Silly bike parking things

In the Netherlands, nearly everybody rides a bike (on average we have more than 1 bike per person!). No wonder that you can find bike parking spots everywhere, like the ones in the photo up here. Actually, this photo shows two different types of bike parking systems.

This is one I found at the trainstation in Eindhoven. In the top photo you see the regular parking spot, in the bottom photo the "new and improved" ones. The old parking method can house nearly twice as many bikes per meter as the new parking method. Seeing as that there are not enough spots anyway, I think this is a pretty lousy "improvement".

On top of that, the new method also relies on technology that can (and does) fail, can only be used for a short duration (after that your bike is no longer locked!) and is only available for people with a citizens-card. You get that card for free when you register for living in the city, but who wants to keep another card in their wallet just to park their bike?

Solution

Remove the "improved" method… Why do we keep putting expensive new designs in places were they are not necessary??

Coffee Machine at TUE

After the ticket-machine at the zoo and the locked-in 24h machine, I now have a new addition for the unusable machines collection :) This time it's a vending-machine for something very essential: coffee!

Aside from the number-based interface (which will maybe come another time), there is something else very wrong with the design: where do you put your money?

You've got 10 seconds to think about this…

…

No, you're wrong: it's not the grey thing that looks like the money-slot! :D You actually put your money in the small, nearly-invisible black slit on the right of the number-pad.

The grey-hole is for the "TU/e Coffee Card". I don't know anybody who has this card, or anybody who knows somebody who has this card. Anyways even if you had one, you can't use it since the grey slots are usually filled with coins :)

On other, similar, machines they've added some stickers. But of course nobody reads the stickers, and so people keep losing their money by throwing it in the wrong slot.

Solution

A simple user test would have shown that this design is misleading. But in general, it would be wise to always keep affordance in mind: if a user can put money in a card slot, he will. Not because he's stupid or malicious, but because putting money in a machine is not the most important thing in his life at that moment.

So we should change the "mouth" of the card-slot so that it doesn't afford to put money in anymore. And besides that the money-slot should be moved to a more convenient location and should be made much more visible. And then of course, we test it again :)

Confusing streetnames

We're looking at a crossing today, in Scheemda. We're driving on the main road and to the left and to the right of is a street, each with a different name. Streetsigns are blue in the Netherlands and usually located on a streetlamp, I hope you can spot them on this small image. Otherwise, enlarge the image by clicking on it!

Now imagine you're looking for a street called "Kwekerslaan", which you know from your map is on your right. It would be logical to look at the streetsign on the right, right? :)

The municipality of Scheemda disagrees!

The streetname for the right street is on the streetlamp on the left street… I've included a close-up to make this clear. Notice the tiny, tiny arrow in the sign?

Solution

Especially for road signs, creative solutions are not a good idea. Drivers have a complicated task to do anyway and every second they have to spent on finding and understanding a roadsign is a second not looking at other, more important things. With 30 km/h, this means a car has travelled 8 meters with the driver not spending his cognitive attention on the road.

The convention is to put streetnames on a streetlamp close to the street to which they belong, and this is yet another case where we shouldn't have deviated from conventions…

Slideshare.net and Squirrel

Hi all, it's time to start blogging again ;)

Today we have two confusing interfaces. These are the financing application for OSX called "Squirrel" (http://www.squirrelapp.com/) and a website for sharing slides (www.slideshare.net). Both are nice applications! But I've been confused by their use of very simple symbols.

Maybe you won't be confused, but remember that you're in the mind-set of things being different than they seem ;)

First, slideshare:

Which button is for zooming in? :) I've blocked the text, so think first about it before seeing if you guessed correctly.

I got confused multiple times. Especially if you don't think about wanting to search through slides. All the items on this page are related to the current slide, not for searching a specific text... (Update: they've changed it now, and ditched both zooming and searching)

Next, Squirrel:

Squirrel is a nice application with which you can manage your financials. It can import from your bank, but sometimes you have to add a transaction by hand. In the image below, I wanted to schedule a monthly transaction. But money can go both ways of course: it's either added to my account, or subtracted. So which button do I check if the money comes to me?? Did I check the right button, or did I check the outgoing-money button?

Again, I was really confused! I actually made a mistake with this that took me over an hour to figure out! :D

Actually, the rest of the program is using color coding to avoid such mistakes. You'll find the solution to the earlier question by looking at a different part of the interface.

