Sort of final graphics

This gallery contains 5 photos.

For now, you’re just going to have to imagine the slideshow graphics.

3C Comment Reply

In response to the suggestions, we decided to break down our main page into three basic content boxes (excluding the logo/header):

1. Simplified dropdown menu.  This means: a) renaming the “External” category to something less confusing, such as “resources”, etc.; b) limiting each dropdown column to no more than two levels.

2.  Expanded JavaScript slideshow, featuring: a) an initial slide describing “what is” the CDG; b) additional content relocated from the “popular data sets” and “featured topics” boxes; c) and additional slides for rotating content.

3.  A very bright/distinct, aggressive box sharing the central part of the screen with the slideshow, containing an invitation for new users, and/or a login for existing ones.  This will be the touchstone that all users can recognize as a starting point.  This will link to the same “About” page as the “about” header in the dropdown, as well as the initial slide in the slideshow.

Let’s see what this looks like.

A better nav bar and more

Inspired by how bad the nav bar is I decided to try and make a quick and dirty new nav bar framework. Somehow that turned into me making a quick and dirty mock-up of the whole site.

Some thoughts

• The slideshow only has two items in it. That doesn’t make for much of a rotating slideshow. I think coming up with 4-6 slides that really encapsulated the core concepts of the Climate Data Guide would make a much stronger front page.
• Noticed that some of the nav bar links have hover text that describes what the link is about. This is just plain bizarre. If your nav link requires explanation. Then you are doing it wrong. A nav link should ideally be brief and easily understood so as to simplify navigation. Their nav bar has soo much in it that it somehow manages to complicate it. I tried to take a screenshot of the hover text but my mac isn’t playing nice tonight. One example is that if you hover on the link “External” it says “external sites relevant to the Climate Data Guide”
  • This brings up the point why didn’t they just use the word “links” for that menu item. Good user design involves following internet conventions so that the user knows what to expect
• I like the featured topics and popular data sets lists. I think they do a good job of showcasing part of what the Climate Data Guide is all about. Maybe they could become slides?
• Put a log in link up at the top to encourage users to log in and contribute. Perhaps it could be in the upper right hand corner or in the nav bar?
• Clicking About Us and Home taking you to the same page. This is just bizarre, unexpected, and confusing. About Us should take you to a page that gives a brief introduction to what the website is all about.
• This website seems intent on burying the lead. The project is such a cool idea but there is simply too much clutter to really even get a handle on what’s going on. Everything needs to be simplified and streamlined. This may mean cutting some content but in the end a simpler website will be better able to communicate to the user what it is about and that will make people more likely to participate. Increased participation is one of the outcomes that NCAR really hopes to achieve with a redesign.

Where do these links go?

The “search” “share” and “join” buttons seem to be very user friendly. They are large, easy to see, and users should be able to guess where the link will take them.

The “search” button does do what a user would expect. It takes you to the search page. However, the “join” button takes the user to a log in page with no other explanation.

To improve usability this page should have some instructions about joining the site.

The “share” button and the “Ten questions about data sets” slide both take users to the same page and the page is confusing to navigate. There are quotes at the top that I’m guessing are meant to promote the need for contributors, but there is no real explanation for why they are there. The “ten questions” are on that page but users need to scroll way down to the bottom. In addition, the slide show blurb makes it appear as though scientists are actually answering these questions, but the questions act more as contributor guidelines. The side bar to the right clutters the page further.

 

 

 

To improve usability the “share” and “ten questions” pages need to be made two separate pages. Include the quotes on the “share” page to make them more of a marketing tool. The right side bar should be removed. A new page featuring the “ten questions” needs to be created. This page should link to data sets on the site that feature scientists/researchers addressing these questions.

Menu Bar, Revisited

But the top menu bar is still confusing, with weird categories like “external” and a poorly functioning search element.  So let’s get rid of those:

Stop Dropping

We also looked at cancelling out the dropdown overload taking place.  This would entail each individual menu bar target having its own, more comprehensive page.  This would also require more clickthroughs, but less user fatigue, since each intermediate page would require less intense examination.

This might require a brief sidebar of popular links at the left or bottom of the front page, or a breakdown of the “Popular Data Sets” box.  Another possibility would be a direct navbar to the various data sets, which could possibly fit next to the slimmed down main page:

No-Scroll Frontpage

One idea was to eliminate virtually all of the non-logo elements, and stick with a non-dropdown menu bar, the existing slideshow, and not a whole lot else:

This would allow the user to view the entire frontpage without scrolling; condense the page width, to make for a cleaner look; and avoid scattering the user’s attention.

Better searching through technology

The search page begs for faceted searching. WorldCat.org demonstrates faceted search interface for bibliographic data. This site would be a great model for a redesign of the search functionality for the Climate Data Guide.

Users enter keyword(s) into the search bar and limiters appear to the left. The number of results returned on clicking a limiter are displayed next to the specific limiter. Leaving the search bar blank returns all data sets. Clicking a limiter will update the returned results in the main body of the page. Using faceted searching in this manner allows for greater search functionality and displays results so that users can more readily see them.

Priority Table