
How would you make your software easier to use? - juwo
http://juwo-works.blogspot.com/2007/04/how-to-make-juwo-easier-to-use.html
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blader
It depends on your software. In general, here are some questions I like to
myself when I design a product in order to keep it simple:

1\. What is the product supposed to do? A corollary is to ask, what can a user
do with my product that he can't do without it? The answer to these questions
should be a single, simple, focused answer.

2\. What is the absolute minimum feature set we must have in order for the
product to do what the user needs? Question EVERYTHING. If you're designing an
email product, ask yourself if you even need folders. If you're designing a MS
Word killer, ask yourself if you even need a Save. If you're designing a media
player, ask yourself if even need a play/pause button.

After you have the minimum feature set, release the software and iterate
quickly based on user feedback. Nothing can replace raw feedback from
strangers who don't give a crap about you or your product. See what the users
like and dislike about the product, based on first hand observation.

More tricky is keeping the product simple in response to user feature demands.
Adding features is good, but only when you do it in such a way that it
complements your answer to the original question: "What is the product
supposed to do?"

You have to think about how each and every additional feature deeply
integrates into your existing product, rather than tacking features on
haphazardly. This is difficult to do. Google does this especially well
(Search, Gmail).

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juwo
"what can a user do with my product that he can't do without it?"

Not clear to me. Do you mean vis-a-vis the competition? For example, with
juwo, you can see the table of contents of the audio/video clip. This
functionality is also available in some of the flash players. Do you remove
the overlapped feature?

~~~
blader
I will assume that showing the table of contents for a media clip is more of a
feature in your product rather than your product itself. I would not remove a
feature just because the competition also has the feature. I would remove it
if the feature isn't critical to the central idea, the main motivation behind
the product. So in that sense, the competition is irrelevant in this
discussion as long as your central idea is reasonably unique.

~~~
juwo
It is one of the legs of the dog (as in the blog post). If you are interested,
I can email you a demo link.

