Brain Freeze

While messing with a Google Apps setup I have created for my volunteer group I found some interesting things about entering events. Not sure they’re features given the circumstances but they’re interesting nonetheless.

First of all, I selected 1pm to 3pm on a Thursday and entered the term “Kayak Thursday” (no quotes). The calendar application then entered an event for me for the Thursday after the Thursday I had selected.

Then I tried entering “Kayak-Thursday” (again no quotes) and it then scheduled the event for the Thursday prior to the Thursday I had selected.

Putting the title in quotes makes it work the way I want.

I’m not sure this is a feature I really like. When I select a specific day put the event on that day. Don’t try to guess what I want. The behavior with the “-Thursday” was even more odd even though it sort of makes sense. Well, it makes sense now. It certainly didn’t make sense then.

I can understand these things for the quick event feature but not given the context I was in while entering events.

I hadn’t used the Spring form tag library before and decided to give it a shot for a small test form I was creating. I am using a subclass of SimpleFormController to return a simple list of value/name pairs from a database call to populate a select/option list in the HTML. I figured it would be easy enough to return an ArrayList as my command object and that is populated with HashMaps of the key/values. Oops. Doesn’t work.

It appears that I have to create an object that holds the list (or maybe a list of objects with fields that are the items I need displayed in the select dropdown). It’s too bad that I can’t do it the way I want with that tag library Since this is a throw away screen though (I suppose the controller is as well) I’m not going to worry too much about it

Updated!!!

I’ll keep updating this page as I find more tools since this seems to be one of the more popular pages on this blog.

Thanks,

Jason

One thing programmers don’t generally know is good design techniques. You can usually tell when a programmer has created a UI because they’re ugly and difficult to use. There are exceptions to be sure (Romain Guy for one). For those of us that aren’t as blessed I present here a list of color pickers that allow you to pick harmonious color combinations for web sites, etc.

• Added 03/06/2007:
  Kuler
  From Adobe and pronounced “cooler” this is a fantastic color chooser. Not only can you create your own color scheme using a very intuitive color wheel but you can also search on the hundreds of color schemes people have already generated to find something quickly. This is a fantastic resource.
• ColorJack Sphere or more generally ColorJack.
  This is another fantastic color resource. Sphere is another easy to use color wheel with options for both the traditional RYB color wheel as well as the standard RGB model. There are many algorithms to choose from (triad, complementary, etc) but the really unique thing about this tool is the ability to see how color blind people interpret colors. Very cool stuff. ColorJack also offers a service similar to Kuler where you can see color schemes others have created using the Studio tool on the website.
• Colors on the Web
  This site is more than a color chooser (one is available from the Color Wheel menu option) as it also gives user-created color schemes, forums, writing on color theory, etc. It’s a fantastic resource for those who want to learn more about color.
• Color SynthAxis
  OK. This is a real designers tool and complicated but damn is it cool. I believe it is best explained by the tutorial.
• Added 11/25/2007:The Color Wizard

The interesting thing is that tools such as these are coming out of the woodwork these days. At one time Harmony, a Photoshop plugin for the Mac from Hot Door, was the only thing available. They now recommend Kuler and their own application hasn’t been updated in years. My how things change.

I love using AOL’s radio website. The player has a fantastic lineup of channels to listen to and the sound quality is wonderful. I never look at the AOL.com site for the most part. Until tonight.

The only thing I can say is damn. How much more obvious do they have to make it that they’ve totally poached the UI from yahoo.com. NOT only that website but AOL’s webmail client is almost a direct rip of the new Yahoo Mail UI, but it’s uglier.

At least AOL didn’t copy Yahoo Calendar (which is awful these days) for their own web calendar. They poached the UI from Google Calendar for that

The other night I was ordering some clothing (a new coat and some slip-on moc shoes if you must know) from Lands End and had a fantastic experience…for most of it anyhow.

I have to say that they have done a wonderful job in the shopping experience. The site is quite easy to navigate and finding the color, size, etc. you need is really easy. They have also done a fantastic job in the support of the buying process when you need help on such things as what the definition of Tall means, etc.

Great. But they have totally failed after the sale is over (an area I believe that Amazon.com has done wonderfully). Where do I see my orders? Where are the easy to click links for tracking those orders? Come on guys. This stuff really is not that hard.

Listing my orders

If I sign in to the My Account section of the Lands End site nowhere to be found is a listing of my orders currently in process. In fact nowhere on the site can you find such a listing. Again this stuff is not hard. Have a page that shows my in-process orders, the stage at which they are in whole process, etc. When the order has shipped have a link to the proper shipping site that already has the information embedded so that I don’t have to input it. Lots of other sites that are a lot smaller than Lands End/Sears are doing this.

They are relying on my to use the email that is sent when the order is placed. Really poor design guys.

Tracking my orders

OK so I still have the email with my order number. Wonderful. I can track it that way. Oops. Not so fast. The link provided takes me to the right page on their website for order tracking but it doesn’t have the number populated in the text input. I have to copy and paste it in. Clicking the button then forwards me to the UPS tracking page with my information already input so that the tracking information comes right up.

Yeah. Rewind just a bit. They know how to do this on the order tracking page but they haven’t figured out that a clickable list available right my from account page would be good too. Odd.

The other thing I don’t get is why not just have a clickable link in the email that goes directly to the UPS site with the relevant tracking number already set up?

Wrap Up

So kudos to Lands End for most of the experience because the shopping experience itself is fantastic. They really need to work on the follow-up though. They have great customer service but it isn’t showing there.

