Interface

The "Eat Me Drink Me" article was interesting because it allowed me to understand a lot of things on the computer that I did not know before. Such as what a wizard is. I realized what type of pages I should use for what type of services I offer. If I wanted to go through something very complex in my site that required visitor interaction I would use a wizard (but only if it was used sometimes) and if I thought the wizard was too time consuming I would use a box of options. Basically I need to be aware of my audience while designing the page.

In the "Politics of the Interface" I read that technology is difficult to use if it is English based and a person does not know English. It was interesting to learn that the authors thought the reliance to change such things fell on English teachers. Becoming a technology critic as well as a user was an interesting section because it really stressed that teachers become aware of what programs are out there for their students to use, and determining which is the best one.

The website I used is www.webkinz.com

Initially the interface expects me know what I am looking for. When I look in the webkinz catalog I am given only a simple page that has a tool bar on top. When I click on what I want, the page changes to show that, but it is the same thing over and over. Within the webkinz world, once you have signed up, you can create a world for your animal. In that interface you choose what type of webkinz you have, whether it is a boy or a girl, what it lives in, what its world is going to be like.

Conventional across the interfaces are the option tools that allow you to view specifically what you desire. Non-conventional tools on this interface is probably the fact that it does not allow you to be specific—its bottons are too broad.

The thins I would change about this interface is that I would make it more specific. I would make the bottons that refer to the webkinz collection, for instance, break down into types of animals that they offer. This not only makes it more user friendly but allows the sit to be more customized for the user.

In the store locater portion, where one can choose which city, state, and country that they are looking for, the interface is pretty basic there too. It begins with choosing what specific product you are looking for. It allows you to choose and search for your area. The thing that I would change about it though is that there are a few cities on there that have no matches to what one is looking for so I would change that. I would add the option to go back or to have the option on the state-country-town page to go and change what you are looking for intially.