Visitor types and tasks - accu-org/website-v3 GitHub Wiki

How to serve the website's visitors or users well? What is ACCU's mission and what are the goals and tasks of the different kinds of users?

Inspired on Chapter 2: People! People! People! in Janice (Ginny) Redish. Letting Go of the Words. Writing Web Content that Works. Morgan Kaufmann, June 2007.

• ACCU's mission
• Major audiences
• Personas
• Persona's goals and tasks
• Usage scenarios

ACCU is an organisation for anyone interested in developing and improving programming skills. ACCU welcomes everyone who is interested in any programming language. ACCU supports its members by hosting mailing lists, running a yearly conference, publishing journals and organising online study groups.

The audience mainly exists of programmers. Depending on their goals and questions, they can come to the website in one of various roles:

• Programmer
• Conference attendee
• Conference speaker
• Manager
• Member

Besides user in the sense of consumer, there are the officers of ACCU who add information to the website, such as:

• Conference chair
• Committee secretary
• Membership secretary
• other website editors

Perhaps it's also good two write several usage scenarios for their tasks. Refer to these roles collectively as ACCU officer.

We try to capture the various uses of the website in personas, a composite of characteristics of many real people. Then we can use the personas to collect their goals and tasks and write usage scenarios for them.

Grace could easily have been member of the board of the company she works with, but she preferred to keep programming and to work with colleagues much younger.

Ben just started his first job and is eager to explore all things programming.

Anthony...

Sofia is an independent consultant and a frequent speaker on conferences in the field of software.

Martha is Anthony's manager and wants to make sure money spent on the conference is well spent.

Avery is a long standing member of ACCU with a lot of programming experience. She likes to keep in touch with peer programmers beyond those at her work. As a member of ACCU see enjoys the bimonthly C Vu and Overload journals for which she writes the occasional article.

TBD

I like to collect the usage scenarios for the different roles together here and describe them as the narrative part of a BDD style story.

Besides from personas and their goals and tasks, usage scenarios may also be determined from the actual use of the current website as can be seen from Google Analytics reports.

• As a website visitor, I want to immediately see that this website is about programming-related subjects, so that I quickly can decide to look further or leave. [slogan: Professionalism in Programming]

• As a website visitor, I want to immediately see what the main themes are, so that I quickly can decide to look further or leave. [menu themes]

• As a website visitor, I expect a search facility at the top-right, so that I can quickly look for an answer to my question.

[1] Category Personas on cooper.com
[2] Stefan Blomkvist. Persona – an overview (PDF). 2002.

---

MB, TBD:

• As an ACCU officer, I want all mailing lists advertised on the website, so that we attract people to ACCU.

• As a programmer, I want to see the archives of public mailing lists, so that I can find out what sort of discussion goes on.

• As a programmer, I want to join public ACCU mailing lists so I can join the discussion

• As a member, I want to search for articles in C Vu journals, so that I can enjoy learning from them.

• As a member, I want to renew subscription, so that I retain its benefits for the next year.

• As a member, I want to update my e-mail address, so that I get renewal e-mails.

• As a member, I want to join private ACCU mailing lists, so that I can join the discussion.

• As a member, I want to search the archives of mailing lists, so that I can find that cool thing I only half remember.

• As a Member I want to update my mailing info so that the journals reach me

• As a Member I want to renew my subscription so I can keep benefiting

• As a Member I want to control how you contact me, so I don't feel I'm being spammed

• As a Member I want to see a receipt of my last payment, so I can commit tax fraud

• As a Non-Member I want to find out about the benefits and costs of Membership, so I can decide whether to join

• As a Non-Member I want to join the ACCU so I can take advantage of the benefits

• As a Membership Secretary I want to do loads of reporting things...(do we need to go into this)?

• As a Non-Member I want to see a selection of articles to get a feel for what ACCU is about.

• As a Non-Member I want to see a recently curated selection of articles so I can see that ACCU is alive.

