Monday, 17 December 2012
11 points to improve iTunes (versions 11.2 and beyond)
Written for Apple iTune's developers and their future users.
iTunes 11 featured many improvements from version 10. Coming soon after a version 11.1 update, here's my eleven points worth on improving aspects of the user's experience (which I just submitted to the iTunes team on http://www.apple.com/feedback/itunesapp.html):
1. Add functionality to import wishlists from one's previous iTunes Store.
For those customers moving from one country's iTunes Store to a newly-opened one, consider providing them with the ability to copy their wish-list from their original Store to the new. In the ideal world, these could even be cross-linked; highlighting which content is only available in a particular iTunes Store.
2. Make artist labeling more idiot-proof.
What is the difference between 'Fleetwood Mac' and 'Fleetwood Mac '? Well, one hard to spot space at the end of the name, that's what. And these are then considered "different artists". There are more easy to spot variations, such as; 'The Jacksons', 'The Jackson 5' and 'Jackson 5', but which is the best option to replace all names with? It would be useful if iTunes could help prevent duplicate artists popping up by flagging commonly misnamed ones and suggesting the 'official spelling'. {Also, where names are duplicated, how about a 'country' tag to differentiate them?}
3. Multiple lines for artist names.
In cutting-and-pasting, I noticed by mistake that one can enter a paragraph-long entry for an artist's name? Not sure who uses this, but if it's as useless as it looks like, please remove the multiple lines option for an artist's name. Or let me know what it's for, ta?
4. Provide an override for auto-corrects to artist album or names
While iPhone auto-corrects can be hilarious (as proved on http://www.damnyouautocorrect.com/), it's not so funny when every time you try and correct an incorrectly-named-album-or-artist and it just keeps defaulting to the prior, incorrect name. The work-around of typing the correct entry in another field and copying-and-pasting it into the correct field is a bit of a schlep. So, please give users like me an override option, thanks.
5. One step forward, two scrolls back.
I'm unusually detailed (yes, that's the nice way of saying it) in wanting accurately-defined iTunes song labels and recently spent a few hours ensuring my artist list didn't feature 'one hit wonders', et al., so that I could readily select the more prolific using the 'Music > Artists' view. However, this was a time-consuming process; after changing a song or multiple songs' information, I was bumped back to the start of my Music Library and returning back to where I was could take a few scrolls or keystrokes. So, kindly give the user an option to stay where they are, after making changes to song information, too.
6. Suggest a shortcut.
The shortcut to quickly move through the 'Music > Artists' view is to 1. select an Artist's name, 2. Press down the shift key, immediately followed by the artist's name's letter(s) i.e. TKZ. It would be very helpful to highlight shortcut tips where I selected the same style of operation via the long keyboard way round! {And while you're at it, how about a shortcut function to quickly navigate through album titles?}
7. Please can I hide that artist, song, album or whatever?
In going through my iTunes song list, I was shocked and amazed to discover that it featured a remix of a Paris Hilton tune and some song by that woman-beating Chris Brown… or other. And then there was even Blondie's "Greatest Hits". Who added that; it could't possibly have been me :) ! As an alternative to deleting them, how can I prevent my (few) hipster, synth-playing friends spotting those trashy tunes and ridiculing my terrible taste? Well, I can't until iTunes gives me an option to hide them…
8. Where is that playing from?
While iTunes gives you great access to a range of media, the flipside is that it's sometimes hard to remember where you've been and to easily get back to what you're currently playing. Especially if it was viewed via the 'Music > Artists > In the Store' route and one's subsequently moved into the deep recesses of your Music Library. It'd be neat to have a show 'Currently playing in the iTunes Store' shortcut.
9. A best-practice user guide
In adding new music to iTunes from non-iTunes Store sources, it'd be useful to have an online reference showcasing the best ways to: title a single versus an album; assign a song to multiple artists, etc.
10. A 'request that song' function
I was searching for Qkumba Zoo's 'Cloud Eyes' under the South African iTunes Store and it wasn't available. It would be useful if I could add items that aren't currently in the store to my wish list, as a variety of 'back-order'.
