| This design attempts to make filter application more prominent by merging
it with the interface for reading items. Filter creation is still separate.
The sidebar on the page (first image) lists the information sources Bob has
registered, and also the filter tags he has made. Bob selects the particular
sources from which he is interested in consuming information right now,
and they are displayed in the center (second image) as a scrollable list.
Contrast this
with Design 1, in which all sources were interleaved and the
sidebar was
not present. There are controls for tagging and saving each item
which
he uses to do the second and third tasks (not depicted in this image,
but would be similar to Design 1's controls).
| | |
In this drawing, custom-made filters are separate from filters available by
default to choose which information sources users want to read from. It
is worth considering the option of unifying these two for consistency, but
this might make it harder to easily divide posts by source.
| Reading the material in the center is similar to
existing information feeds, so users can learn by
recognition.
On his first use of Hubbub, Bob may be confused
as to how to operate the sidebar. Giving him the
power to see multiple items in a list, but with filtering
controlled at all times, increases the complexity of
the interface. Learnability can be improved by taking
special care to provide feedback when interacting
with the left sidebar. At a low level, filters should
change in appearance if selected, and at a high level,
the items displayed in the center should immediately
change.
| Power users who wish to filter items regularly will
find this interface to be useful to them, as it allows them
to quickly apply filters without loading a different screen.
If Bob uses this application for an extended period of
time (which is possible, the significant amount of time
he spends reading data on the Internet), he will appreciate
being able to easily reapply filters, so he doesn't have to
read about Bill's baby.
| If Bob skips an entry, he can just
scroll up. It helps that reading is
innately not a destructive action.
Filter application can be undone by
clicking on the filter again. It will
change in visual appearance to
show which state it is in, to avoid
mode errors.
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