Issue

The current information architecture of the home dashboard is confusing and not accessible from other parts of the system. 

Research Methods

Structured Interviews (Annotation Analysis):

• Users wanted to access their notifications from anywhere in the systems rather than being restricted to the dashboard.

• They expressed that filter functions can be helpful, but confusing. 

Comparative Analysis:

• Icons are helpful for displaying information.

• Many products have notification panels accessible from the header bar.

Goal

Based off of our research, we wanted to design for a panel that could be accessible from the header bar. We needed to choose what to cut and what to keep when transferring items from the inbox into this smaller panel. 

Design Process

• Tabs

  • The original design’s tabs helped users parse the items they needed to address, but still were overwhelming and had confusing names.

  • Therefore, they were reduced from six to three, with two types of item in each tab:

  • Assigned merged Assignments and Actions, as the category for items that need attention before a deadline.

  • Following merged Notifications and Scribe (comments from others on your work), as the category for items other people are bumping towards you.

  • Downloads/Drops merged Downloads and Drops, as the category for files. 

• Filters

  • Interview participants reported the filters to be confusing for first-time users, so they needed to be simplified.

  • Filters were reduced to two main categories, being Type and Time

  • Downloads/Drops were the exception, being simple enough to just require a time filter. 

• Icons and Layout

  • To help quickly differentiate the types of items, pre-existing world icons were made visible on the notifications panel

  • The panel items lean away from the table format, utilizing more vertical space to reduce the horizontal space. In the final design text is stacked on top of each other, with varying colors and boldness lending importance to its Number and Due date. 

• Quick Actions

  • Actions, such as pinning and dismissing, were placed on the right hand side of the panel and accessible through hovering on the item. 

Takeaways

Issue

The current information architecture of bookmarks on the home dashboard takes up a lot of space and is difficult to parse. 

Research Methods

Structured Interviews (Annotation Analysis):

• Bookmarks and Saved Searches were among the features users valued the most.

• Users felt that the dashboard should prioritize showcasing the most important and pressing information.

Goal

From there, we decided on a widget-based design for the dashboard. My personal task was to restructure the Bookmarks into a more compact widget.

Design Process

• Bookmarks Widget

• The bookmarks are more or less the same, with some polishing of placement; the actions such as the drag icon, edit button, and delete button appear upon hover, and rather than having the current overlay that appears when a new folder is created, the folder simply appears and can be dragged and dropped into and out of other folders. Additionally, since bookmarks in particular can't be renamed, there will be an add a note feature that can be seen on hover.

Takeaways