Usability week 2011 – Application usability

Nielsen Norman Group Usability Week 2011,

“Application Usability one”
session on 4^th of April 2011 by Garett Goldfield.

 

My notes and feedback from this session:

• This session was mainly focused on individual components (controls) usability issues
  
• “Easy to use” (frequent users target) vs easy to learn (new users target)
  
• www.sharpbrains.com
  
• What users WANT in applications
  
  • Control
    
  • Understanding
    
  • Recoverability
    
  • Consistency
    
  • Clutter Free (biggest problem in design now a days … everything is added nothing is removed / creates confusion)
    
  • Give satisfaction (is a differentiator)
    
  • Exceed Expectations (is a differentiator)
    
• Primitives (widgets/controls/design patterns) that work the way the users expect will be “easy to use”. It is based on people habits. People always rely on their habits (Even for tackling a new type of problem they will use previous habits/experience/knowledge and try to apply it to the new one)
  
• Gestalt principles (Sampling) : GROUPING – how human brain works to understand things
  
  • Proximity
    
  • Similarity
    
  • Closure
    
• Recognition of things – easier then recall for a human – directly applicable to “browse by subject” where subjects/sub-subjects and terms are listed for the user instead of searching for a term
  
• Big Icons/menus -> Fitt’s Law (military source: close and thus big targets are easier to hit than distant and thus small ones)
  
• Main things influencing usability:
  
  • Order and flow (left-right & top- down for western world) influences usability
    
  • Chronology influences usability (don’t put options after the download button for example)
    
  • Consistency (confusing design influences usability)
    
• Menus
  
  • Needs precise, accurate, meaningful and short labeling. Use the most important word(s)
    
  • Use less than 7 menus if possible
    
  • Respect a logical order for menu ordering and items in a menu ordering
    
  • For Windows/Apple: use their standard…don’t change the habit!
    
  • Avoid abbreviations & acronyms in menus (Drop down especially). Rather use a long version than “handicapping” the understanding of the user. Best is to test options.
    
  • Contextual menus
    
    • Very useful for experienced users
      
    • Most user are not aware of it
      
  • Avoid:
    
    • Cascading menus more than 2 levels (main and submenu)
      
    • Scrolling menus
      
  • Trends are at the moment for horizontal navigation
    
  • List menus show all options at once…user: see all, pick one.
    
  • Panel menus allow
    
    • Display of all options
      
    • Grouping
      
    • Sequencing (mini process implementation possible to “walk” the user to selecting more grouped options)
      
    • Very close to Web metaphor
      
    • eg. John Deer web site homepage.
      
• TABS
  
  • ATTENTION: options remain hidden until tab is clicked
    
  • Can be used to ORGANIZE or to CATEGORIZE
    
  • Used as views or as process
    
  • Double tab is actually a menu on two levels
    
• Toolbars
  
  • Always use tooltips
    
  • no toolbar without alternative menu
    
• Most frequently used items in a list:
  
  • You can place 1 or 2 or 3 at the top of the list…then starting the alphabetical order.
    
• Assistance to a page:
  
  • Instructional text: in-field prompts might do thinks less attractive (field already full)..sometimes also repetitive info…and attention with the text selection if the user tries to fill in that field…
    
  • Use anyway tooltips, embedded prompts and in text fields or example texts
    
  • Give controls explanations. Link out to more explanation if necessary
    
  • Write for eye scanning!
    
  • Assistance tone : friendly error handle – pay attention to words used
    
    • Describe the problem!
      
    • Don’t blame de user
      
    • Suggest ways to solve
      
• Form filling:
  
  • Make fields choice as much as possible rather than free form
    
  • Accept any format (more work for computer not for the user – related to the placement of the complexity problem also evocated by Gerry McGovern so often)
    
  • Use Smart defaults (based on user knowledge) – pre fill fields
    
• Dialog boxes…try to avoid using them as much as possible…
  
• Word wheel/predictive search works way better than the key-search (repeatedly type a letter for instance to advance in a list of words)
  
• Search design patterns
  
  • Search box long enough to suggest
    
  • Button labeled “search”
    
  • Group other similar functionality afterward (advanced search, index, sitemap)
    
  • Make sure the location is consistent on all pages
    
  • Include brief instructions or links to search tips.
    
