Blurbs

1
Blurbs

• The Wiki All About You

2
The Need

• Express oneself
• Learn more about a friend or acquaintance
• Organize information

3
and other important points from the contextual
inquiry

• Preference of profile over canvas pages
• Desire to explore without installing app

4
The Solution

• A wiki for every Facebook user
• Request Functionality
• Searchable

5
Demonstration
6
Implementation

• Apache / PHP / MySQL technology stack provided by
  inst and the CS160 staff
• About 50 profile, 50 canvas
• FBJS AJAX for Dynamic Profile Box
• Relatively simple DB Schema
• Blurbs table
• Requests table

7
Architecture Diagram
Blurbs Profile Box
Requests Tab (on someone elses profile)
Recent Blurbs Tab
Contribute Tab
Search Tab
Requests Tab (on own profile)
Database
Blurbs
Requests
Blurbs Canvas
Edit Blurb Page
View Blurb Page
Specific Users Blurbs Page
Search Page
All Friends Blurbs Page
8
Usability Study Methodology

• 4 Users
• Think Aloud Protocol
• Training Task
• 6 Real Tasks
• Questionnaire
• Semi-structured Interview

9
Usability Study Qualitative Data

• Positive
• All users found the profile box aesthetically
  pleasing
• All users felt the process to handle a pending
  request is clear
• Negative
• None of the users could accurately describe the
  purpose of the application
• 2 out of 4 users commented instead of editing
• 3 out of 4 users did not think to make a request

10
Usability Study Quantitative Data
Clarity of Average Score (out of 6)
Purpose of Application 3
Recent Blurbs Tab 5
Requests Tab 5.25
Contribute Tab 5.75
Search Tab 5.25
11
Usability Study Conclusions

• Positive
• Employing Facebook conventions pleases users
• Prominent text and links aid task completion
• Negative
• Purpose needs clarification
• Collaborative nature of the application is not
  conveyed well
• The context in which to submit a request is not
  apparent

12
Usability Study Design Changes

• Make explanation text in profile box more
  prominent
• Make Edit Blurb link more prominent
• Make suggestion to request more prominent

13
Future Work

• Implement design changes brought to light by
  usability study
• Add originally planned features that didnt make
  it into the prototype
• Privacy Settings
• Revision control
• Photos
• Viral Aspect

14
Questions