Hi Joachim,
Yes, we are aware some biologists find it daunting at first. Once they
are shown how to do a couple of queries they love it but that is not
the point of an ideal GUI design. We did user test the current one but
since then I must admit I have learnt a lot more about usability
testing and we are applying this during the whole 0.8 design process
Cheers
Damian
On 18 Mar 2010, at 11:23, Joachim Baran
<[email protected]> wrote:
Hello,
We are about to get the mart we built up and running soon and while we
were developing it, but also now as it is getting finalised, I kept
asking colleagues whether they could give it a try and test the
interface a little bit. Whilst the purpose was to find possible
inconsistent data in our mart and to check the performance of database
queries, *all* participants were simply overwhelmed by the mart
user-interface.
Even though I find the interface accessible myself, I have to admit
that I spent quite some time with BioMart now, so my opinion is
certainly not unbiased anymore. If it is not too late, it would be
great if BioMart 0.8 could be tested for usability on non-computer
scientists/non-bioinformaticians before it is released.
Best Wishes,
Joachim
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Faculty of Life Sciences
The University of Manchester
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