  • Eye tracking for SEARCH:
    
    • 44% at top or left top
      
    • 56% at right top
      
• use previews (for documents, images, templates)
  
• UNDO gives use confidence…warn if actions are not undoable!!
  
• Grouping: white spaces can group effectively without much noise on the page
  
• MAPS: if you use maps on your site or related search, make sure the map is clickable!
  
• Progress: if you drive the user through a process…communicate him the progress (Step x from n)
  
• if you have a state related activity in your browser, foresee a specific SAVE button – it gives users confidence!!
  
• When using controls and where to place them…think how the users will use them
  

MVP predictions for SharePoint in 2011

In the recent article of Dan Holme, I found a very interesting selection of various MVPs (Most Valuable Professionals) predictions for SharePoint in 2011. Here are the ones I selected:

•  “Choosing a partner that understands how to properly architect cloud based SharePoint applications will make all the difference when it comes to properly securing data while also creating extensible and supportable systems.”  Todd Baginski
• “As everyone starts to do their 2010 migrations with their freshly minted 2011 budgets demand for the best talent will be tight. “ Rob Bogue
• “It’s also good that the training resources are better than they’ve ever been so it will be easier to educate internal staff – if you remembered that budget line. “ Rob Bogue
• “2011 is going to be the year we point to for when SharePoint in the cloud really got its start. Office 365 (currently in beta) is amazing and it is going to spread like wildfire in 2011. “ David Mann
• “I predict that companies will begin to take stock of their software expenses and decide to start their migrations based on business value and not on “new and shiny” like they did for the 2003 to 2007 upgrade. I predict that one driving factor in these decisions will be a focus on search (or, more correctly, findability).” Matt McDermott
• “Companies will quickly realize that SharePoint is at the heart of all things Microsoft these days and SharePoint 2010 adoption will take off! Therefore, there will be a great need for SharePoint training and consulting.” Asif Rehmani
• “2011 is the year we see Office365.” Darrin Bishop

But I strongly invite you to read the whole article (7-8 minutes reading): 

http://www.sharepointproconnections.com/article/sharepoint/SharePoint-in-2011-MVP-Predictions.aspx

Managed Accounts vs unmanaged accounts in SharePoint 2010

A Managed Account is effectively an Active Directory user account whose credentials are managed by and contained within SharePoint. This scenario is what enables farm administrators to join machines to the farm without specifying the credentials as had to be done in previous versions of the product: http://blogs.technet.com/b/wbaer/archive/2010/04/11/managed-accounts.aspx

Attention: Some SharePoint 2010 services will break, because they are default configured with managed accounts (search, usersync). SharePoint 2010 default behavior cross-pollinates unfortunately managed accounts (Search Service app) with unmanaged accounts (default cralwer).

Feedback from SharePoint Connections 2010

After participating to SharePoint Connections 2010, Den Haag, 28-29 September 2010 and to the Pre conference session on Business Connectivity Services I’ve finally succeeded in puting order to my notes and post them all here on my blog. Over all it was a very interesting event focused on SharePoint 2010 features but with comparative insights to SharePoint 2007. We had a bunch of top speakers mostly from US as well as many Microsoft partners presenting really interesting tools for SharePoint 2010 and MOSS 2007. Check it out below. Slides of the session will be availble soon on the Conference web site.

