Usage Scenario: Directness and Awareness
Scenario 1: The "Are you there?" Phenomenon
Tanya logs on to the virtual school from Blacksburg Middle School and Spencer
logs on to the virtual school from Blacksburg High School. Tanya is working
in the notebook. Spencer can see that the notebook is locked and that Tanya's
name is highlighted as being active, but does not see the activity going
on in the notebook, and will not see it until Tanya unlocks it again. After
seeing no activity for a while, Spencer begins to wonder if Tanya is still
working at the computer terminal. He sends a chat message asking if Tanya
is still there. Tanya receives the message, and must interrupt her intent
working in the notebook to respond to Spencer's message, letting him know
that she is still working on the notebook. When she returns to working
in the notebook after sending the message, it takes her a minute to remember
where she was and what she was writing.
Spencer's chat message
Claims for Scenario
The highlighting of users who are logged in to the virtual school
+shows which group members are available for collaboration
-BUT may not be enough to assure users other group members are present
-BUT may not be understood by new users
The use of a status bar letting a user know whether a notebook is locked
or unlocked
+assures only one person can edit the contents of a notebook at a time
+shows all group members which user is currently editing the notebook
-BUT may not be enough assurance that a group member is actually working
in the notebook
The ability for group members to use chat sessions
+allows users to collaborate more quickly than email messages
+gives users a sense of immediacy
-BUT inopportune messages may interrupt users engaged in other activity
-BUT since long messages do not appear until they have been entered,
users may be inclined to fall into the "are you there" problem
Examples
This scenario may seem contrived, but this sort of thing occured often
in the logs. In fact, each group
exhibited this sort of behaviour at one time or another. One group solved
the problem by sending a message saying that unless they said otherwise
they were still there. This seemed to avoid future occurences for this
particular group, but this solution was not one inherent in the system,
and for the other groups who did not adopt this strategy the problem continuously
occured. A GOMS analysis would reflect these extra keystrokes used to determine
whether or not different group members are still there. It might also reflect
the mental effort necessary in recalling where the user was before being
interrupted by seemingly useless chat messages. The groups also exhibited
some problems in determining who was logged on. Often people would log
on to the virtual school and send out a message asking who else was logged
on. Although these messages might be avoided as people got more used to
the software and began to see that active members of their group were highlighted
on the opening screen.