ninja_bill ([info]ninja_bill) wrote,
@ 2005-06-12 07:19:00
Previous Entry  Add to memories!  Tell a Friend  Next Entry
well before it gets taken down....here is my senior design project. It was recommended to me to have real people test it but i never got around to asking you guys for suggestions....
http://www.mymediauniverse.com
it supposed to help people organize their books, CDs, and DVDs, basically creating a big list of what you have that can be viewable by other people (we made it so only mutual friends could view your list). There was gonna b a want list too but we didnt get around to it.

kinda skimped on the partial phrase searching. And there are no databases for CDs (CDDB is stupid), so you really cant add much music. But overall thought it came out pretty well for the amount of time we put into it.
We even implemented a collaborative filtering and recommender system! See if you can find where.

(7 comments) - (Post a new comment)


[info]ranmaguy
2005-06-12 08:07 pm UTC (link)
Dude, if this is your senior project, then I would have had 2 masters degrees by now. XD

One horrible design flaw: You cannot add your own entries. Let's say for some crazy reason that the databases that you use do not have what you own, or maybe you can't find it via the wordmatch. What happens then? You can't add your title.

(Reply to this)


[info]ranmaguy
2005-06-12 08:09 pm UTC (link)
Oops, additional recommendation.

In your collection, have links to like IMDB for movies (don't know how CDs work) so the person can easily find more information about the title. I had this tendancy to click on "My Life" as it was underlined, only to find that it was just an underline. So you should either:

1. Remove the underline and use just italics
2. Turn it into a link that goes to IMDB or something.

(Reply to this)


[info]ranmaguy
2005-06-12 08:13 pm UTC (link)
Again.

Friend finder doesn't seem to work or is in conflict with the "Add Friend" button. I mean, you have a textbox with says "Friend Finder" but the button says "Add Friend".

The button should be "Find", and then when you search, a list of names pull up with links to add a friend.

Also, I have no idea why the page refreshes when I check/uncheck a box. Doesn't make sense unless you're using XML-RPC, which I don't think you are using judging by just looking at the source.

(Reply to this)


[info]ranmaguy
2005-06-12 08:15 pm UTC (link)
Sidenote:

I recommend you study HCI, or Human Computer Interaction. It's what I'm currently studying at NASA, and it's basically about how to properly design applications, applicances, etc that are suitable for the enduser.

Remember, when you design something, you're not designing it for yourself, but the enduser. Therefore, you shouldn't assume that your method of interface design will be the best one.

This is also why you should have people test your work before you submit it, because they are normal users and can help you point out your design flaws so you can fix them.

A recommended HCI read is Don Norman. He's famous for the psychology of interface design and interactions between user and interface.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]ranmaguy
2005-06-12 08:17 pm UTC (link)
"We even implemented a collaborative filtering and recommender system! See if you can find where."

Point exactly. You don't want the user to have to dig his/her way through to find it. It should be easily accessible.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]ninja_bill
2005-06-15 03:01 am UTC (link)
it is easily accessable.
you obviously just didnt notice it. Of course you couldnt tho, since you need friends in order to notice it....And dont get me started on how that is a bad algorithm.

basically your whole point was that we didn't get recommendations from real users. Of course, that is what i said in the beginning. We SHOULD have done it...but we didnt. And we didn't really care that much cause it isn't an area of great job growth these days. It was just a fun project to do.

the "horrible design flaw" was done on purpose. We didnt want stupid users to add in extra entries, cuz then there would be 10 different entries for each movie. Even if people found other entries, they might even want to make their own that they think are "better" than the rest. With that kind of sludge around, its usefulness as a search utility/recommender system would completely suck.

"additional recommendation" : if we got everything else implemented, we were going to do that. Especially needed in a real app would b the CDs, cuz no one remembers the album title that much, being able to at least view the songs might be useful haha.

friend finder assumed you have talked to your friend using AIM or something.

I made the page refresh to change the options that you could search by. Didnt make sense to let a user search by album title if they wernt searching CDs. I think before that we were able to keep it the same.
It was also sad having to take out the code that would keep your last search up, so that if you were adding alot you wouldnt have to keep searching...but it wasnt working perfectly so for the presentation we took it out.

And i think you've realized it yourself by now but: NO, you do not need to finish college.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]ranmaguy
2005-06-15 05:54 am UTC (link)
Bill, I love you because you take my shit and agree in your own words.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

(7 comments) - (Post a new comment)

Create an Account
Forgot your login or password?
Log in with OpenID
English • Español • Deutsch • Русский…