launchpad-dev team mailing list archive

[Jonathan Lange <jml@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hey guys,

Maybe you know, maybe you don't, but we have a page on the developer
wiki that talks about how to design user-facing features.

It's cunningly disguised as a review page, and you can find it here:
    https://dev.launchpad.net/UI/Reviews

Here are the interesting bits, pasted for the link-shy:

== 10 questions to ask yourself before starting a branch ==

 1. Why are we doing this feature? And why now?
 2. Is the page necessary? Or is it small enough to be an expandable
section of another page?
 3. Is there any other page in Launchpad that does something similar?
 4. What value will this add to users?
 5. Will this make it harder for other users to complete tasks?
 6. How would you "tweet" this change? (i.e. describe in 140 characters)?
 7. Are there any other pages that should change their behavior/look
with this change?
 8. Have you had a pre-implementation call with someone outside your team?
 9. If this changes the users' workflow significantly, what does the
transition look like?
 10. How are we going to introduce this feature to its users?

== Principles ==

 * Think about the entire life of the data / object, not just how it's entered.
 * Try to break it.
 * Every error should have a way out.
 * Talk to an actual user.
 * Remember that different users have different access levels.
 * Have pictures of what it actually looks like, don't just cover "the
happy case".

Enjoy,
jml