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- Almost all information of interest (search settings, schedule, search results, class details) are visible in a single screen. This makes it very easy for users to quickly refer to any piece of information they might need.
- It is easy to quickly browse through results and see all the relevant details (class description, HKN rating, etc)
- For new users this large amount of information may be difficult to process, and it may not be clear where they should focus their attention.
- It is hard to compare two classes; for example, to compare a class at the top of the results list to a class at the bottom, this would require rapidly scrolling back and forth between the two results.
- Some visibility tradeoffs have been made with the department selector. It has been placed inside an iframe, which helps the visibility of the page overall because it means that all the selection criteria in the sidebar can be seen without scrolling. However, the individual department selections are not very visible. The user must scroll through iframe in order to see them all.
- Having class descriptions in collapsible accordions makes browsing through results less efficient; however, it also enables you to see more results at once which increasing the efficiency of comparing to specific classes.
Efficiency
- While you can change other options (like HASS-D categories) on the same page as the results, you have to return to the schedule page to make any changes to your free and busy slots. However, since your schedule is the least likely to vary, this should be not a big problem.
- The process for selecting departments is very inefficient, because it requires users to alternate between checking the check boxes and then scrolling down in the iframe.
- Having class descriptions in collapsible accordions makes browsing through results less efficient; however, it also enables you to see more results at once which increasing the efficiency of comparing to specific classes.
Error prevention
- Because the calendar has a constant visual representation, you get immediate feedback on how your schedule looks when you click and drag.
- It supports CRUD, by allowing you to create new schedule blocks, update previously created blocks, and deleting blocks.
- If users decide they want to filter by different search criteria, they can edit their choices in the side panel and the results will update dynamically, so it is very easy to correct mistakes in search specifications.
- All radio button selectors include a "don't care" option, alleviating a common error correction problem with radio buttons: once you've clicked one, you cannot deselect.
- As mentioned above, the user needs to begin the search again in order to change their schedule, making this a potentially costly error.
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