Desn 240 Project 2 App Redesign
Shae McMullin
Discover & Define Report
Client — City of Edmonton Recreation Centres
Organizational goals:
- Get people to find activities at their recreation centres
- Help find recreation centres they are near to
How they achieve those goals:
- Location tab in their app/integration with Google Maps
- Scheduling database for recreation centre
Purpose for app redesign:
- Poor usability in terms of choosing a centre and finding specific activities
- Poorly designed UI, poor scaling of icons and non-responsive design
- Poor design of scheduling: sorted by individual centre rather than overall activities so user can search by their preferred activity over all centres.
Timeline:
- 2 months (Dec 13)
Budget:
- $5,000 (discover, define, develop, no deliver/coding)
People, Activities, & Context
User Interviews:
Interview 1: Jacob
Q. How do you usually (outside the app) schedule your recreation centre activities?
A. I’ll just go, I know the free swim schedule.
Q. Why are you using the app, what tasks do you want to complete?
A. I want to go swimming and use the hot tub.
Q. Are you able to find what you are looking for?
A. Yes, after a minimal amount of work.
Q. What steps do you find most challenging when using the app?
A. Nothing in particular.
Q. What about the app do enjoy from a visual perspective?
A. I like the colours.
Q. Is there an acceptable balance between app requests and asked permissions?
A. Yes, its fine.
Q. What’s your favourite/least favourite part of this app?
A. I didn’t like the non-clickable buttons or the changing banner.
Q. Do you find the app intuitive?
A. No.
Q. Would you use this app/do you like this app?
A. Yes, I like being able to see what’s going on. I like that I can share, and add my member card.
Q. Would you recommend this app to a friend?
A. To someone my age (25) but not my parents’.
Interview 2: Heather
Q. How do you usually (outside the app) schedule your recreation centre activities?
A. I’ll go to edmonton.ca, click on the rec centre link and then try to find their seperate website, I think it’s called move swim play.
Q. Why are you using the app, what tasks do you want to complete?
A. Register son for swimming lessons.
Q. Are you able to find what you are looking for?
A. No.
Q. What steps do you find most challenging when using the app?
A. Trying to find registration information.
Q. What about the app do enjoy from a visual perspective?
A. I like that the carousel matches my location. I don’t like that it doesn’t do anything though. Nice icons.
Q. Is there an acceptable balance between app requests and asked permissions?
A. Yeah.
Q. What’s your favourite/least favourite part of this app?
A. I liked the set up for finding drop in classes/activities. I don’t like that it’s not meeting my expectations of what I should be able to do on the app.
Q. Do you find the app intuitive?
A. Yeah.
Q. Would you use this app/do you like this app?
A. Probably not. If there was registration information and capabilities, yes.
Q. Would you recommend this app to a friend?
A. Depends why they want it.
Interview 3: Connor
Q. How do you usually (outside the app) schedule your recreation centre activities?
A. I’ll search it up on the website.
Q. Why are you using the app, what tasks do you want to complete?
A. I want to go play pickleball. I want to know when and how much it would cost me.
Q. Are you able to find what you are looking for?
A. No, there’s no pricing on app. The more information button goes to 404 page.
Q. What steps do you find most challenging when using the app?
A. I thought it was easy to use. Navigation makes sense there’s just information that’s missing.
Q. What about the app do enjoy from a visual perspective?
A. I like the colour scheme.
Q. Is there an acceptable balance between app requests and asked permissions?
A. Yeah.
Q. What’s your favourite/least favourite part of this app?
A. I liked going through the bylaw section of edmonton.ca when I was on the 404 page. My least favourite was that the more information button went to a 404 page.
Q. Do you find the app intuitive?
A. Yes.
Q. Would you use this app/do you like this app?
A. Sure, if it worked. I mean, yeah.
Q. Would you recommend this app to a friend?
A. Yes.
User Interview Analysis:
Overall, users liked the functions that the app is focused on such as the public schedule. The location setting limited searching capabilities and there was information and functions (pricing and registration) that was unavailable that would be helpful to users. There weren’t any issues navigating the app and the users liked the colours.
Target Audiences:
Group 1: Parents of children using rec centre:
- Socio-demographic breakdown: Adults, 25–50. Live in City of Edmonton and surrounding area. Can afford a smartphone. Can afford Rec Centre services. Have children.
- What are 2–3 key tasks they will want to perform on this app? Schedule, rates, registration.
- Why are they interested in this organization? Want to sign up kids for classes.
- How frequently will they use the app? Once a week.
- In what context will they use app? At home, in a hurry. On their phone.
Group 2: Young adults who want to work out:
- Socio-demographic breakdown: 18–30 years old. Live in City of Edmonton and surrounding area. Can afford a smartphone. Can afford Rec Centre services.
- What are 2–3 key tasks they will want to perform on this app? Schedule, rates, registration for individual classes.
- Why are they interested in this organization? Want to workout, to take a class.
- How frequently will they use the app? Once a week.
- In what context will they use app? At home, in a hurry. On their phone.
Personas & Scenarios:
Competitor analysis:
Existing Product
Major App Functions:
- Directions to facilities.
- Check In: share on social media.
- Check Schedule.
- Check location specific announcements.
- Check hours.
- Contact Information.
- Create personal schedule.
Brand Audit:
The City of Edmonton Recreation Centres app sometimes uses the City of Edmonton Brand Guidelines. The Visual Identity Standard document can be found here. The app also uses a separate Rec Centre brand. The brand was recently redesigned by Berlin Communications, the rebrand is discussed in detail on their website here. We were unable to find the exact font but Sintesi Sans is similar.
Technology:
Platform:
- Native mobile iOS app
Data hosting:
- Amazon Web Services
Prototype Development
4 Issues with existing app
These issues are all with regards to the iOS UI design principles. There were other issues that these principles didn’t address that I also identified:
5. Poor coding/responsive design. The labels for the icons are crowded to the point of near illegibility. The text overlaps with the icons. It gets worse on phones with smaller screens.
6. Unexpected labeling. There is a spot on the homepage that is just an image of the brand’s arrows and logo that when you press it, takes you out of the app to your internet app and loads the edmonton.ca page that corresponds with your chosen location.
7. There isn’t a way to search for activities over more than one location or to filter beyond type and date.
8. The app consistently tries to pull you off the app to edmonton.ca, sometimes by changing apps completely and sometimes through an in app browser. This will often lead to a 404 error page.
Redesigned UI Flow for Key Task
Paper prototype
Moodboard
Style Tile
Video Walk through
Password is desn240