• As a Non-Member I want to be able to find articles I might be interested in.

• As a ? I want Non-Members to see that paywalled articles exist, and a little about them, so they can see a benefit of joining.

• As an Editor I want to import all the journal article archives so that I have a rich selection from which I can choose material to promote.

• As an Editor I want to automatically create articles from each issue of the journals so that I always have fresh material to promote.

• As an Editor I want to add new articles so I can publish news.

• As an Editor I want to be able to create rich articles with images and consistent formatting, so that I can be proud of my work.

• As an Editor I want to be able to easily curate a selection of articles so I can keep it fresh.

CO:

• As a programmer, I would like to see the activities and contributions of my peers such as articles and events, so that I can also contribute and learn from them

• As a beginning programmer, I would like to see what benefits the ACCU will bring to the progression of my career, so that I can see if this is the group for me with my (potentially) limited funds.

• As an experienced programmer, I would like to see the activities and contributions of my peers such as articles and events, so that I can also contribute and learn from them

• As a conference visitor, I . . . , so that . . . (What is a Conference Visitor and how does it differ from Attendee?)

• As a conference attendee, I want to see the conference costs, speakers and schedule, so that I can decide if the conference is worth my time and money or plan which days/sessions I'd like to attend. I would also like easy access to practical details such as location and recommended hotels so that I can plan accordingly.

• As a conference speaker, I need access to practical details such as location and also the schedule, so that I can plan accordingly.

• As a ACCU member, I want to see the latest news, events, meetups, journals and notifications, so that I am kept up to date and aware of all the facilities and information available to me or that I can get involved in.

• As a non-ACCU-member, I want to know rather quickly what the ACCU offers and how it differs from other subscription requiring groups such as the BCS, the IET, ACM, etc, so that I can quickly decide if the ACCU is worth my time and money.

BP:

• As a programmer, I need access to a ton of information on tools, methods, technologies, etc -- so I can do my work better and deal with my curiosity.

• As a beginning programmer, I want to know how to grow efficiently in general and do deal with my immediate problems, so I can keep my job and possibly move to a better one.

• As an experienced programmer, I'm interested in expanding the horizon in both knowledge and IRL performance, so I can find working places where my experience can be actually used for good and is welcome; also to have more fun finally

• As a conference visitor, I want to see vital details about the conf: its time, place, content, price (!), and do sign-up -- so I can make up plans way ahead and when made up my mind proceed without wasting time.

• As a ACCU member, I'm interested in other members, what they do, how to reach them -- so so I can ask or provide help, get into social activitty.

• As a non-ACCU-member, I what to know what is ACCU about and why it's better in than out -- so I can decide to join or pass.

DSL:

I'd like to see a site that doesn't indicate the organisation has forgotten the capabilities of HTML5, JavaScript and is designed by people (or computes, I guess :P) with design and user experience skills.

Don't like at me - unfortunately - design skills are an incomplete problem for me; I can point at something and say that design is good or bad and even sometimes give reasons. But getting a design from scratch...forget it.

• As a non-conference-visitor, I . . . , so that . . . I'm none of them but the ability to link into the conference papers and such when/if they are released would be quite handy.

• As a ACCU member, I can manage my membership easily - figuring out how to determine what was my e-mail address in the current interface and how to subscribe to the members list felt like sacrificing a chicken vicariously at the local Inghams Chicken factory might have been easier, if less effective.

• As a non-ACCU-member, I want it's easy to join; like dead, super easy.

• As a non-ACCU-member, I want it's easy to contact the appropriate person (membership secretary or something like that) for information if unsure.

• As a non-ACCU-member, I want it's easy to see what we're about.

IB:

• As a website visitor, I'd like access to book reviews for me to reference when buying a book.

• As a programmer, I would like to see links to key web sites about programming topics.

• As a ACCU member, I like being able to access CVu and Overload articles online. Saves shelf space.