Sessions plan and schedule: http://www.devconnections.com/shows/images/schedulepdfs/F10_ShrPntEuro_Schedule.pdf

Sessions slides as uploaded by speakers: http://www.devconnections.com/updates/DenHaag/

My notes for the sessions I followed:

Tools from partners present at the SharePoint Connections 2010 in Den Haag

Information Architecture and the Managed Metadata Service: A to Z (MIT13) – my notes

Developing Windows Phone 7 Applications for SharePoint 2010 (MDV08)- mynotes

Incorporating Managed Metadata in Custom Solutions (MDV11) – my notes

Architecting and Managing Virtual- ized SharePoint 2010 Farms (MIT09) – my notes

Creating Content-Centric Sites with SharePoint 2010 Web Content Management (MNC04) – my notes

Windows PowerShell Crash Course for SharePoint Administrators (MIT07) – my notes

Creating Search-Based Solutions with SharePoint 2010 (MDV03) – my notes

Creating a Rich Business Application with the Managed Client Object Models in SharePoint 2010 (MDV01) – my notes

SharePoint & the Cloud: Pushing the Boundaries (KEYNOTE) – my notes

Business Connectivity Services Deep Dive (MDVWRK1) – my notes (1 full day Pre Conference Session)

Tools from partners present at the SharePoint Connections 2010 in Den Haag

SharePoint Connections 2010, Den Haag, 28-29 September 2010

Interesting and useful tooling I found from partners present at this conference:

• HiSoftware Compliance Sheriff (www.hisoftware.com ) helps you automate the process of compliance testing and guarantees you that your content is following well established policies. It covers 5 important areas:
  •  Invasion of privacy – ensures that corporate sensitive information or personal data like passwords, credit cards, health records, etc are not published to sites, documents or email.  Checks various privacy protection acts and decisions (EU directives & US acts on privacy, health & children privacy acts like COPPA & GLBA, etc)
  • Accesibility compliance – WCAG (1.0 & 2.0), Common look & feel (CLF), XML accessibility Guidelines (XAG)
  • Social networking content policy enforcement (e.g. inappropriate language).
  • Brand Integrity & Site Quality (e.g. multiple logos & formats, etc)
  • Operational Security Breach (compliance with OPSEC guidelines)
• Aptimize (http://www.aptimize.com; http://www.aplicationperformance.com )  is an ISAPI filter  which speeds up the display of web pages in the client browser by collecting and shrinking into a single file all the dependent resources needed by the display of that page. (css, images, javascripts, etc). It also provides different options of dynamic or progressive display of your web page. The editors (AP) also provide users with a very useful free performance analysis tool. When run against one website page, it displays processing time as well as the sequence of all components called by that page and in parallel it simulates the behavior of that page in case Aptimize would be used to render that page..
• Powershell references and scripts: http://www.concentratedtech.com/download
• SharePoint Performance Manager from Idera (http://www.idera.com/toolsforsharepoint/)– allows you analyze and manage performance issues across multiple SharePoint farms from infrastructure level and up to the page display time.  Idera provides also a very nice free tool called SharePoint Performance Monitor allowing you to identify possible performance bottlenecks in your SharePoint sites (check more on the web)
• Powershell tooling & resources:
  • http://www.shellhub.com
  • http://www.concentratedtech.com
• Business connectivity services (BCS) tooling:
  • Generate artifacts for Outlook solutions> BCS Artifact Generator: http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/odcsps14bcsgnrtrtool
  • BCS Packaging Tool (to package and deploy your BCS Solution):
• Windows Phone tooling:
  • http://developer.windowsphone.com download all tools and phone emulators
• Mindjet MindMap 9.0 with SharePoint add-in: gives you the ability to visualize content from Sharepoint in a Mind Manager map. (http://www.mindjet.com/products/mindmanager-extensions/mindmanager-explorer-for-sharepoint/overview)
• Keep alive job utility from Andrew Connell ( AC’s SharePoint 2010 Site Collection Keep Alive Job Utility (v1.1 – Updated June 7, 2010) for site warm-up : to be used before demos and presentations or for testing purposes.
• MAPILab – Reporting tool for SharePoint and Exchange : http://www.mapilab.com/

Information Architecture and the Managed Metadata Service: A to Z (MIT13) – my notes

