User Analysis

There are three possible personas for users of our program:

• Novice mixer
• Experienced bartender  
• Social drinker

Person 1: the novice

Goal: to find tasty drinks that are easy to make and do not require too many ingredients

The novice is a college student who has become tired of the same drinks over and over at typical parties. He wants to make some tasty drinks without having to spend too much money on many ingredients. At the same time, he also does not have too much experience and wants simplicity. The novice has heard of some popular, simple drinks from his friends but might not remember all their ingredients or how much of each to use. The novice drinks socially with his friends, some of which might bring other ingredients (juices, liquors, etc.). At a social event, he wants to find a small number of different drinks to make with what he has and what his friends brought using our program. The novice should be proficient at using basic computer programs like a browser and selecting and clicking through the necessary items to get to the list. If the novice does not know what a certain ingredient is, he or she will likely ask around or do a simple Internet search.

Lessons learned

• The novice mixer sometimes forgets recipes, leading to experimentation which may end badly and wasting ingredients.
• The novice does not want to spend too much time making the drink, nor does he want to spend money on too many ingredients. 
• The novice would like to find out about more simple drinks than what he knows right now.

Person 2: the experienced bartender

Goal: to find more complex drinks that require some expertise in mixing and more exotic ingredients

The experienced bartender has experience making lots of complicated drinks. He understands how different flavors and ingredients interact to make a good drink. However, even the most experienced bartenders sometimes get used to only the most common requests and may forget the names or exact recipes of some rarer drinks. In addition, the experienced bartender may also be faced with a request not for a specific drink but for a kind of drink. For example, one such person was asked to "make me something tropical, not too strong, with mango juice", and he decided to include pineapple juice and coconut rum, among other ingredients. The experienced bartender would like to be able to select these ingredients, and find an actual recipe if he cannot think of one off the top of his head. The experienced bartender might not have a college education, but should understand how to use a browser. The bartender will also likely know most, if not all, of the ingredients listed.

Lessons learned

• The experienced bartender will not heavily rely on this program, but it should contain enough variety and complicated drinks to satisfy experienced bartenders.
• The experienced bartender will often just enter a few ingredients and ask for suggestions. Thus, our program must be able to identify drinks for which the ingredients entered is only a subset of the drink's entire ingredient list.

Person 3: the social non-alcoholic drinker

Goal: To find a great source for mixed drinks that do not involve alcohol

The third drinker is the non-alcoholic consumer. He often likes to host friends, but as a non-drinker, he prefers not to serve alcohol when he himself doesn’t consume it. He hasn’t gone to great lengths to look for non-alcoholic mixed drinks, and he doesn’t keep many recipes in mind, but he would really like a source for mixed drinks that don’t involve alcohol. Additionally, when he goes to other social events and meets up with friends, he would like to be able to propose an alternative to all the alcoholic drinks based on what they have available. This drinker could be a college student who does not drink or even part of an older demographic in a social setting.

Lessons learned

• Many who do not drink alcoholic beverages find a lack of interesting drinks at parties; they are confined to the mixer such as simple juices and sodas.
• There are many different non-alcoholic drinks, but they are not well organized. Users want to look up non-alcoholic drinks such as slushies and smoothies by ingredients.
• Non-alcoholic drinks can be just as complex and require a large number of diverse ingredients. It may harder to make a good non-alcoholic drink than a simple "mixed" alcoholic drink. 

Task Analysis

There are three main tasks when using Fat Charles:

• Looking for a drink
• Adding a drink
• Leaving comments/ratings on any particular drink

Task 1: Look for a drink

Goal - Find some drink based on your current ingredients or based on the name

Subtasks

• Put in your set of ingredients
• Put in the name of the drink you'd like
• Get the list of drinks that you can make
• Organize the list by a metric such as difficulty or popularity.

Preconditions

• Know what ingredients you have
• Know what amount of each you have, if it's a limited amount

Frequency - Once a week (potentially at every social event)

Why is the task being done? - to try something new, or to find a creative way to use current ingredients

Constraints

• What ingredients the user has
• The time the user is willing to browse through the recipes. Some users might be impatient and just want to make something really quickly, like within a minute or two.

How is the task learned? - by clicking around the site, following a recipe, and evaluating the drink

What can go wrong?

• Entering incorrect ingredients to the program
• Pouring incorrect amounts of ingredients
• Pouring the wrong ingredients if the user is new to mixing

Task 2: Submitting your own creation

Goal - Share your own creation for others to try and leave you feedback with

Subtasks

• Put in ingredients needed
• Put in amounts of each ingredient needed
• Put in amount of servings

Preconditions

• Having already made a certain drink
• Knowing the recipe you want to share

Frequency - Rare: most people take quite some time to perfect a recipe and test it on themselves and their friends before they will send it. The rating system of the site should help reinforce this as well.

Why is the task being done? - to share your creation with other people, and to get feedback and ideas for improvement

Constraints

• What ingredients the user has
• How well the user remembers the recipe. Some users simply mix until they feel the drink tastes good.

How is the task learned? - by clicking around the site, and following links to submit a drink. The user can also watch a friend submit a drink and become inspired.

What can go wrong?

• Entering incorrect ingredients to the program
• Forgetting an ingredient or a step in the recipe

Task 3: Leaving a comment or rating for a drink

Goal_ - _To leave your experience with a drink and share it with others

Subtasks

• To leave some sort of summary of your impression (rating 1-10 or thumbs up/down)
• Potentially leave ways to improve the drink
• To leave a detailed account of your experience

Preconditions

• Have tried the drink before
• Have a set of thoughts you would like to share

Frequency - Once a week (potentially after every social event, when a user wants to rate or comment on all the drinks he tried that event)

Why is the task being done? - to leave feedback and help other people make better drinks

Constraints

• What the user has drank
• How much time the user is willing to spend leaving feedback (likely less than 5 minutes).

How is the task learned? - by clicking around the site, finding a recipe, and scrolling to the bottom to leave feedback. The user can also watch friends do the same thing.

What can go wrong?

• MIstyping or leaving the wrong rating or comments.