of finding apartments equidistant to points of interest. One way to get around this is to have a start page, much like Yahoo's driving directions page. Here, we would give them a simple form to get started, helping them enter in points of interest. Once the users are on the main page, then they can enter in more search criteria and alter their query.
Finally, we want to offer the users a way to sort through the apartment listings, by price, location, and number of bedrooms.