Some usability issues (breadcrumb links, delete buttons)

[bittner]

I'm regularly stumbling over the following rough edges of the Shippable user interface:

1) Breadcrumb-like Title With Double-Function

• On the Subscriptions page (e.g. https://app.shippable.com/subscriptions/...) the "breadcrumb", which is the name of the Organization, is a link off the page to the organization's Bitbucket or Github repository list.
• On a Project page (e.g. https://app.shippable.com/projects/...) the breadcrumb is divided in two parts:
  1. The first part is the Organization name again, but now it is a link taking you back to the Subscriptions page.
  2. The second part is the Repository name, which takes you off the page to the Bitbucket or Github repository.

     Suggestions:

  3. All links in the breadcrumb-like title should help navigating through Shippable only! None of the links should take you off the page (except you make it really clear what will be happening!).
  4. On the Subscriptions page the "Bitbucket Organization" or "Github Organization" text below the Organization could be made a link to take me off the page to Bitbucket/Github.
  5. Links to the repos off the page should generally be made very obvious (e.g. provide a clickable arrow icon next to the Repository name).

     2) Dangerous Delete Buttons

• The user account drop-down menu has a "Delete account" option right there in the drop-down. This scares me to death, and I always move the mouse cursor away to not accidentally click on the option.
• On both the projects page (e.g. https://app.shippable.com/projects/...) and the build page (e.g. https://app.shippable.com/builds/...) there is a large dust bin in the right upper corner to delete the project (sigh!) and a single build, respectively. That's a little bit less scary ("Fine, I'll only lose my configuration work, not the whole account..."), but still an obvious word of warning is missing (think: "When I click on it, will it immediately delete X?").

  Suggestions:

  1. Move the "Delete account" option into the account page, the Dashboard, make it a little less easy to click on it by accident (or even: to find it!). Maybe on the right-hand side, below the "Organizations" block you could make another block for "Account" things, like destroying the internet of things.
  2. Make the large dust bin in a warning color (e.g. red) when hovering over it. I think Github does it do like that for dangerous actions.

[manishas]

:)

Thanks for your suggestions! Yes, the account delete button is very easy to find, and we do show a warning dialog when you click on it. But don't try :)

I'll leave this open and see if we get some +1s.

[bittner]

@manishas Thanks for your reply. Fixing the breadcrumb-like title would be awesome, this is a real problem. I enjoy Shippable's user interface, it's fast. But this specific issue causes some frustration, and slows down work.

Moving between organizations, repositories, projects, builds should be fast and effortless, always! :+1: Thank you in advance!

[tobiasfuhlroth]

+1

[chschuermann]

+1

[sebastianmanger]

+1

[bittner]

Howdy Shippable, just wanted to let you know: Thanks for moving the "Delete account" button into a separate account page! :+1:

... also the links on the headers seem to have improved. Though still not perfect yet. It's not clear which of the linked headers will lead outside of Shippable. At least this opens a separate, new window.

(Just sad that the Shippable logo has gone away. The "shippable" writing is so "normal".)

[manishas]

We now have a brand new UI :)

Breadcrumb-like Title With Double-Function - fixed. Dangerous Delete Buttons - fixed

Additional UI feedback is very welcome since everything;s changed recently. Please let us know :)

[bittner]

First of all: Thanks for fixing the issues I reported! :+1:

As for the new UI unfortunately I have bad news:

• Navigating the UI and finding the information you need has become much worse. My colleagues complain regularly. It's obviously not just a matter of "getting used to it". There are more hierarchies to climb it seems like (or at least feels like).
• The look and feel is more Travis-CI like, but is that really what you want? Your former UI looked more refreshing, more slim, easier to understand.
• The performance, the application response, is still slow. I strongly believe you need to switch technology (consider Django, Ruby or something similar). Using front-end technologies for all and everything is not going to work out in the long run.

This is serious. I believe you'll have to go over the whole UI again and get the concept right. You need professional UX support. Please, don't be offended. It's really that I want a tool that's a pleasure to use for everyone of us.

[manishas]

@bittner Thanks for the feedback :) We will definitely keep this in mind as we move forward.

Can you provide a bit more detail on what your colleagues are trying to find that is difficult with the new UI? This will help us see if we can address it with small tweaks while keeping the scenario in mind as we evolve the UI.

[bittner]

@manishas In general, the old UI was much more refreshing. Yes, there were issues, but there was less clutter, less "we want to look like Travis-CI".

One major issue I just faced: On the home page there is no easy way to find one of our numerous projects. There is no search box, and only the first 5 projects are listed. Okay, there is a "Fetch More" link and the subscription drop-down box for drill-down, but when you select a subscription from the drop-down the next drop-down box appearing only offers you the projects that are already visible in the list! OMG!

So, in order to get to the build of a project we've not touched for 2 weeks or more I have to click me through "Fetch More" about 10 to 15 times until the project is listed! -- And it's clear that the drop-down is of no use this way: I can find the projects then on the page already.

Don't Get Me Wrong: It's an Honest Feedback

I'm really sorry. I don't want to be mean. It's just that we really enjoyed Shippable. Because it was different. With all the issues there were (speed, mainly) it was nice to use Shippable, really nice. Refreshing!

And now it feels like a single stomachache. I've never again heard anyone saying what a pleasure it is that we have Shippable, think about this! It was different before. -- And, acknowledged, I never was a big fan of Travis-CI. The UI always felt clumsy and complicated, or not transparent as for the user experience to say at least. It's sad to see you copying their style. It's just plain wrong. Sorry.