11. More user-friendly network error messaging
Coming from a bandwidth-constrained, developing-world country, I'd appreciate better error-messaging around network issues. While 'Can't access the iTunes store' is accurate, it doesn't give the user much to act on. For example, warning the user not to 'simultaneously stream music, download songs and order new ones' would be more so...
N.B. Apple's iTunes team don't normally provide individuals with feedback, but I'll add it as a comment to this post, if they do.
Friday, 5 October 2012
Improving the Student ICT Access and Use Project’s Coding Indices with Second Generation, Activity theory activity system components
Written for ICT researchers developing titles for coding indices.
Introduction
Using the components of an ‘activity system’ from the second-generation of Activity theory (Engeström, 2005) proved useful for creating more descriptive category titles in four coding indices that were developed during Laura Czerniewicz and Cheryl Brown’s research project Student ICT Access and Use (2004 -2012) project’s fourth phase (2011). This phase explored the first year university students’ formal and informal uses of Information Communication Technology (ICT). As the project gathered data from the ‘digital habitus’ of 26 students, it uncovered how they participated in many different activity systems. This long blog post explains how components of these activity systems were used to make more accurate and descriptive coding titles for each index.
Background
Phase four of the research project aimed to better understand how first year students from diverse social backgrounds were using ICT technologies, both formally and informally, at four South African universities in 2011. It sought to explore the ‘habitus’ (Bourdieau, 1986) of twenty six student subjects by analysing interviews, questionnaire feedback and day experience media (DEM) collected by a different researcher at each university for up to seven subjects.
To support efficient analysis across different media file types (video, audio and documents), these files were imported into qualitative research software. To code these media, four coding indices were developed after viewing students’ first and second interviews. The four indices could be used to code each subject’s: ‘past-’ (1), ‘present-’ (2) and ‘intended- ICT use’ (3), as well as common aspects of their feedback concerning ‘recent social media use’ (4). After publishing these indexes as Google documents, with supplementary posts on their development, I was asked to see whether Activity theory could serve a lens to improve the indexes’ category titles.
The Components of a Second Generation, Activity Theory ‘Activity System’
Activity theory (Engeström, 1987, 2001, 2005) has been used in many countries, including South Africa (Hardman, 2005, 2007), in order to understand the use of ICT in education (Kaptelinin and Nardi, 2006). Activity theory is a conceptual framework that is well suited to explain students’ use of online software in the complex social environment of university.
In Activity theory, the basic unit of analysis is an activity system, which in the first generation comprises a ‘subject’ who works with a ‘tool’ on a problem space, or ‘object’, to achieve an outcome that supports ‘objectives’ (Leontiev, 1974, 1981; Vygotsky, 1978, 1987; Wertsch, 1985). Second-generation Activity theory expands the activity system’s framework’s components to include ‘community’, ‘rules’ and ‘division of labour’ (Engeström, 1987).
An example of an activity system components in use is a student subject using a learning management system software tool as part of a common assignment (or problem space) to download an exercise. She does this with the the conscious objective of starting her assignment timeously. As a student, she is expected to observe rules; principles of control affording or constraining behaviour. If she does not submit her work on time, she will be penalised by losing marks. A division of labour that comprises a horizontal division amongst community members and a vertical division between the power- and status-holders also shapes the community’s actions. For example, the lecturer assigns an exercise to the class, which they must do individually. If he assigned a group project that would mark a change in the division of labour typically expected in class.
As this project’s indices reveal, its researchers explored many student activity systems; whether in the formal university environment or outside. The explanatory power of their components was then applied to all four indices, to see if they could better define category titles.
Updating coding index one, ‘Students' Past ICT Access and Use’.
The first index defined students’ exposure to ICT prior to university. This aligns with the Activity theory principle of development, which emphasises the importance understanding the origin and history of tool-appropriation by subjects. In this instance the index’s original titles did not reflect the learners’ secondary school context versus university: The index was divided into five categories, originally titled: ‘Demographics 0’, ‘Education 1.1’, ‘First ICT use 1.2’, ‘ Family history 1.3’ and ‘Access 1.4’. To clearly distinguish between these two contexts, the title ‘Education 1.1’ became ‘ICT education at secondary school 1.1’. By contrast, ‘Demographics 0’ became ‘Student's demographic details 0’ to highlight that the demographic details captured were for the students in 2011, not learners. It was also important to distinguish between the learners’ initial uses of ICT before university, so ‘First ICT uses 1.2’ became ‘Pre-varsity use of ICT tools 1.2’.
