Assignment 1 User Testing
I tested my design with three different users and have made decisions about how to revise based on their experiences.
Some feedback was about context and the lack of it within the design. While I explained to my testers what their goal within the app was, they still said they would’ve liked more of an introduction to the app and some visual indication of where they were within it. This point was less critical of my design and more of my testing process. In future prototypes, I will take care to frame the design with a home screen and better indicators to avoid dropping users too suddenly into the interaction.
Much of the feedback of my design was levied on the loading indicators. Some feedback was that it would be better to visually show where data was transferring to and from, although another user said they were her favorite thing about the design (I suspect this had more to do with seeing how the element was represented in a paper prototype than the actual design of it, however). Another bit of feedback was that it should be more exciting and visually intriguing (this tester suggested using a cheetah or something to symbolize speed and agility). I think I need to look carefully at other loading indicators that show the transfer of information between devices as well as elements that are symbolic in exercise and fitness.
Users also pointed out the lack of information displayed on the watch screen. While there was positive feedback about the little running avatar showing how far users were in their workouts, there was a common pain point where testers wanted more information. There were willing to sacrifice the cute and symbolic element for a more useful display, and wanted information like heartrate, calories burned, avg speed, etc. Because there are a large amount of different statistics that could be displayed, I think in further and more in-depth iterations I would want to offer users a way to customize their displays for during their workouts.
One more piece of feedback that tied together the two main design criticisms was that it might be valuable to show the information being transferred back to the phone instead of just a loading indicator. Depending on the route I take with the information display, this might be a very useful idea.