One of the problems facing applications that grow organically, is that functionality placement and workflows become disjointed. With disjointed features, the users are required to jump back and forth between apps to perform their duties. This was the case where related functionality was scattered across multiple apps. In this redesign project I went back to the beginning of the design process.
The application is a database management and monitoring tool and the specific area of redesign is the configuration of database parameters. We currently have four separate apps that affect database configuration.
To start, I identified the reasons why a user needs to change a configuration parameter.
Next, I needed to understand the life cycle of a system by documenting the life cycle stages that affect configuration settings. This shows when a user will need to affect configuration parameters.
For each of the affected stages, I identified the users and their stories. I identified 4 separate user roles that will need to interact with configurations: IT administrator, DBA, security officer, and application owner. Knowing the who and their roles affects where and when features are available.
I followed by taking an inventory of all the configuration functionality from the various existing apps and grouped the features by user roles.
I consolidated the features into two separate applications and proposed two options.
Next, I created workflows for the separate applications in the recommended option.
The result was an integrated configuration application that allows the user to edit configuration values, create and apply templates, and compare to snapshots and other systems. The user is no longer required to switch between apps within the cockpit to view, compare, and edit parameters.
List of parameters and their values. Note addition of new features.
List of snapshots for the system