Solutions

Symbols are always difficult. Include a text-label always, or use conventions. Even that doesn't guarantee usability: slideshare was doing both! In that case, I would suggest removing the search-button and adding a search-field (similar to how the top-right of your browser looks, most likely).

In the case of Squirrel there definitely is color coding needed! But even better would be to just use the "+" or "-" symbol. This is just confusing :)

Ps: Mac-users, I can really recommend Skitch to you! It's great for making screenshots!

Opening windows (again!)

Seems like mistakes are often found in the same places, this time we go back to an item also discussed in my very first blog-post: university windows! :)

For some reason, there's something weird with the windows in my current office at the Technical University Eindhoven as well. They can only be opened with a special crank (which can be seen in the image above).

Now we are a lucky office: we have a crank in our room! However, some offices are not so lucky, and people in those offices need to go to the "servicedesk" which can be multiple floors away from you depending on where you are!

The cranks have to be brought back as soon as possible, because there is only a limited amount of them and they are slowly disappearing (guess why…).

The only reason I can come up with why this was implemented this way was to have a better control over the heating of the building (which is also terrible). If this was the purpose, then it failed, as people can get the cranks without having to justify where and why they are opening a window. As it is now, the very simple problem of opening windows got a needlessly complicated solution.

On top of this, the mechanism is difficult to operate, which means you need a strong arm. Also, the mapping is very strange: the top window opens by rotating a handle all the way down at knees-height in the window frame. You can see this in the below image, with the beautifully sunny weather we had. Newcomers wouldn't have a clue how to open our windows :)

Solution

I'm starting to wonder if I should skip the solution section, as again the answer is: keep to the standards! There are dozens of designs for opening windows that do work, why reinvent the wheel?

Another trainstation oddity

After the 'smoking pole', I've found another weirdness at a train station, this time at Eindhoven Central Station. What we see here is part of the roof of the bus station and part of the train station. The weird thing that these aren't connected.

When it's raining, it pours in between these two roofs making a big mess of the station. Even after the rain, it keeps dripping for at least half an hour. This leads to a weird distribution of people who are waiting for the bus, as they logically leave the rain-trench free. Which in turn is very inconvenient if you quickly need to go through this crowd to catch the train, you'll keep crossing the rain!

A 'solution' provided by the station for the mess the rain makes can be seen in this image, the water is caught in a drainage system… But that's after making a mess of the people that were standing there! :)

Also, can you spot the person who's using the smoking pole wrong in the image below? (taken in front of the entrance)

Solution

Either roof could have been made 50 cm. longer and there would have been no problem. As it is now, it'll probably require a lot more work and money to remodel one of the roofs.

The USI-waterboiler and Dishwasher

Today features two common household-appliances: a waterboiler and a dishwasher. Both were found in our department kitchen. I thought I'd add two items today, so you have something to ponder about during the weekend :)

Let's start with the dishwasher (click to enlarge). The main usability issue is that it has not just one, but two on/off buttons! The on/off button on the right has no directly discernible function. Pressing it seemingly only changes the state of the button (which can go in or out).

Only the left button, which has a symbol of a square with an 'I' in it, actually makes the machine do something (start cleaning)…

My guess is that the right on/off button actually puts the machine in or out of standby-mode and that the left button acts more like a 'start' button. After some experimentation, this seems to be the case.

Added to this, it's quite difficult to see if the right-most button is pressed or not.

Also, is there anybody who can tell me what the two cryptic symbols with the 3h-duration mean? (they're located near the right on/off button)

Now we proceed to the main dish of the day… The waterboiler!

I've grown to hate this machine. It's not that difficult to make a good waterboiler!!

First of all, sometimes it doesn't turn off automatically, which is dangerous. Secondly, the spout is shaped in such a way that boiling water easily overflows, which is also dangerous.

But the most absurd attraction of this devilish device is: only a tiny fraction of can be used! I've clarified it in the image above, the green arrow shows the usable part, while the red arrow shows the height of the total device. It's absurd! Even in nightmares you wouldn't dream up such a monstrosity :)

Solutions

The dishwasher has several issues: it uses non-common and unclear icons and it counter-intuitively sports two on/off-buttons. I think a redesign is necessary, but for now we might get away with some simple modifications: relabel the left on/off button to say "start" instead of an "I" with a square, reshape the right on/off button so that it is easier to see it's state (perhaps make it a switch) and change the weird symbol with two clocks saying "3h" to something meaningful (I have no clue what it means, so I can't suggest anything here).

Sadly (?), the waterboiler can't be saved. It has to go back to whence it came! I have seen over thirty examples of simple electric waterboilers that do work and the best solution is just to replace the current one with one of those.

