StickyBrain

Rules and Patterns:

Style
The interaction style is generally exploratory and moderately directed. The application as a whole presents a wide array of choices at the primary screen, and a number of tasks can begin at the first click.

Orientation
StickyBrain is organized around the note. It is a virtual space for interaction with these notes. Each note object might be related to any number of tasks and take any number of forms. Notes could be a text document of passwords, a collection of movies or a time-based event alarm.

Characteristics
On the whole, StickyBrain presents a weak modality. Any type of note can be created, viewed managed, modified and deleted at any time from the main window. However certain subordinate functions are highly modal.  Setting alarms, reading meta-information and changing types exclude other activities. The process of changing note links and adjusting fonts present floating dialogs which produce an attentional, but not a functional modality.

StickyBrain is a generalized storage utility for notes since these note objects are fairly flexible in format and application. The program is also specific to creating and storing notes. It does not modify images, edit movies or provide communications.

The program is intended for novice users, with computer skills. It was very easy to begin using the program without any instruction or guidance from the help system. Exploratory errors were not punished, and most actions were clearly reversible.

Most of StickyBrain requires a "lean forward" interaction to choose, enter and maintain the note library. Several "lean back" features are present, including export of notes to handheld devices and note alarms. These features allow peripheral engagement with the program. A user would not need to be near the computer or paying attention for an alarm to reach his attention.

There's certainly not a lot of built-in context awareness in this application. In fact a main feature of the interaction style is to allow notes to be added in a disordered manner. Later organization can include categories, so the user could create modes and context-specific categories for themselves.

Diagram of the UI
<see attached>

Examples of errors and inconsistencies:
 Failure to accept objects dragged onto the program's icon. This is a major flaw in task flow, because the impetus for a note is usually an event outside of the note-taking program itself. For example, receipt of an image might trigger a note creation action. In that case, the logical first step is to drag the frontmost image into the note-taking process, whether that program is running or not. A second step would be to add test, and then maybe a category, alarm or other attributes. StickyNote requires the program to be opened first, then a note type created for images, and then the image relocated for drag-and-drop into the note.

The Contacts window provides some kind of inteface to link AddressBook contacts to notes. This pane looks very much like the main window, but behaves differently, with contacts being added to note categories rather than to note objects, which seem to have disappeared in this semi-modal view. The proper or intended use of this window was unclear to me.