Saying Aloha To Usability

I've been working in the restaurant industry for a few years now.  I started at a little hole in the wall dive but immediately realized that I wanted to keep waitressing and tending bar since that's where the money seems to be at my age.  I never had a problem hand-writing everyone's orders and personally running them back to the kitchen, that is, until I started working at the brewery I work at now.  At Iron Hill we currently use a computer system called Aloha.  General knowledge would lead us to the conclusion that computers are usually more convenient than hand-writing in most situations today, but it wasn't until I started thinking about usability that I realized just how convenient the Aloha system is.

The place where I work when I'm not at school is the perfect definition of a neighborhood bar / grill.  Almost everyone knows each other and every time you work the same people are always in their predictable seats.  To be honest, a computer system would look ridiculously out of place there.  However, with having all of the customer checks hand-written we tend to run into a lot of problems.  To start, the kitchen staff is always having trouble reading the employees writing/ abbreviations and a lot of the time we forget to write down information that the kitchen staff needs.  This then causes someone who works in the kitchen to come find you and ask you what the customer wants.  Not only does this waste the kitchen's time, but it adds to the amount time that the customer waits for their food.  Having the waitresses personally run the order to the kitchen creates problems as well.  Especially on a busy night, you don't want to have to take the time to run back to the kitchen.  When you're constantly running to the kitchen you can end up neglecting your tables and be completely oblivious to the fact that you have a new table.  From what I've noticed the Aloha system has fixed these problems.

The Aloha computer system is a touch screen system that stores every table's order information and relays information to the correct area of the restaurant.  After you put in your employee number a simplified map of the dining room and cocktail areas appear.  You then touch whatever table you're putting the information in for and navigate through the options.  Everything is broken down into convenient tabs so once you know the menu there isn't any guess work.  There is a tab for everything from appetizers, soups/salads, and entrees to beers, liquors, cocktails, and deserts.  Once you've entered you're tables orders you have the ability to hold or send whichever items so that you can control the time of when the food comes out.  Once you hit the send button it sends the alcohol orders directly to the bar, entree orders to the kitchen, pizza orders to the pizza station, and appetizer/salad/desert orders to the back line.  This eliminates the task of running to the kitchen after everything one of your tables orders and also alleviates the problem of the kitchen reading your writing or understanding your abbreviations.  Another perk to Aloha is that it is impossible to forget to get a meat temp., egg style, type of cheese, etc. because whenever you select an item that needs that information the system prompts you with a list that you can't navigate away from without removing the item.  No more kitchen staff coming to find you for forgetting to put how a customer would like their burger done.

The system also makes a number of other things convenient.  Just by touching the screen you can automatically divide a check equally, create separate checks just by dragging items over, and easily re-order a customer's drink without having to flip through your book and guess which table the order is for.  Aloha also makes payment convenient since you can slide someone's credit card right at the kiosk.  It keeps track of your tips, sales, check averages, and at the end of the night there is no guess work behind how much you owe the restaurant and what is yours to take home.  When you're shift is over you simply print out a "check out" slip that shows you your sales, customer transactions, and how much you owe the restaurant / they owe you.

This system has excellent usability and now that I'm used to it I never want to go back to the old-fashioned way.  Since I've worked in environments that has lead me to experience both ways I see just how convenient and user friendly Aloha is.  It's definitely going to be a rough adjustment going back to hand-written checks this summer, but who knows, maybe I'll be able to convince them that usability is extremely important to convenience and success.

Florida Turnpike Troubles

Last Saturday my friends and I set off for Florida. Extremely excited for spring break, we piled our ridiculous amounts of luggage and ourselves into my Civic. After spending a few days in Daytona Beach with thousands of bikers all amped up for bike week we decided to head for relaxing Key Largo. For most of the drive to Daytona you're on I-95 South, but when going to Key Largo you need to get off of I-95 and take the Florida Turnpike for a good 3-3 1/2 hours. Perhaps it's because I'm used to the Pennsylvania Turnpike, but I've grown accustomed to just grabbing a ticket when you get on and paying the toll when you get off. Don't you think it should be the same in Florida? Well, it's not.

Originally, just like the PA Turnpike, we grabbed our ticket as soon as we got on the turnpike via the Jupiter exit. However many miles later we were stopped mid-turnpike and asked to pay the toll. I was a little confused since we still had a solid 100 or so miles ahead of us on the turnpike (when heading to the Keys you take the turnpike until it doesn't exist anymore), but I didn't think too much of it. Then, not even 15 miles down the road, I discover I'm in a SunPass only lane. In the midst of traffic I had to move over 3 lanes of traffic to get into a lane where I could pay cash. I was very confused because I didn't have a ticket. I didn't know how much I was supposed to pay, and I was being completely directed out of the way I was traveling. Eventually the traffic in the lane I was directed to started moving and I made it to the toll booth. The toll was only a dollar so I wasn't too concerned. However, it would have been nice if the person from "How to Read a Sign" had came and evaluated this because they probably would have suggested they place signs farther in advance to reduce accident likelihood and frustration. Even a simple sign that lets you know to get out of the left lane before it becomes an ordeal would suffice. When you're driving 70-100 mph you approach things pretty fast, so you think that they would warn you way farther in advance than they actually do.

