Findings panel UI confusing/misleading

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Hi Alexei,

thanks for replying so quickly!

>Does this help?
Well, that depends. I hope that you took my comment as feedback and not merely as a user who needs help using your software. If so, then yes.

I had trouble figuring out how the "Edit Blocking Options" interface works, and I'm so bold to state that it was due some UI design flaws (sorry if I repeat myself):

The user doesn't know what the checked/unchecked state of trackers reflect. When you toggle them you get no feedback that might help you find out what checking/unchecking actually does. I see that changing the crossed-out state doesn't make much sense, because you would then led to believe that changes have immediate effect, which is not true, obviously.

Since the user is not getting any feedback when he checks/unchecks items he might think that the interface is of the kind "select items and apply". By that I mean the scheme that many web mail clients use: you would mark emails in a list by toggling checkboxes and then click some apply button. The apply button in your case would be the one labelled "Don't block on foobar.com - you know the big one right under the items in question!
And the label of the button actually fits that scheme (unfortunately). The user might think that by clicking "Don't block on foobar.com" all the selected items are not blocked on foobar.com

This button should not be a button after all but rather a checkbox itself. A button that toggles its label to reflect some state is an inherent bad UI idea. I can't point to some books on human interface design but I bet that there are many who support my point. :)

Well, I hope you consider improving the interface. I filed my comment as error" because I think UI design is really important.

Oh and before I forget: Thanks for making Ghostery! Your work is so crucial in defending our privacy in these times and for that I'm very grateful.

Stefan

Excellent point about the lack of feedback, and the possible confusion with "select and apply".

I haven't mentioned yet that we do have plans to improve the browser popup, by eliminating the "show tracker sources" option (and making display of sources dynamic), and then by eliminating the "Edit Blocking Options" toggle.

You will then be able to exempt (whitelist) pages, toggle individual tracker blocking preferences and view tracker sources without any intermediate toggling step.

We still have to figure out the exact tracker block/unblock checkbox interaction. Do you have any suggestions re feedback?

After several attempts using the "Edit Blocking Options" while on a particular website, I figured out how to selectively block and allow trackers on a particular website.

At first I misinterpreted the "Don't Block on ______" button to mean ""Don't Block the trackers I selected (or de-selected) on ______".

The "Don't Block on ______" button deactivates all blocking for a particular website but a standard interface with check box selections would have a button to save and activate the selections. Apparently, in the case of Ghostery, the method is to select, or deselect the check box(es), then simply click outside the Ghostery window to dismiss it and save the selections.

I recommend two changes: document the behavior of this option in a FAQ or blog and clarify the wording of the text button...something like "Stop ALL Blocking on ______" and "Block ALL trackers on ______"...or similar.

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
selective tracker blocking per website.

Too much clicking back and forth. It was much simpler before. I may just use no script.

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
I liked Ghostery better the way it was before this..

Regarding the new release of Ghostery ( circa 2012 Sept 11)
How come I can no longer ...
simply click-on a Tracking Item, and then disallow it, tracking me ?
(a) I want to stop items, myself ... is this "New UI" preventing me from doing that ?
(b) How do I block the trackers, in this New UI ?

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
New Ghostery UI: Users can no longer block a Tracking Item, themselves !?!.

Hi
I know you realize that a lot of people don't get your new interface. I had a lot of trouble because the logical sequence didn't seem to work. I've got it now but not really because of anything you guys told me. The problem is there's no"OK" button. People want a step that confirms the action but a clear instant feedback would do. I tried many times to check the box a in Edit but then I would click Don't Block to find a button that said something like"Block This". And I wanted a positive action to finish the sequence and close the dialogue.
Now I just check and click on the page and the dialogue closes and it's done BUT the list still says "2 trackers 1 blocked" until I refresh when it should say 2 because I just blocked the second one. Is this making sense?
A lot of impatient people would have just uninstalled.
I like what your doing, though. Keep it up.

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
I get it now.

The new interface provides no feedback on whether a site is blocked. When you open the Ghostry panel, you are presented with either an icon that looks like a "pause" button, or a "right arrow". But you can never tell whether the site is blocked or not. The user interface needs to provide feedback that a site is blocked. I like the old interface MUCH better in this regard.

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
Obtuse User Interface.

I volunteer as a moderator for a website that has a lot of very diverse new user-submitted content each day. Part of my job is to assess whether that content is spam or not, and for that it's often helpful to check the content/advertising ratio on those sites.

In order to see all the ads, I have to turn off Ghostery, but every time I have to painfully find the right area to click in (simply clicking on the icon in the navigation bar in the is not enough; I have to click to the right of the number of trackers, which is the first problem). Then I have to wait for the list to open, and depending on how many trackers there are on the site, find the pause button at the bottom of that list. I'd rather have a keyboard shortcut.

To summarize:

1. The clicking area of the button is not well defined.

2. The pause button of the pop-up menu should always be in the same place, maybe at the top, to make disabling easier - currently it's a bad UX.

3. And most importantly: I'd like a keyboard shortcut to disable/enable blocking.

Thanks!

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
I'd love to have a shortcut for enabling/disabling blocking.

