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Khalilah Gambrell

June 26, 2019

June 2019 User Research Findings

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Overview

  • Between late May – mid June 2019, FOLIO community participated in two usability testing efforts to gather feedback on the:
    • state of FOLIO user experience (UX)
    • user interface designs (provided by Filip) to address UX challenges reported by the community
  • Community provided feedback via
    • a survey using Qualtrics
    • an online card sort of the Inventory app’s instance record to review its fields using OptimalSort
  • 125 responses were generated by both tests.
  • Responses will guide UI design and frontend development backlogs

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Insights from user research survey

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Key findings

  • Survey participants were asked to rate the FOLIO UX on a scale 1 to 5. Avg rating: 2.9
  • Users are challenged by 
    • Scanability 
      • Color contrast, font, and text size
      • Current three/four pane layout display
    • Main toolbar navigation
    • Detail record
      • Small area to work
      • Too many fields
      • Unsure how to take actions on a record

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Scanability: Color contrast and text size

  • Color contrast has been a concern reported by the community and the survey validated this concern. 
  • Low color contrast makes it difficult to scan a page; it is also a WCAG 2.1 AA no-no.

Respondents’ comments

“making sure there is plenty of contrast for those with poor vision and making sure that there are visual/colored cues instead of a screen full of black, white, and grey.”

“I think the type in general is too small and too light for an aging population.”

Recommendations: Implement color contrast and text size changes as outlined in revised UI designs as shown on next slide. Ensure updates are WCAG 2.1 AA compliant. 

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Scanability: Improved Color Contrast UI redesign layouts favored by survey respondents

Results List

Detail Record

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Scanability: Three/Four Pane Layout

  • Users want a layout that works on multiple monitors
  • Users want more working space on the UI when viewing/editing a record 
  • Users want the ability to resize panes and columns
  • Users provided UI feedback on UI redesign for expanding/collapsing the search pane 

Respondents’ comments

“most of the results of a search are squeezed into the far right hand third (or quarter) of the screen. I find this extremely frustrating.”

“Currently, I see final results on the very far-right portion of the screen, which is maddening. It requires a lot of scrolling, which means that much of the information at the top of the column gets hidden as you scroll down. I know it's important to be able to see the hierarchy of what you selected, but having the hierarchical selections take up full columns of space makes no sense at all.”

Recommendations: Revise UI to support more working space for a detail record. And ensure design and development support working with multiple records across multiple screens. Implement changes to expand/collapse search pane based on survey results.

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Search Pane Expand/Collapse function: Revised UI design favored by survey respondents

Search pane collapsed

Search pane expanded

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Main toolbar navigation

  • UI redesign layouts addressed the following concerns reported by users 
    • Unsure what app s/he is on
    • Unsure how to return to the default landing page 
  • Responses expressed concern about app order on the main toolbar  

Recommendations: 1.)Provide libraries details on setting up main toolbar – app order. 2.) Revise current app order requirements to prevent same apps displayed on the toolbar from appearing on the apps dropdown. 3.) User must easily return to an app's default landing page

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Main Toolbar Navigation: Revised UI design layouts favored by survey respondents

Design 2

Design 1

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Detail Record: Actions dropdown UI redesign layouts favored by survey respondents

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Detail Record

  • UI redesign layouts addressed the following concerns reported by users: 
    • Save/Close location 
    • Access detail record actions 
  • Users prefer the detail record open in a new pane rather than third pane. Overall, users want 
    • Display multiple records/views on one/multiple screen(s)
    •  And it may address privacy concerns in relevant Circ apps
  • Respondents' concerns
    • Ability to return to results list / previous page
    • Numerous fields on the screen (especially fields a library will not use)  

Respondents’ comments

“Now it is to many fields on different pages. Fields that we don´t use. It should be so clean and simple that everyone understands how to use it.”

“Also, if a field is required when creating a new record, consider having the accordion in which that field is located, open automatically. We're forcing extra clicks to find a field that is required to complete which will likely cause frustration.”

Recommendations: Implement layout changes based on survey results. UI design and POs define rules for fields and accordions (including placement/components to use). POs evaluate app’s field and accordions. UI should better indicate if accordions contain no information when collapsed and expanded (i.e. follow the Users app pattern). 

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Detail Record: Save/Close buttons UI redesign layout favored by survey respondents

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FOLIO Platform: What else do respondents want? 