The tiles ‘Family 1.3’ and ‘Access 1.4’ were changed to be more descriptive, the former became ‘Use of tools in the family 1.3’, the latter ‘Site of access to ICT tools 1.4’.
For each index, the activity system components that each category featured were also highlighted under category headings. As an example, ‘Subject - Community - Rules - Division of Labour’ were added under the category ‘ICT education at secondary school 1.1’. This reflected the category’s focus on the learner subject whose formal exposure to ICT at school largely depended on the schooling community that they were part of, and its rules (or policies) influencing its learners’ access. By contrast, ‘Pre-varsity use of ICT tools 1.2’ focussed on each learner subject’s use of ICT tools, so only ‘Subject’ and ‘Tool’ were listed.
Changing coding index two, ‘Students’ Current ICT Use 2’
The second index was developed to code the students ownership of, as well as formal and informal access to, ICT tools and their academic or informal uses. Most students had access to a diverse range of tools which were provided through a community including their; University, parents or sponsors, peers or acquired through their own work. Although this was reflected through the sub-categories under the original ‘ICT ownership 2.1’ category title, this was not highlighted in the title itself, which was changed to ‘Student’s personal ICT ownership and/or access 2.1’ to better reflect different avenues of tool access. The other two category titles were changed to be more descriptive; from ‘ICT use 2.2’ and ‘Academic use 2.3’ to ‘Student’s personal ICT use 2.2’ and ‘Student's academic ICT access and use 2.3’, respectively.
A sub-category title was also changed to be more descriptive of community; ‘ICT help 2.34’ changed to ‘University, family and peer assistance with ICT 2.34’ thereby emphasising the varied members who provided assistance.
Revising coding index three, ‘Students’ Intended ICT Use 3’
The third index was used in coding transcriptions of students describing; the types of ICT tools and resources they desired, their future aims with ICT, how they plan to use social networks in the future and their current and future social work contributions. The original category titles were ‘ICT tools and resources wanted 3.1’, ‘Future ICT aims 3.2’, ‘Future social network use 3.3’ and ‘Subject's social work 3.4’. These were revised to highlight the role of the learner subject, becoming; ‘ICT tools and resources wanted by the student 3.1’, ‘The student's future ICT aims 3.2’, ‘The student's future social network desired use 3.3’ and ‘Student's social work 3.4’, respectively.
Modifying coding index four, ‘Students' Social Media Use 4’
The fourth index focussed on coding student feedback regarding their social media use for self-representation, friendship and achieving specific tasks (through its affordances), as well as rules they employed in using social media and their feelings about it. The original titles were; ‘Representations of self 4.1’, ‘Friendships and social media 4.2’, ‘Social media affordances 4.3’, ‘Personal social media rules 4.4’ and ‘Student feelings in relation to social media 4.5’. These were also modified to reflect the subject’s importance; ‘Student's representations of self 4.1’, ‘Student's friendships and social media 4.2’, ‘Student's perceptions of social media affordances 4.3’, ‘Student's personal social media rules 4.4’ and ‘Student's feelings in relation to social media 4.5’
In conclusion
Using the components of a second-generation Activity theory activity system proved useful as a lens to create more accurate and descriptive titles for the Student ICT Access and Use project’s coding indexes. Following a similar process may prove useful for ICT researchers creating or reviewing index titles.
References
Introduction
Using the components of an ‘activity system’ from the second-generation of Activity theory (Engeström, 2005) proved useful for creating more descriptive category titles in four coding indices that were developed during Laura Czerniewicz and Cheryl Brown’s research project Student ICT Access and Use (2004 -2012) project’s fourth phase (2011). This phase explored the first year university students’ formal and informal uses of Information Communication Technology (ICT). As the project gathered data from the ‘digital habitus’ of 26 students, it uncovered how they participated in many different activity systems. This long blog post explains how components of these activity systems were used to make more accurate and descriptive coding titles for each index.