SharePoint Connections 2010, Den Haag, 29 September 2010

Session: Information Architecture and the Managed Metadata Service: A to Z (MIT13)

Speaker: DAN HOLME

• Term Store hierarchy
  • TERM Store -> TERM GROUP -> TERM Set -> TERM
• Other labels (synonyms): if other labels(synonyms) are input for a given term, when the user types one of theses synonyms in a list where he uses the managed metadata, what the system will keep in the list is the real term and not the synonym
• The number of available working languages of the TERM Store depends on the language packs installed on the server.
• Security:
  • Security at the TERM Store scope: you need the be declared as ‘TERM Store Administrator’ to be able to manage the TERM groups
  • Permission for who has the right to do what with the terms is situated at TERM GROUP level (Group Managers, Contributors) -> delegation to librarians for the management of the TERMS is now possible.
  • TERM Sets have a Contact and Stakeholders fields but these fields do not set any permission levels. If a contact is put in the Contact text box at the level of the term set, then a “send feedback” link appears for users when selecting terms from that term set using browse button in a SharePoint list using a Managed Metadata column.
• If you change a term, the change will be reflected to all items being tagged with that term – this can create a historical data consistency
• If you delete a term, it will be deleted in all items being tagged with that term
• Known Managed Metadata Service LIMITS:
  • 30 000 TERMS per TERM Set
  • 1 000 TERM Sets in a TERM Store
  • 1 000 000 TERMS in a TERM Store
• OBS: as it is, the management tool of this Managed Metadata Service is not great…dealing with thousands of TERM can be a pain.
• Metadata driven navigation on SharePoint lists – very useful to filter lists and find content
• Content Type Syndication
  • = Define the content type once and use it in multiple locations
  • How you do it: define a Publisher HUB = a site collection to which we publish the content types; Content Type HUB is a property on the Managed Metadata Service Application which indicates the site collection serving as publisher for the syndicated content types. (known bug: you have to type this property correctly as it can not be changed later)
  • Configure Service Application connection: Managed Metadata Service Connection (proxy) properties have to be checked as well to allow connections to the HUB:
    • Consumes content type from the define HUB
    • Accept updates of the published content types.
  • Two timer jobs to consider so that all works:
    • Content type hub job
    • Content type subscriber job
  • The published content type will be available in subscribers’ content type galleries
• Important takeaway: Create a site collection dedicated as a content type hub for enterprise wide content types
• MMS can be published across sites.

Developing Windows Phone 7 Applications for SharePoint 2010 (MDV08)- mynotes

SharePoint Connections 2010, Den Haag, 29 September 2010

Session: MDV08: Developing Windows Phone 7 Applications for SharePoint 2010 (MDV08)

Speaker: PAUL STUBBS (http://blogs.msdn.com/b/pstubbs/)

• Globally Web parts are not rendered but only content is rendered on the mobile from a SharePoint site.
• If you wish to render web parts content, use Mobile web part adapters:
  • Renders alternate view
  • Lookup in browser.compat config file
  • Supported in SharePoint Foundation
  • Use Microsoft.SharePoin.WebpartPages.MobileAdapter
  • Override CreateControlForDetailView()
• Applications supported on Windows Phone:
  • Silverlight (business applications)
    • Modern XAML/event driven application UI framework
  • XNA (games)
• Capabilities of the Phone (features writable against SharePoin)
  • Input
    • Touch
    • Hardware buttons
  • Media
    • Digital media capture&playback
    • Media Library access
  • Data
    • Isolated Storage
    • LINQ
  • .NET
    • Superset of Silverlight 3.0
    • WCF (SOAP and REST services)
  • Phone Access
    • Integrated access to phone UI
    • Sensors, camera, microphone
    • Picker for contact and photos
  • Integrated with could Services
    • App deployment & updates
    • Notifications (very important for mobile services)
    • Location
    • XBOX live
• Authentication to SharePoint is an issue for development on mobile phones
  • The phone DOES NOT SUPPORT windows authentication yet but only Forms based authentication
  • Forms based authentication
    • Supported very easily through claims provider in SharePoint 2010
    • Provider neutral: SQL, LDAP
    • Solution: forms authentication provider can be set to LDAP and so the users will be still use the same username and password as the one in active directory
• Windows Phone tips for SharePoint
  • Only supports Forms Based Authentication sites in SharePoint
  • FedAuth Cookie is HTTPOnly
  • Pass along in a CookieContainer: set enableHttpCookieContainer on binding. One you have it (after authentication) always pass your CookieContainer with any list call you initiate.
  • Authentication.asmx not compatible with Service Reference in Visual Studio: use instead HttpWebRequest
  • Access to list web services works fine.
• Phone tools are working for Windows 7 only – phone development machine needs to be on Windows 7 (if you start the phone emulator in a server it will reboot L )
• Check slides for a development environment schema
• Tooling
  • http://Developer.windowsphone.com download all tools and emulators
  • Download SharePoint 2010 Developer VHD (Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard, SharePoint Enterprise with Fast, etc)
• Run your App on a Phone for tests: Matthijs Hoekstra (matthijs.hoekstra@microsoft.com )