Ironing device from Hema

Another one from Daniel, thanks!

This device can be set to different settings with a dial underneath the handle.

The problem is that this dial can't be read when the device is used :) The above image shows the default (top) view, can you see at which temperature it's set?

Below is another view of the dial. For me (I have to admit I never use ironing devices), it's still difficult to see what is going on. It's set to 'min' right now, which is colder than 'max' of course :) But what does it mean to go to one, two or three dots?

Solution

Put the dial on top of the device. Also, could somebody used to ironing devices tell me whether an actual temperature instead of dots would be more helpful as well?

24 hour information machine

A finding from the other side of the globe, this one was sent to me from my brother in New Zealand. Thanks Remco!

What we see here is a '24h-touch screen information display'.

But it's locked inside the store and thus unusable…

What's more, it is turned on and asking to be touched :)

To me what adds to the fun is the dissonance between the happy font of the 'closed' sign, and the firm and decisive font which says "touchscreen: 24 hour". It's as if the 'closed' sign is laughing at us :)

As the solution is so blazingly obvious I've decided to leave it as an exercise to the readers :)

Refrigerators

Here is something I've always thought was strange about refrigerators: you set the power of them, not the temperature. Looking at the example up here (my Nordland refrigerator), you see it is set to '1' right now. But which temperature is associated with this?

The answer is that you can't know, it depends on the model, the outside temperature and the products placed inside.

Another thing is the operation of the dial: if you want the temperature to go up, the number should go down.

This number ranges from 0 to 7, which coincidentally is also the temperature-range most commonly used for a fridge (according to wikipedia). That makes this number even more confusing, as one might confuse refrigerator-power with temperature.

I've looked into many fridges and this is the same everywhere. Below you can find two examples from old manuals :)

AEG Arctis 0832-5I. Control 6 is for temperature, 7 shows a thermometer. What the others do, I have no idea :) Control 6 is also a beautifully weird design, for me it reads 4-1-2-3, I also have no clue why there is no dot between 3 and 4.

Sharp (dw37-41_OM) noticed that their control might be confusing and added the label 'Coldest', which is a (small) improvement.

Solution

Users don't want to set the refrigerator power, they think about the temperature. Change the system to be a thermostat, so that we can just set temperature as we're used to with heating systems!

Elevator at V&D

(thanks to Daniel for finding and photographing this)

For some reason elevators are a challenging system for designers, you can find the weirdest shapes and interaction designs.

The blog-item of today was found by my friend Daniel, at a large chain store in the Netherlands. As you can see in the photo, this elevator has two identical columns of buttons. Or does it only look like that?

As a matter of fact, the second column are only indicators, they can't be pressed. To make matters even more complicated, the actual buttons (the left column) also have a light in them. The buttons in the left column are only on when the lift is moving and the indicators in the right column are only on when the elevator is standing still.

It doesn't stop with the inside of the elevator, though! The buttons on the outside are maybe even more confusing. Here we see six buttons. Or do we? No, we get fooled again! :) The top two 'buttons' are actually indicators, showing if the elevator is going down or up. The third 'button' is also just an indicator, telling us if the elevator is out of service or not. The fourth and fifth 'things' are actually buttons, indicating 'up' and 'down'. The sixth and last thing is nothing at all, it's just there because these panels have six holes, probably… The bad thing about this is of course that the symbols up and down are more universal than the Dutch text and are a lot clearer. We'll probably never know why the designer thought this was a good idea :)

Solution

The solution is quite easy, we just remove all the indicators that look like buttons. The buttons can then show which floor the elevator is going to and we can use a simple LED-screen to show the current floor. Or if we want, we can keep a bit of the current design and just reshape the indicators so that they actually look like indicators instead of buttons, by modeling them as a light for instance. For the outside of the elevator, we can remove the 'op' and 'neer' buttons and use the first two buttons as actual buttons, with a light in them showing that they are pressed.

Smoking Pole

All Dutch trainstations are "smoke free", meaning that it is only allowed to smoke at certain designated areas. These areas are marked either with a yellow square painted around a small, covered hole or with a yellow circle painted around a 'smoking pole'. The pole in the image is an example of that, at the trainstation of Groningen.

It earned it's place on this blog, because of it's conflicting message. Normally these poles mean "smoke here" but this one has a sign stating that it is not allowed to smoke here! So what is the pole doing here?

