
Notification Overload and User Control - moz-ur
https://medium.com/firefox-ux/notification-overload-and-user-control-4b590271188e#
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hon1nbo
This article presents some very good points on how the user experiences
workflow, and I have been taking significant note of this in my recent work. I
shall preface this story with the detail that I have a hundred-odd
notifications a day I have to read and, for the majority of them, act in some
way whether it be a reply or logging into a system. Having started wearing an
Android watch recently, I became more immersed in my notifications. However,
due to a OEM implementation of notification permissions I ended up having to
allow notifications on the home screen as well as the watch. Whilst this would
normally only be a nuisance from a privacy standpoint, I found that it was
causing additional disruption in my workflow. When I would look at my phone
and see the first line of a message, which I was not used to seeing, I would
then subconsciously either unlock the phone, or if it seemed relatively benign
read it on my watch. However, after reading on my watch I found I ended up
opening it on the phone anyway to either reply or read it in full. Since
switching to AOSP and disabling lock screen details, while keeping the watch
on, I started only looking at my watch and then answering on the phone when
necessary. This subtle difference in going from phone-watch-phone to watch-
phone was a significant shift in how I started processing my messages. When I
was reading first on my phone, I was trying to determine with too much effort
if the message was worth my time. When I got it on the watch first, it became
easier to optimize my workflows. Over the course of hundreds of emails this
became a significant interruption. Even the most subtle of notifications can
be devastating to a proper flow when presented in larger numbers.