Background
Phase four of the research project aimed to better understand how first year students from diverse social backgrounds were using ICT technologies, both formally and informally, at four South African universities in 2011. It sought to explore the ‘habitus’ (Bourdieau, 1986) of twenty six student subjects by analysing interviews, questionnaire feedback and day experience media (DEM) collected by a different researcher at each university for up to seven subjects.
To support efficient analysis across different media file types (video, audio and documents), these files were imported into qualitative research software. To code these media, four coding indices were developed after viewing students’ first and second interviews. The four indices could be used to code each subject’s: ‘past-’ (1), ‘present-’ (2) and ‘intended- ICT use’ (3), as well as common aspects of their feedback concerning ‘recent social media use’ (4). After publishing these indexes as Google documents, with supplementary posts on their development, I was asked to see whether Activity theory could serve a lens to improve the indexes’ category titles.
The Components of a Second Generation, Activity Theory ‘Activity System’
Activity theory (Engeström, 1987, 2001, 2005) has been used in many countries, including South Africa (Hardman, 2005, 2007), in order to understand the use of ICT in education (Kaptelinin and Nardi, 2006). Activity theory is a conceptual framework that is well suited to explain students’ use of online software in the complex social environment of university.
In Activity theory, the basic unit of analysis is an activity system, which in the first generation comprises a ‘subject’ who works with a ‘tool’ on a problem space, or ‘object’, to achieve an outcome that supports ‘objectives’ (Leontiev, 1974, 1981; Vygotsky, 1978, 1987; Wertsch, 1985). Second-generation Activity theory expands the activity system’s framework’s components to include ‘community’, ‘rules’ and ‘division of labour’ (Engeström, 1987).
An example of an activity system components in use is a student subject using a learning management system software tool as part of a common assignment (or problem space) to download an exercise. She does this with the the conscious objective of starting her assignment timeously. As a student, she is expected to observe rules; principles of control affording or constraining behaviour. If she does not submit her work on time, she will be penalised by losing marks. A division of labour that comprises a horizontal division amongst community members and a vertical division between the power- and status-holders also shapes the community’s actions. For example, the lecturer assigns an exercise to the class, which they must do individually. If he assigned a group project that would mark a change in the division of labour typically expected in class.
As this project’s indices reveal, its researchers explored many student activity systems; whether in the formal university environment or outside. The explanatory power of their components was then applied to all four indices, to see if they could better define category titles.
Updating coding index one, ‘Students' Past ICT Access and Use’.
The first index defined students’ exposure to ICT prior to university. This aligns with the Activity theory principle of development, which emphasises the importance understanding the origin and history of tool-appropriation by subjects. In this instance the index’s original titles did not reflect the learners’ secondary school context versus university: The index was divided into five categories, originally titled: ‘Demographics 0’, ‘Education 1.1’, ‘First ICT use 1.2’, ‘ Family history 1.3’ and ‘Access 1.4’. To clearly distinguish between these two contexts, the title ‘Education 1.1’ became ‘ICT education at secondary school 1.1’. By contrast, ‘Demographics 0’ became ‘Student's demographic details 0’ to highlight that the demographic details captured were for the students in 2011, not learners. It was also important to distinguish between the learners’ initial uses of ICT before university, so ‘First ICT uses 1.2’ became ‘Pre-varsity use of ICT tools 1.2’.
The tiles ‘Family 1.3’ and ‘Access 1.4’ were changed to be more descriptive, the former became ‘Use of tools in the family 1.3’, the latter ‘Site of access to ICT tools 1.4’.
For each index, the activity system components that each category featured were also highlighted under category headings. As an example, ‘Subject - Community - Rules - Division of Labour’ were added under the category ‘ICT education at secondary school 1.1’. This reflected the category’s focus on the learner subject whose formal exposure to ICT at school largely depended on the schooling community that they were part of, and its rules (or policies) influencing its learners’ access. By contrast, ‘Pre-varsity use of ICT tools 1.2’ focussed on each learner subject’s use of ICT tools, so only ‘Subject’ and ‘Tool’ were listed.
