I've been trying to write some more letters to orphans, but the things that frustrated me a bit in the past could still be improved.
I think the history of an orphan should be more clear. I take an orphan for example:
Aylin Elizabeth Ramos Medina (06991060)
She has been written a letter by us and she send back a letter in reply. Someone has written her a new letter, and although that letter is genuine it's not a response to the letter she has send. This is disappointing to me, because she won't receive a reply to her questions this way.
The reason that this is happening - in my opinion - is because not all information is in clear view. To me, the process is as follows now:
I went to the 'Sponsored Orphan List' to see which orphans still need writing.
Aylin was one of them.
So next I went to the 'Inbound Letters' list, to see her new letter (something that Dale - the one who wrote the latest letter - probably hasn't done. He probably saw that a letter needed to be written and send a letter based on her bio and not her letter).
After that, I started reading her letter and started formulating answers to her questions. But instead of that, I should have gone to the 'Outgoing letters' tab, because only after I wrote my letter, I found out that there was there was already a letter that was written by Dave (although I don't think it a good letter, because he doesn't reply to the questions that Aylin asked), but it wasn't approved yet.
So. I suggest a couple of 'improvements':
-Maybe in the 'Sponsored Orphan List', there should also be a column that shows if an unapproved letter is already written,
-Maybe there should also be a column that links to the latest inbound letter?
I'm not sure how to improve the flow of information here, but to me the whole proces is a bit frustrating at the moment, because I feel that I have to take too many steps.
Or maybe we need a page that shows the following things (just an idea):
Name - Biography - Latest Letter - Needs written (TRUE/FALSE) - Unapproved letter in pool (TRUE/FALSE)
Just trying to find a way that works with less steps than is required now
I think I know what is missing in the letter writing page: the ability to see the communication recently sent from the child in the same view without navigating away. Ill add this in asap.
I like the idea of a user sponsoring or owning the communication responsibility of one child. We should look into that as a possible longer term solution.
Ok, go ahead and write a letter now.
Now you can see the inbound communications on the same page as you are writing on by clicking "VIEW" on the inbound row.
Note: In the pool, you are 'allowed' to right click a browser window and click 'open in new window', and keep one part of your process in another window, and take care of the other process in the other window. If you have multiple monitors this is useful if you are a power user - you can drag window #2 over to the other monitor and refer to the thing you need to refer to. (For example you can have the orphan inbound letter list on monitor #2 and have the Write window on monitor #1).
EDIT:
This inbound feature is actually 'the missing link' to writing quality letters. This is what the child wants to read, and this is what gives the writer great ideas as to what to write! As a matter of fact this is more organized than if you were to lose your mail at home and not find that most recent orphan letter, whereas in our case we have the letters all in one place and organized.
Next we should add a proposal and expense OCR scanning software - and have the inbound letters scanned by the pool and inducted as freetext. <-- But not really, because the letter contains a cartoon, and the formatting is so wild this idea won't technically work. The user needs to primarily read page #2 of the letter, so if you are a writer you can focus more on every even page in the list.
Thanks, this really helps!
I still think that the proces could become a bit more streamlined. I have no problem having multiple tabs open, but I think it should be possible to do the possible thinks in the same screen:
1. See if an orphan needs to be written (true/false)
2. See if a letter has already been written but not yet approved (true/false)
3. Click 'write' to go to the 'letter writing' screen (where you can also read the inbound letters, as is already implemented).
I'm not sure how point 2 could best be implemented. I would like to know if a letter is already in the 'outgoing letters' pool, because now I have to go back and forth to see if a orphan who has a 'NeedWritten TRUE' tag has actually been written a letter already, but it just hasn't been approved yet.
Of course, letters in the pool could eventually be downvoted, but I still think it would make selecting an orphan to send a letter to more easy. When downvoted letters get deleted, the 'point 2 flag' would return to 'false'.