Incorporating Managed Metadata in Custom Solutions (MDV11) – my notes

SharePoint Connections 2010, Den Haag, 29 September 2010

Session: Incorporating Managed Metadata in Custom Solutions (MDV11)

Speaker: ANDREW CONNELL  ( http://www.andrewconnell.com/ )

• Main ideas covered by this session:
  • Creating & Importing Taxonomies
  • Managed metadata columns
  • Programming with the taxonomy Field
  • Overcoming Limitations of LINQ to SharePoint
• Taxonomy TERMS scope in SharePoint 2010:
• Global terms are scoped to Service app
• Local terms are scoped to site collection
• Taxonomies are multilingual
• In Managed Metadata Service Application you can import a CSV file
• You might consider having one Service Application per domain (e.g. one for Medical, one for finance, etc))
• You have the possibility to configure the submission of terms to the Service application (‘Closed’ meaning available only for Managers of this service application or ‘Open’ to everybody); nevertheless you can not make usage of a workflow for validation of submitted terms (not out of the box)
• Operations on a TERM in a TERM set:
  • Create, copy, reuse (capability of a term of being referenced in more than one term sets but managed in only one), merge, deprecate, move
  • The Folksonomy terms are stored in the Managed Metadata Service (MMS) in the System/Keywords terms set
  • Metadata Navigation functionality can be activated on every SharePoint List: go to ‘List Settings’
  • Automate tagging of content: It is possible to enforce a specific term by default on all items/documents of a storage element like a folder for example (option in the document library)
  • Creating & Importing Taxonomies
    • From CSV file
    • Does not support importing labels (synonyms)
    • Full taxonomy API provided: Microsoft.SharePoint.Taxonomy.dll
• Not all customer needs are satisfied by MMS out of the box like for example
  • Taxonomy based on external systems
  • Inclusion for synonyms and translations
  • Options on working with taxonomies from external system:
    • Use BCS
    • Build something yourself using the API
• Working with taxonomies through the API
  • Get a taxonomy session
  • Select a term store (MM)
  • Check the code for this session for a perfect example (adding and updating new terms via l’API)
• Creating Managed Metadata Columns in a SharePoint list is possible:
  • Via Browser or SharePoint Designer
  • Declaratively (Feature)
• Programmatically
• You must set the Term Store ID, the Term Set ID
• TermSet.GetTerms() returns a TermSetCollection and has a lots of overloads (LCID, taggable terms, collection size,  filter deprecated, terms, etc)
• Tooling: Metalogix (specialized also in migration and considers metadatas)
• LINQ & SharePoint limitations:
  • SPMetal.exe’s generated entity model includes only SharePoint Foundation 2010 types – > it does not work with LINQ to update Taxonomy terms
  • BUT a solution would be to augment the generated model via ICustomMapping.MapTo() & ICustomMapping.MapFrom() (adds logic to map data in DB to field and vice versa)