Options make no sense. LEFT click on the Ghostery icon it says "Edit Blocking Options." Click there, and it says "Don't block xxx." Does that mean Ghostery is blocking that now? Makes no sense... please fix so that it is clear. Same with the "play" and "pause" buttons - does Pause button showing indicate Ghostery is running, or not? Please resolve to make current state of Ghostery clear.
Thanks

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
Please make iconography clear.

First - I love the extension (Chrome).
One thing that's really frustrating is that at the moment I need the trackers' info is when it's hardest to get to:
1) I click on the Ghost, I get the list of trackers.
2) I can click on any of them for more info (which pops up a new tab, which is kind of annoying).
3) After I click Edit Blocking Options, I can no longer get the information without making the list go away.

Suggestion: Implement a hover or tooltip so that the snippet ("FooAdTracker is...") shows up without exiting the blocking dialog. This would make choosing things to block soooo much easier.

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
See Tracker Info while choosing blocking.

Thanks. OK, I see what you're talking about now.
Where - any where - does anything explain that the bar labeled, "Edit Blocking Options" is the "Add / Remove Sites on Whitelist" control bar?

Without searching forums, is there anything, anywhere - easily accessible that says, "toggling the setting on this bar will *actually* add / remove the current site to Ghostery whitelist, or it's related to white list at all?

There's something fairly flawed about several options dialog & actions in main options & on tray icon pop up.

Do you really think there's not room on that bar, (as LEAST when click it), for wording like [meaning, "if you click this, it will...]
"Add this ("current") Site to whitelist" (or, add the actual full or partial name of site in that string, as it does now?
And when toggle it to opposite, it would say (before clicking it, "Remove XYZ.com from whitelist.

Then, after each of the above actions, the button / bar, then reads,
Site XYZ.com is blocked (or unblocked). Or SOMETHING to show the current status. This is the way people think.

I've taught & tutored adults, HS, college math / sci for ~ 15 yrs & I know exactly how differently worded statements, sentences or labels on diagrams, etc., will be misinterpreted or interpreted correctly. Ghostery has several of those "trick" statements / labels.

The way it is now, is unintuitive. It make much more sense to show the current selected option THAT IS IN EFFECT, rather than after you click "Start blocking xyz, it immediately changes to read, "Stop blocking xyz."

Or just put a check mark beside the wording "Block site xyz.com." Then after that string, have wording, "Added to white list" or, "Deleted from whitelist" - depending on check box status. Hell, go wild & put a Yes & No circle / box to check.

EVERY one knows that a check in a box mean "ON" or "Yes," and no check mean "OFF" or "NO," if the statement is NOT asking to confirm a negative:
"Do you not want to block xyz site?" It's been proven that asking readers to confirm a negative is confusing as hell.

The behavior now is overly confusing & doesn't explain (anywhere I've seen) that it controls the whitelist.

You or other devs make some changes in pre versions, notify me & I'll be happy to take a look & make suggestions, if needed, so that most everyone will understand. It's not done very well in some places, right now. I've helped several addon devs make simple changes that improved user friendliness & often function.

Note: This topic was created from a reply on the ? Restart browser to resume blocking?; icons confusing topic.

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
Confusing Ghostery panel UI.

Been using Ghostery for some time but never knew there was an "Advanced" Options page. DOH Why? Partly because it's getting difficult to see things with these eyes, and partly because all web pages are nonstandard so more and more of my time is consumed scanning umpteen thousands of web pages and then, upon a revisit - days, weeks or months later - having to do a trial and error retrace of steps because I forgot where that something is hidden. It took way too long just to figure out which cookies this stupid GetSatisfaction site requires just to post a comment, and it refreshed and erased EVERYTHING each time I tried a different combo! Turns out it requires the intrusive untrustworthy Google cookie enabled!! WTF?

#1 - How's about making it clearer that GENERAL and ADVANCED are actual live TABS? When I go to that page, I see GENERAL highlighted in blue and never even noticed the word ADVANCED right next to it in pure white not even framed by a tab outline. Might do the same down below to 3PES | COOKIES | SITE WHITELIST

#2 - I've grown to loathe cryptic icons and odd option selection methodologies. IMHO, using:
|| vs > to indicate enabling/disabling is clear as mud. The whole process of selecting is bizarre (to me, at least) in that when we want to block something we first have to switch to a second mini-screen on the popup menu, then because there's no OK button or X-CLOSE button we have to remember not to touch anything on the popup menu after selecting something but just touch some dead space on the browser window, because if we click the bar below our selections it reverts from a confusingly worded "start blocking" to "don't block" for everything checked off! Whoever designed that should have asked several seniors to beta test it to see if it makes sense.

That so many asked how to get rid of the irritating purple bubble should be a clue that something's lacking in the GUI department. Another fer instance - I'd love to know if I'm the only one who has to pause, think, leaf back and forth between 2 almost identical little "Ghostery Found the following" pages and then click that enable/disable bar on/off several times EVERY FREAKING TIME just to feel like I've actually enabled what I wanted to enable... and then still not get it right! I've been a programmer, documentation writer/help directory indexer and web designer working with computers and software for over 35 years and to say this is irritating is an understatement. Like dealing with the Facebook settings and permissions maze in miniature.

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
GUI Lacks Clarity - I'm getting OLD but I don't like to feel stupid.

can wtite some tpsi to whereto sart learnig r trae,ifprogrammmig is ur trade .all hail ue have a nice cold one