topic Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)? in Plusnet Feedback

Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

iain — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 14:56:24 GMT

I'm new to PlusNet and indeed am still to make the switch, but have this piece of feedback for PN. Odd to do it in public, but as it seems impossible to send feedback direct, here we go...
So I find a very helpful page on Server Addresses & Settings (http://www.plus.net/support/customer_service/using/settings.shtml). Brilliant, all the info I might ever need and as the page say; "A handy reference guide". But what happens if you print the page to keep for reference?
Well, some developer has oh so thoughtfully set all the css with a media="screen" attribute (meaning the layout only applies to screen devices) and there is no alternative print css. This means if you try and print this helpful page you get a mess of info as most of the layout has been lost.
So it makes me wonder; Does anyone ever stop and THINK about how a customer might use info like this? I just find it *so* frustrating that people don't actually think through how things will be used. It's just sloppy, so please PN, just can the media="screen" attribute and we can all print and keep the page without having to resort to chopping up screen grabs to get a print that's readable.

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

Mattz0r — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 15:12:23 GMT

Hello iain,
Welcome to Plusnet and the Community, Hope you're having a good weekend.
I'm not sure what you're having a problem with, when I visit the settings page link you've given, and press on the "Print" button at the bottom, I get a print preview that looks like it should.
Is that what happens for you as well, or does it not show correctly in the print preview either?
Cheers,
Matt

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

artmo — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 15:16:00 GMT

Welcome to the forum.
I've just printed the page (3 pages) without any problem.

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

iain — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 16:51:03 GMT

Well I've looked in Firefox v24, IE10 and Chrome. Fx is probably the worst and which I use, but I repeat, the source defines all the css as media="screen" and so you just fall back on default formating. You don't get a neat referecne page, you get spreawling text over three pages which is hardly an easy referecne. You have to wonder why anyone would restrict css to screen if they don't provide a print alternative.

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

iain — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 16:53:28 GMT

Oh, and that 'handy reference' spreads over five(!) pages as all the layour of the menus, implemented as styles unordered lists, is lost, causing them to take up the first two pages!

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

Oldjim — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 17:09:24 GMT

This is what it looks like in Firefox 24 when printed to pdf

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

artmo — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 17:15:05 GMT

That's what I got Jim using Firefox 24.

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

Apprentice — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 17:48:52 GMT

Print preview gives two pages to print when set to "shrink to view", contents look/format the same as in Oldjim's pdf
OS is XP and using the Pale Moon browser.

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

Finguz — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 19:01:21 GMT

No problems here, it looks like Jim's .pdf, using Win 8.1 and Chrome.

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

ejs — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 19:29:47 GMT

The source code of the page does appear to contain a print style sheet:

    <style type="text/css" media="print">
        @import url(/assets/stylesheets/generic_print.css);
    </style>

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

iain — Sun, 27 Oct 2013 10:48:22 GMT

Hummm, my reply disappeared. So to answer the various points:
@Oldjim: I do not see the same as you. What I see is attached and is the result of there being no print css
@ejs: I've attached the source of the page served to me...as pdf as I'm not permitted to privde it as text or html format - that is what blew out my last reply...and it contains no print css. Search the source for yourself
So maybe the feedback to PN is that whatever ejs and Oldjim are seeing, as your pages clearly do include a print css, I for some reason I am not seeing the same. Why? Or maybe you can all tell me I'm making it up and the page is perfect with no room for improvement? In fact one thought...why not offer a pdf print layout of all the info for people to print and refer back too...best of all worlds...or is that going to be shouted down too? is there indeed any point in providing feedback?

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

artmo — Sun, 27 Oct 2013 11:39:50 GMT

Nobody is shouting you down we're only saying we don't see the same problem
Perhaps nobody from PN has read this thread. Raise a ticket and they will deal with it .

Re: Does anyone ever think about the user experience (UX)?

ejs — Sun, 27 Oct 2013 11:49:04 GMT

Perhaps the lack of a print css is due to being logged in with a business account?
In the source of the page I get, there is:

@import url(/assets/stylesheets/new_root.css?refresh=01102013);
@import url(/assets/stylesheets/support/support.css?refresh=300713);
@import url(/assets/stylesheets/support/sifr.css);
@import url(/assets/jquery/colorbox/colorbox.css);

then shortly later there's the print css I posted earlier.
In the PDF of the source code iain posted, instead of the above 4 stylesheets, in a similar place there is:

@import url(/assets/jquery/thickbox/thickbox.css);
@import url(/assets/stylesheets/new_root.css?refresh=16MAR12);
@import url(/assets/stylesheets/business/business.css?refresh=oct10);
@import url(/assets/stylesheets/support/support.css?refresh=oct10);
@import url(/assets/stylesheets/support/sifr.css);

A workaround would be to log out, then print the page. Or try Control+F5 to refresh the page, or clearing browser cache if you haven't already tried that (because oct10 sounds a bit old).