Author: b7059021

9) We Love Bikes : Preparation for the user tests

At the moment we are writing this blog post, we still working on our prototype which will be completed by the end of the week. As we said before, we have chosen the Marvelapp website as a platform to build our prototype.

Meanwhile, we sent invitations to two of our stakeholders, Heather and Mark, to do the prototype demonstrations with them. We’ve agreed that these testings will take place on two different days, one day with Mark and another day with Heather, as our availabilities are not always compatible, and also that our group will be split for each interview as we don’t need to be all there, too many people can also make it difficult to conduct user interviews as the end user may feel uncomfortable if there are too many of us there. We think that the user will feel much more confident in this way, and it’s important to build a relationship of trust between us and the stakeholder.

So on Monday 4th December, Jordy and Isaac will have a meeting with Mark, and on Tuesday 5th December, Ellen and Aymeric will do the same with Heather. We still need to fix the time for each interview, knowing that we only can after 5 p.m on monday and after 3 p.m on tuesday.

Mark’s interview will surely be held in his office, just as we did when we first spoke to him, but the location of Heather’s prototype demonstration is still unknown. We don’t want to do the same mistake as go into a coffee shop to ask her some questions, as we did the first time we met her, because there were too much people and to much noise. So we are thinking on asking her to go at the university instead.  

The user interviews should help us to understand how well our designs perform in practice, the accessibility to the end user, and to get some fresh point of view about our project. This is very important for the end goal of our project as it needs to be easily useable. We also hope to answer the question of how effective our prototype is at displaying the accountability of the council when working on cycling projects. We will ask at the end of the interviews if the interviewee has any overall issues with the design and how we could correct them.

At the end of this process the two separate groups will come back together and discuss the feedback from the meetings. Using this information we would then address the major issues, which would most likely be the issues raised by both of the interviewees and add or remove these features to the design and correct them.

7) We Love Bikes : Prototype activities and setting goals

With our last step of the storyboard, we wanted to show how easy it will be for everyone to give their opinion or to raise issues about cycling through the project we are working on. For the prototype demonstrations, we will try to achieve the same goal and make it as simple as possible to use the interactive map or to log in as a member of the forum in order to comment on each individual step of the process.

In order to test this prototype we are going to send invites to two of our stakeholders, Heather Evans and Mark Nelson. During the initial interview of Heather she seemed to be reluctant about bringing new technologies into the forum and didn’t want any changes, so this prototyping session could be a good way to try to change her mind with something easy to understand whilst also being respectful to her role in the forum.

Our stakeholders will be led through our platform and will be shown how we have structured in the minute of the forum and other interactive features. The Prototype will be a replica of our website that contains all the areas we plan to have on our final product. the user will be able to navigate these as they would a website. our first steps will be to design the first page where the idea behind our website is explained and also a section which contains the information on how to use the site to help the user navigate the site.

After that we arrive on the main page where the interactive map will be situated  in the center with all pins representing the issues marked, there will be a menu at its left and a “login section” in the top right corner, just like the picture below:

Through this main page we can access all the features so we will be able to clearly show  our stakeholders how to easily navigate the site including; creating a profile, how to access the notes and minutes of meetings and how to raise an issue on the map. the main section of our website will be the progress bar which show how the council is dealing with this problem and shows feedback from the users from the site, when the issue is resolved there will be a section where people can give their feedback on how the process went and an opportunity to add constructive criticism to the council

To build a convincing prototype, we are thinking about using the website Marvelapp. This tool is quite helpful for anyone who wants to create a “demo” of his project from pictures, draws or sketches. In this way, we can put together all we did as an interactive process and create a convincing prototype for our issues.

6) We Love Bikes: Prototype and StoryBoard

The prototype for our design will include multiple user friendly interactive features that all revolve around improving the accountability and the communication of information of the forum. All these features will be available on a website dedicated to the cycle stakeholders forum.

One of the main features of our website prototype will be an interactive map which shows the location of issues raised involving cycling infrastructure in Newcastle. In this format everyone including new members to the site and forum will be able to clearly see the key issues and problems facing cycling in Newcastle. Users will be able to view the key issues raised in the meetings and also on the website and view comments by other member of the public, members of the forum, engineers and council representatives. Each issue will also show a progress bar showing different colours that indicate whether or not these issues are being addressed by the council and at what stage these improvements are at, this will improve the accountability of the council and show that the issues raised are being used by the council. There will also be markers to show where improvements have been completed by the council from issues raised by the forum to show new members that the forum works and cycling infrastructure is being improved in Newcastle.

There will be an organised minutes section that is set out in chronological order that users can access to see what was brought up at each meeting. Users will also be able to access meeting dates and times. It will also have links to other relevant groups and pages that are relevant to cycling in Newcastle. Users will also be able to create profiles to be able to comment on different issues. They will be awarded points when they contribute to the page which acts as an incentive to do so, this means that individuals can be recognised for the time and effort they put into the forum.

To have a glimpse of our prototype, here is a storyboard that shows how our project could be helpful and how we can use it. The starting point is basically a cyclist facing a problem and who wants to raise it up to the city council.