Comments on: Preview: Smaller Icons!

By: melvin tedisky

melvin tedisky — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 15:31:32 +0000

just do it!!!reduce the icons. I can’t get at some icons like “run”

By: REBlogGirl

REBlogGirl — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 12:09:33 +0000

Wow, I have to say, it is nice to see a company take user response and incorporate it into their development and improvement plan. It’s also nice to see that you recognize the problems with Safari. That kind of communication means the world to me as I often deal with software firms that try to mask one problem as another. Kudos on your commitment to the customer and your honesty.

By: Matt Goyer

Matt Goyer — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 07:59:31 +0000

Joel, I know. It sucks. We are actively working with Microsoft on a solution for Safari.

By: Joel

Joel — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 05:51:24 +0000

I’d love to be able to use this and give feedback on icon size, but, I run Safari — too bad for me. I did an informal poll of the dozen or so people who use Macs at work and discovered one person who did and the remainder either not understanding the question (’why not run Safari? It works great!’) or openly dismissive (’if I wanted bloatware that crashed I’d run Windows’). Its a bummer that Redfin chose a mapping engine that leaves most Mac users out.

By: Matt Goyer

Matt Goyer — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 03:08:56 +0000

Thanks everyone for the feedback either here in the comments or via e-mail. I look forward to posting more ideas up here for your feedback.

Craig, the icon’s center will be on the center of the property. This should minimize the amount of overlap with other icons. I think if we had tails/pointers there is more potential for overlap. As for your future development suggestions, we’ll consider it!

A. Robbins, the big problem with the old approach where we always showed the parcel was that many users couldn’t see the parcels at high elevations. Also users sometimes lacked the dexterity to click on them since they were really really small. At some point I’ll post all our color iterations, there were a lot. As for highlight, we will be fixing that, just not right away.

Susan, we will look at some other way of pulling up the parcel without having to zoom all the way down. Might take a bit of time for us to get to it though.

By: susan

susan — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 21:34:37 +0000

Lot size and shape really matter, I miss having that information at the ready. Now I have to click through to the post (since it isn’t even included in the pop-up blurb) and leave your site for zillow. It’s a lot of work.

Given the choice on icons, I like the John L Scott size and shape (no pointer at the bottom).

By: A. Robbins

A. Robbins — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 18:12:20 +0000

I agree with the previous reviewer that the old version of seeing the parcel shape, rather than an icon, was far more effective and useful. If your issue is that the parcel shapes are difficult to see when zoomed all the way out, perhaps it would work to show icons only when zoomed all the way out, and show the parcels at all other levels. Choosing bright colors for the parcels would also make them more visible, even when small, rather than the dull greens you currently use.

There is another problem in your new system in that a selected icon is not highlighted. That means when you select an icon and then change the zoom level, the selected icon can’t be seen since it looks the same as all the others. I still feel your old system worked the best.

By the way, your responsiveness to your users has been terrific!

By: yaron

yaron — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 17:43:20 +0000

Everyone is doing the Icons … The old version of seeing the parcel was what made you unique and great to view for 2 reasons: No Overlap – if you add the past sales, with the current icons it gets very very messy. It used to be clean & neat.
And the second reason, if one is looking for a large lot, one could view that from a very large area.
I still vote to get rid of the icons and reinstate the parcel view from a much larger overview.

Thanks ! and keep up the great work!

By: Craig

Craig — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 15:41:34 +0000

Agreed, smaller icons are better. The larger icons at the fully zoomed out level did not allow immediate access to the property information popup. Personally, I like Zillow sized icons which your new icons seem to come close to matching. The icon tails/connectors are helpful especially when zoomed out – helps the user select the exact property and not wonder which one they are getting when icons overlap. So, auto-spacing and not allowing overlap by using tails/connectors is invaluable.

For future development: As someone who likes to push the limits of the status quo, when will you be linking directly to city and county parcel, utility and other records for a property? Would be pretty sweet to be able to click a button on the property details page and view the already publicly web-accessible city and county held documents (usually database tables or PDFs). Keep up the good work.

p.s. Tell users upfront that the site is best viewed with Firefox or other browsers if there is a performance issue with IE.