Session summaries

Participant 1

Wanted more options in the POI list like freeways

Understood the blob idea, but wanted estimates of nearness displayed

Couldn't find the checkboxes for displaying POIs. Was afraid that checking one of them would modify the blob

Didn't think Map It and Navigate It conveyed anything descriptive.

Gave the idea of being able to click on the name of a city on the map to include it in the blob

Difficulty: Moderate - all the feature are there but not easy to find.

Liked the idea of being able to hover to bring up routes

Understood what the sliders did but wasn't sure if they were independent of each other.

Was not sure how he would know how to show the routes and distances without our help. There is no clue that you need to hover

Difficulty: Moderate

Thought the category view was very useful. Wanted to see more categories based on price, size, etc. Didn't understand what the date in the listing conveyed.

Difficulty: Easy

General Comments: found #3 the most helpful. Thought that functionality was not well labeled and difficult to find. Would like to see cities that fell into the suggested area displayed in italics to make recognition easier

Said that even with these shortcomings the idea was an improvement over current interfaces

Participant 2

Said interface breaks from convention by not allowing to enter city or region.

No problem modifying the blob based on public transportation but was not sure what type of transportation was being displayed.

Wanted ability to sort by price.

Was confused by the difference between the list of points of interest on the left and the check boxes on top of the map.

Didn't realize that manipulation of the blob using points of interest other than addresses was possible.

Difficulty: creating the first area was easy. Manipulating the area very difficult.

Was not sure what the sliders where interactive or just for displaying relative distances.

Difficulty: Once given the task, thought it was easy.

Didn't find categories useful. Preferred the blob because it provided more context.

Would like to see mileage to poi next to each apartment listing

Difficulty: easy

Participant 3

Needed verbal instructions to enter addresses and points of interest.

Didn't notice listing on the right until later in the test

Thought the blob represented city boundaries

Pointed out that the right side area is usually used for advertisements so he conditioned himself to ignore it.

Would like to be able to sort the listing

Likes that he is able to enter all criteria in one step

At first doesn't notice the checkboxes at the top of the map, but once does, thinks they are the same as the list on the left.

Thinks that brushing and linking provides to subtle a connection between the markers and the list of apartments.

Difficulty: difficult

At first seems to understand the sliders quickly but then is confused by the blob moving, illustrating that the idea of the blob is still not clear.

Thinks apartment listings and markets should be numbered to make the connection between the 2 more obvious.

Thought categories were useful and easy to use.

Difficulty: easy

Likes categories the best. Easiest to compare apartments.

Thought it would be useful to combine sliders and categories.

Wording on the form very confusing.

Sliders are much easier than direct manipulation

Proposes that icons that correspond to each poi category should appear next to that poi in the list on the left.

Participant 4

Was confused why the list of poi's appeared in two places.

Did not think "map it," and "navigate it" conveyed anything informative.

Was able to figure out "click and drag" to reshape the blob

Difficulty: Moderate

Thought that the blob doesn't adequately convey nearness.

Liked being able to bring up route information by hovering over a market. Would like to see that idea expanded to other points of interest.

No problem with manipulating the sliders. Thought that "closer/farther" is too subjective.

Liked the idea.

Difficulty: easy

Didn't like the categories. Didn't convey any additional information. Again, the term "near" was unclear.

Preferred interface 2, than 1. Liked that distance information for all routes was consolidated in one location.

Participant 5

Wasn't sure if the price range was per month.

Liked that he could add more addresses.

Thought that the POIs on the left and on top of the map did the same thing.

Is multiple selection allowed? Is it persistent?

What is under the public transit category?

"Complete confusion" as to what Navigate It and Map It mean

Said click and drag makes sense only after an explanation.

Really liked details on demand and brushing and linking

Said the interface was not self-explanatory, hard to figure out. Thought more labels or a legend would help.

Said that different routes should be displayed in different colors and the poi marker should correspond to the color of the route associated with it.

Would like to see one route at a time.

The idea is very useful but it's hard to figure out that you need to hover over the marker.

The numeric distance values are very helpful.

Difficulty: Moderate because of lack of labels, but felt would be easy second time around.

No problem with the sliders. Thought it would be nice to mark the middle of the slider just to reinforce the idea of equidistance.

Was not sure if the sliders were independent of each other.

Difficulty: easy. More user friendly for a beginner than click and drag.

Didn't like the category idea. Thought it added no value to what was already shown on the map.

General comments: Thought sliders would be best for beginners. But thought he'd want more control eventually and would want the click and drag.

Really disliked it that there were no explanation for the functions, but liked the general layout of the interface. However, he pointed out that there doesn't seem to be room for any functionality we might want to add later on.