+ Ken Guzik Product / Interaction Designer User Experience Manager

+ About User Experience Lead User Experience Manager Software Architect System architecture Engineering org Building creative teams Creating standards Setting UE priorities Evangelize UE Interaction design User research Look and feel

+ Timeline Much of who we are now depends on where we’ve been…

+ Timeline Xerox Go Corp Lexicus Sun Microsystems G Force Blue Martini VMware Where I’ve Been

+ Timeline Xerox Go Corp Lexicus Sun Microsystems G Force Blue Martini VMware UI Frameworks & Applications for Xerox Viewpoint Xerox Notable Events During This Time ‣ IBM PC AT Introduced ‣ Apple Macintosh Introduced ‣ Windows 1 Introduced Xerox What I Learned ‣ Value of Consistency ‣ Importance of Work Flow ‣ Importance of User Models ‣ Challenge of Mimicking the Real World ‣ The Risks and Rewards of Abstraction

+ Timeline Xerox Go Corp Lexicus Sun Microsystems G Force Blue Martini VMware UI Frameworks & Applications for Go PenPoint Go Corp Go Corporation What I Learned ‣ Adapting What I Learned at Xerox to a new Platform ‣ Different Physical Interaction Models ‣ Designing for Mobile Devices

+ Timeline Xerox Go Corp Lexicus Sun Microsystems G Force Blue Martini VMware Lexicus Longhand Lexicus What I Learned ‣ Weaving New UI Models into Existing Systems

+ Timeline Xerox Go Corp Lexicus Sun Microsystems G Force Blue Martini VMware NIST Grant - All Digital HDTV Broadcast Studio What I Learned ‣ Being Productive in a Pure Research Environment ‣ Managing Across Large, Mostly Remote Teams Sun Microsystems

+ Timeline Xerox Go Corp Lexicus Sun Microsystems G Force Blue Martini VMware G-Force eLearn Central What I Learned ‣ The Challenge of Single Page Web Applications ‣ The Pitfalls of Following UI Trends ‣ The Risk of the Bleeding Edge G Force G-Force Systems

+ Timeline Xerox Go Corp Lexicus Sun Microsystems G Force Blue Martini VMware Blue Martini Analysis Center Blue Martini Blue Martini Software What I Learned ‣ Managing Large Applications Teams ‣ The Value of Selling Ideas ‣ Differences Between Technical and Consumer Applications

+ Timeline Xerox Go Corp Lexicus Sun Microsystems G Force Blue Martini VMware VMware vSphere, View, Server, Go, WaveMaker What I Learned ‣ Creating and Growing Creative Teams ‣ Design and Evolution of Enterprise Applications ‣ Nuances of Designing for Consumers ‣ Importance of Independent Thinking VMware

+ User Experience User experience is the totality of a user’s feelings about the products they use for entertainment or to accomplish tasks Ease to use Easy to learn Appropriateness of functionality Integration into the user’s environment Enjoyment of use Ways in which they make the user’s life easier

+ Great User Experience Great user experience is about how the product “feels” when used

+ Bad User Experience

+  User Centered Design (UCD)  Put users at the forefront of all design activities How Does Great Design Happen?  What are their problems?  Product requirements  Use cases  Who are the users?  Personas  Ethnographic studies  Contextual inquiry studies  Define the user experience  User models  Work flows  Information architecture  Refine the designs  User test  Prototypes  User test (again)  What is the technology?  Limitations / constraints

+ Evolution of Design Creation of VMware vSphere VMware started with a vision to create a hands-off data center using virtualization Users were conservative and risk averse IT administrators To our users, virtualization was complex, mysterious and scary Simply providing great technology wouldn’t cut it The product had to “feel” simple and non-threatening

+ Evolution of Design How could VMware bring virtualization to the enterprise? Focus on the user experience as a primary goal Make the user experience simple, familiar and approachable Remove the “mystique” of virtualization Make the most complex operations ridiculously simple Instill a culture of great UE across the company Hire a dedicated UX design lead (Ken)

+ Initial Concepts Single Pane of Glass As Familiar and Comfortable UI as Possible (Windows Explorer) Well Known UI Models VMware VirtualCenter Concept Model

+ Initial Concepts Alternate VirtualCenter Concept Model Separate Navigation From Views Less Familiar to Windows Users Well Known UI Models Multiple Windows for Increased Visibility Rejected

+ 1.0 Design Very limited functionality VM management and Host/VM monitoring only Simple wizard based VM deploy Drag and drop VM Migration Not much else

+ 2.0 Design Full datacenter automation High availability Host load balancing (DRS) Fault tolerance Scale out to 1000s of VMs Full host, VM, network and storage configuration