Architecting and Managing Virtual- ized SharePoint 2010 Farms (MIT09) – my notes

SharePoint Connections 2010, Den Haag, 29 September 2010

Session: Architecting and Managing Virtual- ized SharePoint 2010 Farms (MIT09)

Speaker: MICHAEL NOEL (http://www.cco.com )

• Dynamically expandable disks a penalize performance so for PROD try to define a disk size
• Recommendations for Database Roles
  • If possible try not to virtualize the database servers
  • Mirroring and clustering are now supported in virtualization (KB 956893)
  • Use best practices for tempDB (put it on fast disk, resize it – there is a guidance on how to configure tempDB for SharePoint)
• Sample specifications presented for various farm types (check slides)
  • Cost effective Farm would be 1 Host with 2 quad core supporting:
    • 1 vm (10Gb, 4 proc) for SQL
    • 1 vm (10GB, 4 proc) for web applications
  • High available Farm with only two servers hosts
  • Best Practice Virtual/Physical with High availability
    • High transaction servers are physical (DB). Multiple farm support with DBs for all farms on the SQL cluster
    • 2 server hosts quad core supporting each
      • 4 vm: 2 vm for web applications for PROD environment, 1 vm for web applications for TEST environment & 1 vm for web applications for DEV environment
      • VMs are load balanced for PROD, TEST and DEV environments
  • Large virtual Farms:
    • 3 server hosts quad core supporting each:
      • 1 vm for DB
      • 1 vm for web applications
      • 1 vm for search server
      • 1 vm for central admin
      • 1 vm for service applications
  • NUMA (non uniform memory access) memory Limitations and Guidelines
    • It exists at the hardware level
    • You can end up with swaps if you allocate more memory to sessions than the NUMA boundary -> instead of increasing performances you end up with decreasing performance
    • Don’t get cheap on memory if you bought a server with many CPU’s
  • Monitoring:
    • Configure Counters and Thresholds on Hosts & on Guests Very interesting slide (check photo)
      • Monitoring processor on guests is useless…you have to measure this on the host
      • Memory…over 50% free is good
  • Support from Microsoft is conditioned by:
    • The hardware used for virtualization (Intel VT or AMD-v)
    • Hardware-enforced Data Execution Prevention (DEP) is available and enabled
    • Deployed on Microsoft Hyper-V (RTM or R2) or on a validated third party hypervisor (SVVP program –> ok for VMware ESX/ESXi)
  • Tooling: System Center Virtual Machine Manager (VMM 2008 R2)
    •  SCOM 2007 is aware of SharePoint features
    • Quick provisioning: Allows creation of SharePoint template servers which can be quickly provisioned on TEST or DEV environments
  • Licensing:
    • Very important to know that licensing rules related to virtual guest licensing are applicable to all SVVP program vendors: e.g. you can run VMWare ESX/ESXi on a 1 processor host and have only one windows datacenter license for all guests (Windows Datacenter license is per host processor: 4 processors on the hosts = 4 Windows datacenter licenses; it might nevertheless be more interesting to use the Windows Enterprise virtual licensing facilities)

Creating Content-Centric Sites with SharePoint 2010 Web Content Management (MNC04) – my notes

SharePoint Connections 2010, Den Haag, 29 September 2010

Session: Creating Content-Centric Sites with SharePoint 2010 Web Content Management (MNC04)

Speaker: ANDREW CONNELL (http://www.andrewconnell.com)

• Planning a SharePoint 2010 WCM Site
  • Define major areas of the site
  • Define the types of content
  • Define different rendering options on the site
  • Define major actors for different sections
  • Define content review & approval process
  • Define content management plan
• Tooling small nice application from CriticalPath Training company (check on the Members area of the web site for it: AC’s SharePoint 2010 Site Collection Keep Alive Job Utility (v1.1 – Updated June 7, 2010) for site warm-up : to be used before demos and presentations or for testing purposes.