Then, between every 10-20 miles, there was another booth that pulled me out of the lane I was traveling in. For the most part I stayed in the left lane because traffic was moving faster, so every time another one of these redundant toll booths appeared I would find myself in a panic having to travel across three lanes of traffic to get out of the SunPass only lane just to be veered to a separate pocket of traffic in order to give these people a dollar. After about 8 of those toll booths and having to deal with the fiasco of constantly crossing over lanes to a nice traffic jam I was infuriated. I was mid five hour drive, knowing that I had a 20 hour drive home ahead of me in two days and I was enraged that I was constantly being stopped and shoved into traffic just to hand the toll person a dollar. Couldn't they have just stopped me once or twice and made me pay a higher toll at each one? How does it make any sense to stop people traveling a decent pace continuously? It just adds length and frustration to the already long and somewhat frustrating drive and I think that Florida should re-evaluate their techniques to make their turnpike more driver/user-friendly.

Apple Everyday Keeps Confusion Away

I've had an iPod for quite some time now, close to seven years at this point, but it wasn't until I started to look closer at usability that I noticed just how user friendly it is.  Many people are pretty used to this specific technology by now, but for those that aren't the iPod is a portable MP3/video player.  Of course it has other features, such as games, alarms, calendar, pictures, etc.  Fortunately for consumers it does all of these things very well.

In "The Psychopathology of Everyday Things" one of the points that stood out to me the most was when he discussed the problem of single buttons having multiple functions.  With the iPod there are only five buttons and one sliding key, with all but one of these buttons being clearly marked.  The five buttons have six functions, however, the button with two functions is the easy and convenient play/pause button.  The button that isn't labeled happens to be the "select" button, but due to the design natural mapping easily leads you to conclude that the button dead center of the device would be the one to push if you were trying to select something.  The only feature that might appear to be slightly confusing at first is the scroll function.  In order to scroll you have to drag your finger on the circular button pad, but hey, at least clockwise scrolls forward and counter clockwise scrolls backwards.  For the record, as soon as you turn your iPod on it's almost inevitable that you will immediately figure out the scrolling function.

I agree with Jonathan Lazar in his article "Designing Senior-Friendly Living, or Why Doesn't My Cable Work?" when he touched on the fact that people who aren't tech savvy aren't necessarily afraid of technology, they just want it to be simple and convenient.  Even as a twenty-something who can figure out most technologies, I still get frustrated when products are confusing and not user friendly.  Thank goodness for Apple and their ability to make one of my everyday devices simple, convenient, and very user friendly.  Especially since my dad, who for the record STILL does not own a computer, could figure the iPod out with very little difficulty.  I would definitely say that Apple did an excellent job when they designed this product.  Since the button layout and design hasn't changed from it's original release I'm assuming that other customers feel the same way that I do.  Simplicity, usability, and organization sell.  Just ask Apple.

Barnes and Noble Gets an A+ for Usability

As an English major, and someone who enjoys reading, I occasionally have to make a run to the local Barnes and Noble.  After living at home for 18 years and finally adjusting to how everything is set up at the Barnes and Noble there, I had to readjust when I moved to college and start attempting to figure it out once again.  Even though I like to read, 99% of the time I'm completely lost in a big bookstore.  It seems as if there are an unlimited amount of sections and even if you know where the section is, you can't be quite sure of exactly what books you are going to find located within the section.  Thankfully, the smart people who operate Barnes and Noble installed computer kiosks to help ease the process of finding what you're looking for.

The computer stations, randomly scattered throughout the store, give you all the information you need to find what you want.  There are different categories to help ease your search as well.  You can search by title, author, subject, keyword, or even ISBN.  I've only found the ISBN to help me when I look for textbooks, but if you happen to have the ISBN number for the book you're looking for it would be extremely useful.  On countless occasions this computer system has saved me an hour of wandering and guess work. 

I can actually remember one time this summer my friend and I had heard about this book called "Smoke Screen".  When we typed "Smoke Screen" into the title search it turns out that there are quite a few books with that title.  Thankfully the "subject" and "keyword" functions helped us out and we quickly found the book we were looking for.  Along with the ease of locating books, the computer system also lets you know right away if the book is available in the store.  If the book isn't in stock you can find out which other store locations have it or you have the option of ordering it.  This feature is nice because you don't end up wasting your time looking for a book that isn't currently in stock.

Overall, I definitely think that this technology is user friendly.  I have a lot of first hand experience with the Barnes and Noble computer kiosks and I give them an A+ for usability.  The system has made my shopping experiences more enjoyable and a lot of my friends feel the same way.  Technology can either be your best friend or your worst enemy.  In my case, the Barnes and Noble computer kiosks turned out to be a saving grace.