  • FOLIO Homepage/Dashboard
  • Improved required fields across multiple accordions handling 
  • Improved results list columns responsiveness 
  • Change to toast notification display 

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Insights from Inventory app – Instance record

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Key findings � Instance record

Instance accordions: respondents want title data (64.7%) displayed first by an overwhelming number. Administrative data (11.8%) was second. 

What else do users want to see at the top of the instance record? 

Provide me item info and tell me if the record has been suppressed

For circulation and public services staff, the item information is what they will go to almost all of the time, and it needs to be easy to get to.”

“To optimize the view to get a quick understanding of the instance and our holdings including status and requests, when working in the information desk.”

“I like to see if the record is suppressed or not along with date last modified.”

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Key findings � Instance record cont'd

Accordion grouping of fields align with respondents’ expectations!

Only a few fields did not have a clear accordion grouping: Instance HRID, statistical code, system control number, mode of issuance, instance status term

The following fields/values were not well understood by respondents: ASIN, Instance HRID, UkMac, StEdNL, BNB, CODEN, ASIN

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Key findings � Instance record

Respondents’ thoughts about the instance record cont’d

Easier access to item information

“... Circ staff need a different way to get to the item record that isn't nearly so difficult to get to.

“…It is challenging that you can't copy the item barcode easily from the holdings accordion - say, for example, if you're trying to troubleshoot items that may have been misbarcoded, or you want to take that barcode and use it another way (say, an in-app report in requests.)”

Frustration with empty accordions and field values

Accordion titles that show up even when there is no content in it is problematic….I can understand them being in the edit view, but not in the simple display view…You end up looking at a thing that just looks like it has holes and tons of wasted space.”

“…Fields that are not in use locally should be suppressed from view as well. Lots of empty labels take up screen real estate and the display is not optimized to draw the eye towards the fields that are populated with information. 

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Key findings � Instance record cont'd

Respondents’ thoughts about the instance record cont’d

Instance record and MARC

  • I love that it puts some distance between itself and MARC. I'm happy that it doesn't try to replicate everything from MARC (I'm looking at you, BIBFRAME...) and instead only makes use of the descriptive fields that are helpful in other parts of FOLIO or are found in other schemas.” 
  • “I like that there doesn't have to be a marc record. It has text fields and labels that are fairly straightforward. However, I don't like how MARC based the instance record is. I'm not sure if we are really leaving marc behind or just disguising it.”

Streamline Administrative data display

  • “I'm happy that so much information/data is being included. I do wish that the information in the Administrative data according could be displayed in such a way that it takes up less space--I find this information useful and I don't necessarily want to have to hide it or have to scroll down to have to view more of the Instance record.”

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Instance Record | Short term Recommendations

  • Make Title data accordion the first accordion
  • Instance record view updates
    • If the accordion has no values entered/selected, then do not display the accordion
    • If a field has no value entered/selected, then do not display 
    • Make item information easier to access
    • Make it easier to copy an item barcode
    • If the accordion has an action button(s) then display a message that no information found when applicable
    •  Redesign Administrative data section to take up less space so it remains closer to the top of the screen. (Or consider placing less used fields under another accordion)
    • Consider merging Subjects accordion with Descriptive data accordion 
    • Move resource type field under title data accordion since it is a required field. 
    • Update Subjects to display as a line versus a list 

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Instance Record | Short term Recommendations cont’d

  • Re-order the Instance record’s accordions to the following:
    1. Title data (expand by default)
    2. Descriptive data (expand by default)
    3. Holdings/Item (expand by default)
    4. Administrative data (collapse by default- only place in this order if section is not redesigned)
    5. Contributors (collapse by default)
    6. Identifiers (collapse by default)
    7. Classification (collapse by default)
    8. Electronic access (unsure how often electronic access is entered at the instance level) (collapse by default)
    9. Notes (collapse by default)
    10. Instance relationships (collapse by default)
    11. Related instances (collapse by default)

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Instance Record | Long term recommendations

  • Support two instance views: one view for non-catalogers and another for catalogers 
  • Support a way for libraries to decide which fields should display on New/Edit/View records

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Next Steps

  • Review selected UI redesign layouts with POs and UI Designers
  • Add features/user stories to backlog
  • Review Instance record findings with MM SIG

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Questions?

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