Changing coding index two, ‘Students’ Current ICT Use 2’
The second index was developed to code the students ownership of, as well as formal and informal access to, ICT tools and their academic or informal uses. Most students had access to a diverse range of tools which were provided through a community including their; University, parents or sponsors, peers or acquired through their own work. Although this was reflected through the sub-categories under the original ‘ICT ownership 2.1’ category title, this was not highlighted in the title itself, which was changed to ‘Student’s personal ICT ownership and/or access 2.1’ to better reflect different avenues of tool access. The other two category titles were changed to be more descriptive; from ‘ICT use 2.2’ and ‘Academic use 2.3’ to ‘Student’s personal ICT use 2.2’ and ‘Student's academic ICT access and use 2.3’, respectively.
A sub-category title was also changed to be more descriptive of community; ‘ICT help 2.34’ changed to ‘University, family and peer assistance with ICT 2.34’ thereby emphasising the varied members who provided assistance.
Revising coding index three, ‘Students’ Intended ICT Use 3’
The third index was used in coding transcriptions of students describing; the types of ICT tools and resources they desired, their future aims with ICT, how they plan to use social networks in the future and their current and future social work contributions. The original category titles were ‘ICT tools and resources wanted 3.1’, ‘Future ICT aims 3.2’, ‘Future social network use 3.3’ and ‘Subject's social work 3.4’. These were revised to highlight the role of the learner subject, becoming; ‘ICT tools and resources wanted by the student 3.1’, ‘The student's future ICT aims 3.2’, ‘The student's future social network desired use 3.3’ and ‘Student's social work 3.4’, respectively.
Modifying coding index four, ‘Students' Social Media Use 4’
The fourth index focussed on coding student feedback regarding their social media use for self-representation, friendship and achieving specific tasks (through its affordances), as well as rules they employed in using social media and their feelings about it. The original titles were; ‘Representations of self 4.1’, ‘Friendships and social media 4.2’, ‘Social media affordances 4.3’, ‘Personal social media rules 4.4’ and ‘Student feelings in relation to social media 4.5’. These were also modified to reflect the subject’s importance; ‘Student's representations of self 4.1’, ‘Student's friendships and social media 4.2’, ‘Student's perceptions of social media affordances 4.3’, ‘Student's personal social media rules 4.4’ and ‘Student's feelings in relation to social media 4.5’
In conclusion
Using the components of a second-generation Activity theory activity system proved useful as a lens to create more accurate and descriptive titles for the Student ICT Access and Use project’s coding indexes. Following a similar process may prove useful for ICT researchers creating or reviewing index titles.
References
Bourdieu, P. (1986). The forms of capital. In J. Richardson, Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education (pp. 241-258). New York: Greenwood.
Engeström, Y. 1987, Learning by Expanding: An activity-theoretical approach to developmental research, Orienta-Konsultit Oy, Helsinki, Finland.
Engeström, Y. 2001, Expansive Learning at Work. Towards an Activity-Theoretical Reconceptualisation. University of London, London, England, UK.
Engeström, Y. 2005, Developmental work research: expanding activity theory in practice, Lehmanns Media, Berlin, Germany.
Hardman, J. 2007, "Making sense of the meaning maker: tracking the object of activity in a computer-based mathematics lesson using activity theory", International Journal of Education and Development using ICT, vol. 3, no. 4.
Hardman, J. 2005, "Activity Theory as a framework for understanding teachers' perceptions of computer usage at a primary school level in South Africa", South African Journal of Higher Education, vol. 25, no. 4, pp. 258-265.
Leontiev, A. 1981, Problems of the Development of Mind, Progress Publishers, Moscow.
Leontiev, A. 1974, "The Problem of Activity in Psychology", Soviet Psychology, vol. 13, pp. 4-33.
Kaptelinin, V. & Nardi, B. 2006, Acting with Technology: Activity Theory and Interaction Design, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, USA.
Vygotsky, L. 1978, Mind in Society; The Development of Higher Psychological Processes, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, USA.
Vygotsky, L. 1987, The collected works of L.S. Vygotsky. Plenum Press, New York, USA.
Wertsch, J. 1985, Culture, Communication and Cognition: Vygotskian Perspectives. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.
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