+ 3.0 Design Continuing to build out functionality Policy based automation High level intelligent monitoring Scale out to 100Ks of VMs Integration with other mgmt UIs

+ What happened to the small user? As the product scaled out, care was taken to ensure things worked on a small scale But… Complexity creeps in, and the usability for the small datacenter suffers Time to rethink the small users’ needs Better understanding of use cases lets us consider a different product that addresses their needs

+ Downsize & Simplify Conceptual single host UI model Supports only the most valuable use cases Fully automated with minimal user interaction Focus on small business needs

+ Focus on Tasks Cloud based management of local datacenter Primarily task and wizard based UI Integrated with community for automated recommendations Designed for the small business use cases Go.vmware.com

+ More on VMware vSphere Ken Guzik’s portfolio page Case study of the evolution from vSphere 1.0 to 2.0 User-Centered Design Stories, Real-World UCD Case Studies Case 12 – User Centered Design for Middleware Publisher: Chapter: VMware vSphere product page Video tour of vSphere 4.0

+ Evolution of Design Know what need the product fulfills Understand the product vision and growth path Know the technology Know the users Who are they? What do they need the software for? How will the product fit into their world? What do they love? What do they fear? Verify everything through research For vSphere, we performed: 5 contextual inquiries 35 user studies 6 months of design partner reviews Countless heuristic evaluations

+ Evolution of Design Creation of VMware vSphere VMware started with a vision to create a hands-off data center using virtualization Users were conservative and risk averse IT administrators To our users, virtualization was complex, mysterious and scary Simply providing great technology wouldn’t cut it The product had to “feel” simple and non-threatening

+ Evolution of Design How to bring virtualization to the enterprise? Focus on the user experience as a primary goal Make the user experience simple, familiar and approachable Remove the “mystique” of virtualization Make the most complex operations ridiculously simple Instill a culture of great UE across the company Hire Ken

+ Initial Concepts Single Pane of Glass As Familiar and Comfortable UI as Possible Conventional UI Models VMware VirtualCenter Concept Model

+ Initial Concepts Single Pane of Glass Simple Windows Explorer Model Familiar Tree Organization Conventional Top-Level Navigation

+ 1.0 Design Very limited functionality VM management and Host/VM monitoring only Simple wizard based VM deploy Drag and drop VM Migration Not much else

+ 2.0 Design Full datacenter automation High availability Host load balancing (DRS) Fault tolerance Scale out to 1000s of VMs Full host, VM, network and storage configuration

+ 3.0 Design Continuing to build out functionality Policy based automation High level intelligent monitoring Scale out to 100Ks of VMs Integration with other mgmt UIs

+ What happened to the small user? As the product scaled out, care is taken to ensure things worked on a small scale But… Complexity creeps in, and the usability for the small datacenter suffers Time to rethink the small users’ needs Better understanding of use cases lets us consider a different product that addresses their needs

+ Downsize & Simplify Conceptual single host UI model Supports only the most valuable use cases Fully automated with minimal user interaction

+ Focus on Tasks Cloud based management of local datacenter Primarily task and wizard based UI Integrated with community for automated recommendations Designed for the small business use cases Go.vmware.com

+ Questions? VMware product line spans ~ 60 products Every product design has a story Every product had unique challenges Feel free to ask me!

Thanks

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+ Bad User Experience Bad user experience results when a product fails to help users accomplish their goals

+ Designing a User Experience Accurate Product Requirements DNA of good UX design Understand the Target Audience Deomgraphics Know how the tools will be used

+ VMware Creation of VMware vSphere VMware started with a vision to create a hands- off data center using virtualization Needed to sell into conservative and risk averse IT shops Virtualization was complex, mysterious and scary Simply providing great technology wouldn’t cut it

+ VMware How to bring virtualization to the enterprise? Make the user experience simple, non- threatening, and approachable. Remove the mystique of virtualization Make user experience a focus for the whole company Hire Ken

+ Design Fro m humble beginnings… Several simple models were proposed UI models needed to be familiar and common Conventional approaches would aid adoption UI needed to be immediately usable by anyone

+ Design Single Pane of Glass Basic Windows Explorer Model Familiar Tree Organization

+ Design Multiple Windows for Increased Visibility Separate Navigation From Views

+ Design Tested the idea with early design partners Single application window was overwhelming favorite Made the application seem simpler Immediately understood how to navigate the application

+ Design

+ Evolving to 1.0 Testing the application Internally With design partners Polishing the interface Apply graphic design Catchy icons Clean look and feel

+ 1.0