Connecting the dots

June 9, 2009 2:39 AM

A minor enhancement for Ask (maybe)..

Appending the top ten "related questions" suggestions (featured on the questions posting form) to the bottom of posted questions would be pretty nifty. It would also engender more accurate tagging once users got the hang of how it worked.

posted by a non e mouse to feature requests at 2:39 AM (18 comments total)

You mean instead of the top five that are already there?
posted by Pants! at 2:56 AM on June 9

Fuck.

Delete.
posted by a non e mouse at 2:58 AM on June 9

Seems I only scroll down to the question box.
posted by a non e mouse at 2:59 AM on June 9

That's okay. I've never actually scrolled down this far on the page before.
posted by Item at 3:05 AM on June 9

What is scroll?



















Now, I know that some of you will be thinking that that was just a throwaway smartarse comment. But I've recently had to deal with a web based software package (for generating school reports, as it happens) whose designer apparently didn't believe that his users would know how to use a scroll bar.

On some (but not all) screens, there's a "paging size" dropdown menu that you can use to limit the number of database rows displayed to the "paging size", which defaults to 10. You can make it 5, 10, 20 or All. If you make it All, it shows you everything and you can indeed just scroll up and down to see what doesn't fit inside the initial browser window.

Since most users find that the default "paging size" also requires scrolling to see all 10 entries, and since most of the screens this thing applies to only involve about 15 database rows anyway, and since the system reverts to the default size every time you revisit a given screen, it's really easy to conclude that you've applied your changes to every available database row when in fact you've only seen the first 10.

And this is not the most egregious piece of UI breakage in this package. It has lots more. Teachers should no more be allowed to design software than software designers should be allowed to teach classrooms.
posted by flabdablet at 3:49 AM on June 9 [2 favorites]

Here's a throwaway smartarse comment for those of you left hanging.
posted by ryanrs at 3:56 AM on June 9 [2 favorites]

than software designers should be allowed to teach classrooms.

Is our classrooms learning?
posted by Horace Rumpole at 5:00 AM on June 9

No software designers left behind.
posted by educatedslacker at 6:32 AM on June 9

I guess no one does read the comments down there
posted by ShawnString at 6:44 AM on June 9

We've looked at your suggestion and decided to implement it AskMe-wide as of 5:40 this morning. HTH!
posted by jessamyn at 7:29 AM on June 9 [1 favorite]

And now we dance.
posted by cortex at 8:00 AM on June 9

*dances*
posted by cortex at 8:00 AM on June 9

Aren't you stealing pb's glory? What if pb wants to dance?
posted by philomathoholic at 8:14 AM on June 9

He can do so if he wishes, and he can furthermore leave his acquaintances in the antechamber.
posted by cortex at 8:18 AM on June 9 [4 favorites]

Like a wave on the ocean? Romance?
posted by SpiffyRob at 8:23 AM on June 9 [1 favorite]

Dancing is like standing still, only faster.

*stands still*
posted by blue_beetle at 8:28 AM on June 9

[...and he can furthermore leave his acquaintances in the antechamber.]

This has gotta be a(n?) euphemism for something. If not, I declare it is from this day forward.
posted by deborah at 9:25 AM on June 9

Yep, we already do this, I'm gonna close it up.
posted by mathowie at 9:46 AM on June 9