A couple of days prior to their melt-down, um, I mean before their public beta started after Techcrunch, I received an email inviting me in to the private beta of mint.com. Lets face it, this was one site that almost everyone wanted in on and who could resist the pull of pain-free personal finance. They say “put your finances on autopilot”. How about starting with “put your finances on self-destruct” followed up with a dollop of “wow….this is what everyone was foaming at the mouth over?”.

First off let me say that the site itself is very nice looking. They have done a great job with the look. Green makes me feel calm. I feel calmer just looking at their front page. If looks were everything then they’ve hit a home run. However once I created an account the beauty contest winner started looking more like Miss South Carolina in the Miss Teen USA 2007 competition.

I Personally Believe…

The first time I logged in to Mint I couldn’t add any of my accounts. No Chase. No LaSalle. Nothing. Not one of the sites would connect to get my data. I realize that this type of system is highly dependent on the financial institutions not changing their sites but I never even received a notice that there were any problems. It’s a beta guys and you should be able to notify your customers a bit better than having to look in the forums to see what is going on. Beta? This felt like Alpha.

Some people out there in our nation don’t have maps…

After the site launch at Techcrunch the problems only became worse. Not only could I not get any financial data but I couldn’t even use the site. It was inundated with new people trying to get signed up and logged in. At the very least they finally, after a day or two, managed to get a note up on the front page letting us know that due to overwhelming demand they were having problems and were working on fixing them. Good. Maybe though with a known waiting list for the private beta they could have anticipated this? Awful job all around so far and I haven’t even talked yet about the actual site.

…the Iraq everywhere like such as and…

So I finally got in. I was able to get my accounts set up and had transactions downloaded. Now what? I can:

• See some nice graphs of spending trends
• Categorize transactions that haven’t been automatically categorized
• Label/tag transactions
• Find ways to save money

Spending Trends

This feature is so underwhelming I really don’t have much to say. They show you nice graphs that are animated when you drill down into them but thats about all that happens. There really isn’t much more to that area of the site. Boooo!

Transactions and Categories

Great. I can view transactions from multiple bank accounts/credit cards. I can already do that in lots of other places. I can categorize but only with the categories Mint has chosen. You read that right. I can’t create my own categories in a “personal finance” application. And this is a “beta”?

Everything else

I found out today in the forums that there is no way to cancel an account via the website. “We’re in beta” they tell us. “Email us and we will remove your account.” They’re keeping very sensitive personal financial data and the only way I can cancel an account is to email someone. Again this is a beta?

…so we can build up our future…for our children…

Mint has a long way to go and I simply can’t believe the fuss that was made over this site. I’ve been using Yodlee for awhile and their MoneyCenter site stomps Mint into a muddy pulp (and funny enough Mint is powered by Yodlee). I want to like Mint. I really do but it’s all looks. There is no depth there. Now just need to email them my cancellation….

Update: The only way to contact Mint is via the contact form on their website. No email address, phone numbers, or addresses seem to be located anywhere on their website. How shady is that?

Update 2: I was contacted via the comments by Anton Commissaris from Mint. He commented to correct my information and apparently Mint does have an email address and phone number on their site - on the Privacy and Security page. I was in error that there wasn’t a phone number/email address but to be honest when I want to find a phone number for a company I am dealing with I would expect it to be on the more conventional, Contact Us, page. If I want a mailing address I also expect to find it on the Contact Us page. Why would those bits of information be buried on a page about privacy and security? Come on Mint, get with the program.

Mr. Commissaris also states that Mint uses the email route of account cancellation for security purposes. I don’t buy it. Maybe I am incorrect here but a way to cancel my account online, where I have already authenticated, should be as secure as an email if not more-so. At the very least make it more obvious how to cancel an account and have a email address that makes more sense such as “accounts@mint.com” for example. It would also be helpful if the guy running the Mint forums knew this information instead of giving information such as given here.

I was reading an article today about the launch of Google Presentations and the author noted that

I’ve complete abandoned using Microsoft Office altogether, but I do have NeoOffice installed for offline usage (mostly when flying).

Hmmm…Mac user maybe? Not sure why he’d want to abandon Microsoft Office in favor of NeoOffice but hey to each his own. But then he goes on to mention that the Google offering doesn’t have all of the bells and whistles of PowerPoint but that somehow makes it more appealing. Then somehow he puts in another dig at Office with

Anyone who has used the Microsoft Office 2007 ribbon is able to explain their frustration at what at first is a bizarre interface that takes a fair bit of learning.

I’d counter that based on all of the conversations I have had with people who have switched to Office 2007 (or articles I’ve read) that in fact the interface takes minimal learning.

Here is a snapshot of part of the ribbon for Word 2007 (click for the original screen capture)

Clearly this is a different paradigm than the traditional text menu with a graphic toolbar below it but would it really take a fair bit of learning? Options are actually presented more clearly than in any other version of the Office applications. Most importantly everything you can do with the application is provided in the ribbon (preferences aside). There is no hunting through many layers of menu items.

Items are logically grouped (with a text label at the bottom indicating the grouping) and the most important options are provided to the user with more visual feedback. Items used more often are larger while items used less often are smaller. In addition all items can be collapsed at once if the user wants to concentrate on what they’re writing.

Microsoft invested a significant amount of time researching and designing the ribbon (3 years). For more information on their research see this posting from Jensen Harris at Microsoft.

Near the end of his article the author of the Google presentation software “first impression” says

…like Docs and Spreadsheets before it is straight to the point

right after the quip about the Ribbon in Office 2007. Actually Microsoft made it to the point prior to Google Presently and with all of the features of Office intact. The Ribbon allows you to get more done in less time. How much more to the point can they get?