The key is to know the pole's location; it's at the entrance of the translation. The idea being that you stop smoking here and discard your cigarette!

Of course, this is not what happens: people start smoking at these poles, creating a "smoke-screen" at the entrance of the station, which is the opposite of what this thing tries to reach!

Also, its prime functionality (discarding your cigarette in it) is not being used, as demonstrated by the cigarettes in the flower bed…

Solution

Actually, this is a rather tough one! We want to encourage people to discard their cigarette, but not to linger and smoke at this place. This goes against the common pattern I've observed with people putting out their cigarette: they do tend to linger around ashtrays.

One design change is to adjust the shape of this ashtray, so that it is physically different from a pole. We can combine this with the international non-smoking symbol, and an indication of the fine associated with continuing to smoke.

Bank mailbox

This is a rather confusing mailbox for a bank in the Netherlands. The top text states that for security reasons one should really not put payment transaction forms in "here", the bottom text says "here" is only for payment transaction forms (with arrows pointing upwards). The problem with this is that there only is one mailbox: the top one is bolted shut and thus looks like it is just a sign.

Solution

The two mailboxes serve a different purpose, one is an actual mailbox, the other a deposit for payment transaction forms. One of the possible solutions is to more clearly separate the mailboxes. For instance, put them on the same horizontal plane with some space in between. Or put the normal mailbox near the main door and the transaction-form mailbox near the payment machine, those might be more 'natural' locations.

Any other suggestions?

Parking machine at the zoo in Emmen

Trying to decipher this machine is not easy! Just look at the amount of signs that are necessary, the fancy screen with instructions and the option of calling in help…

Red text: "Discount card! Always insert parking ticket first!"

Green text: "Pay in advance. Insert parking ticket. Press daycard"

On the left side of the machine there are two places to insert cards and four labels, above the yellow block a label with the instruction "insert chipknip", then a label saying "chipknip", then a label saying "insert parkingticket" and underneath the yellow block a label stating "these cards can be inserted above".

On the right side, the label says "these coins can be inserted" and "these bills can be inserted below".

Creditcards and the parkingticket go in the same slot, eventhough the parkingticket doesn't look like a creditcard at all. I believe the parkingticket doesn't even come out before you have to insert your creditcard in the same slot!

As far as I can tell, the idea is that you get a card when you park your car (the parkingticket), with which you can buy a daycard. If you decide not to buy a daycard, you have to pay afterwards by inserting the parkingticket again when you return to your car. If you have a discount card, you can use it to pay less for the parking.

When observing this machine, I've seen people trying every slot for their cards, some slots accept multiple cards, others only one. The weirdest thing is that this machine does not offer the default option in the Netherlands: a slot for a debitcard.

Solution

This machine requires a complete redesign. There's nothing left to save! But let's suppose we want to keep all functionality that is currently in the machine.

Since the procedure is in several steps, it makes sense to separate the interface in these steps as well. First, the user has to decide if she wants a daycard or if she wants to pay per hour. Then the parking ticket has to be read. Only then do we need to see the payment options.

I've included a sample diagram, but of course it should be user tested :) The diagram is a redesign of the machine, with orange blocks indicating the steps in the procedure.

I've separated the different payment options and the parking ticket is no longer read by the same device that reads the creditcard. I think it's a lot clearer already: we need less labels, show more information and we even lost the LCD-screen!

Any other suggestions?

Building design

An old favorite of mine is this window (picture taken september 2007, Bernoulliborg - Groningen, NL), it is just impossible to use! :)

Although the big window looks fancy, it is impossible to walk through the corridor if it is opened! The window has no 'half-open' position, it is either open or not. Nor has it got hinges to support rotating it over an other axis...

Another oddity is that behind this window is not the outside world, but rather another layer of glass with blue dots on it.

Solution

Please allow the window to be opened by rotating it on the bottom axis and have it not open all the way!

Another blog on usability?

Do we really need yet another blog complaining on unusable objects and systems on this planet?

To be honest: I don't think so... Finding a name for this blog took the better part of a day (okay, that's exaggerated), as all my suggestions were rejected by blogger because others had come up with it as well, I'm not the only one finding unusable bits of world everywhere.

So, this blog is mostly for myself, but readers are welcome and responses even more!

The idea is to post three times a week (the same days as XKCD :) ), with an example of a usability difficulty. If you have examples, please send them in!

Posts will be short and constructive (rather than the usual long articles complaining about problems :)) and I'll try to come up with solutions for the problems I present. Also, every post (except this one) will have photos!

Now let's get going!