Re: [libreoffice-design] User Research

Hi      Christoph, Phil, dror, *

The discussion goes excatly into the right direction - but I would like to 
actually do things step by step, and not not doing anything right now because 
there is a far goal we would like to reach sometime. So please slow down and 
take it one step at a time :)

What do I mean?

The first step would be to actually start talking to users. This is what I 
try to intend right now. This should be purely voluntary, un-obstrusive and 
will for sure be biased in the one or the other way. But it is also done 
without great effort from our side.

This way we can gain experiences with talking to our users. 

In the course of these surveys we can then (user-centrically) evaluate the 
acceptance of other ways of involving users into the development.

As it has been discussed in this thread this mainly divides into two 
sections:
- We will need to install a direct feedback into LibO. This should aim at 
users reporting problems, wishes, but also positive feedback and targets all 
existing users. The trigger for communication here is the user.
- We will need to install one or more ways to quickly solve questions arising 
during development, e.g. to user-centrically decide between two options. The 
target here are existing as well as potential users. The trigger for 
communication here is the (UI-)development team.

These are channels of communication between users and developers. On these 
channels communication needs to be goal directed, as dror mentions. So each 
survey needs a goal and needs to be quality assured in order to not-piss-off 
participating users (They will be lost forever!).

To pick up other examples: 
- If we want to do online focus-groups, we can recruit participants via these 
channels.
- If we want to set up a group of lead-users, we can recruit them via... well 
you know :)

But it does not stop there. We will e.g. need a way to store and handle the 
incoming data. So doing anything just quick and dirty will not work out in 
the end. So my advice is to slowly but steadily go on on this topic.


If you - the team - agrees, I would very much like to volunteer and take 
responsibility to drive this process step-by-step towards the far goal of 
establishing a good communication between team and user - or even better: 
make the users part of the team. 

As it happens, I do this kind of work professionally and via 
OpenUsability.org with quite some experience in Free Software. As well I am 
having fun doing so and I am working on a tool, that will help us and other 
Free Software as well on solving the above mentioned issues. 

So what do you think?

Best,
Björn

Am Donnerstag, 16. Juni 2011, 15:17:57 schrieb Phil Jackson:
> Hi Dror
>
> That might work by restricting voting to unique users.
>
> I think it will be problematic trying to control groups though - how do
> you identify a group and associate users with it?
>
> There will always be people who contribute more than others, sometimes
> out of genuine interest, sometimes in order to unduly influence outcomes.
>
> If we get large samples of feedback, I would think that this would
> negate having to make decisions about the numbers and groups and what
> they actually mean. It would be simple enough to set a minimum number of
> entries before the decision is accepted, much like a citizens' referendum.
>
> Cheers
>
> Phil Jackson
>
> On 6/16/2011 1:26 PM, drorlev wrote:
> > Hi Phil,
> >
> > What you suggest (a built-in list of proposed changes to choose from)
> > seems very interesting to me.
> > Personally, as a user, I would have liked it a lot.
> >
> > Still, one thing that bugs me is the possibility of sampling bias.
> > Assuming that there are several groups of LO users that have different
> > design requirements, the worry is that some groups will contribute to
> > the
> > survey more then their relative share in the general users population.
> >
> > A possible way to control for this might be to have users who wish to
> > contribute register to an account in which they have to provide some
> > demographic data. In order to influence, one will have to register and
> > tell a bit about him/her-self.
> >
> > This will enable, first, to look for different user-groups (in terms of
> > usage preferences) and then adjust the poles by demographic statistics
> > (for example, if the users population has about the same amount of
> > small-business users and students, but it turns out that students are
> > much more active in sending their preferences, the survey analyst can
> > weigh each contribution by group-membership weight in the general users
> > population).
> >
> > Such a registration-based system can also control for multi-votes.
> >
> > HTH,
> > dror
> >
> > --
> > View this message in context:
> > http://nabble.documentfoundation.org/User-Research-tp3067418p3070307.ht
> > ml Sent from the Design mailing list archive at Nabble.com.

-- 
Björn Balazs
Leitung Analyse, Design & Test, Gesellschafter
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