Ordering analytics: “Orca” UI patterns

“Orca” was a code name for the now released SAP Analytics, a data visualization tool.

the challenge

“Orca” was put together quickly as a proof of concept as SAP’s first SAAS analytics offering. As a result, it suffered from usability problems due to inconsistent UI from view to view.

WHAT I DID

Working with four other designers, my goal was to streamline the user experience across the application, by clarifying and documenting the use of common design patterns and re-usable components.

Result

A source of truth for UI patterns and components for a globally distributed team of designers and developers.

Panels

I was responsible for clarifying the use and structure of "panels", the area at far right in the UI. That is, what is their purpose and how should they behave?

Many panels

The patterns I designed had to accommodate a wide variety of use cases.

Empty States

I also worked on a pattern for empty states. Is the view empty? Should we invite the user to start something?

The UI Guidelines website

We published all of the patterns we found on a centralized website accessible to everyone who needed it: a large and globally distributed team of designers and developers.

See Case Study