Competitive Analysis

--- title: Competitive Analysis tags: assignment --- # Competitive Analysis Assignment :::info **Released: October 5th** **Due: October 17th 11:59 PM** ::: :::warning Reminder: There are no late days for non-code assignments! ::: ## Background Over the past weeks, we have looked at hypertext systems from 1967 onwards. In the Engelbart papers and MOAD video, you saw an outline-based, text command-controlled system for doing knowledge work, including taking and keeping track of notes and information. In the ensuing years, hypertext became more graphical, using WIMP GUIs (windows, icons, menus, and pointers). Recently, there has been a resurgence of interest in going back to Engelbartian systems with outline and a substantial set of text commands. Products such as Obsidian, RemNote, and Notion all fall into this category. **The assignment this week will be to critically evaluate these products based-on what you have learned about hypertext so far.** We have spent a bunch of time talking about the various dimensions of hypertext and demoing past products to show the “lost features.” We will now switch to look at products from a *user perspective* as opposed to a *feature perspective*. That is, you will be making decisions as a product designer / manager in terms of feature prioritization rather than implementing these features as an engineer. This exercise is what usually happens before engineers implement solutions in real-world product teams -- and on highly-effective teams, the engineers participate in this process. To be successful in designing and building a product, one must understand who the **target audience is and what they are trying to accomplish** (i.e., what problems(s) they are trying to solve?). Only then can you choose features that you will incorporate to make a successful product. Back to food analogies again. If your target market is fine dining, you are probably going to use a huge number of expensive and unusual ingredients to produce the experience. If you are creating authentic Italian “down-home” food like cacio e pepe, you will use only a few high-quality ingredients (pasta, cheese, pepper), but in a way that they meld together and make a perfect dish. The same goes with software. Photoshop has a professional audience expecting a comprehensive set of features and has been highly successful. The WWW, as you have seen, used the “worse is better” philosophy and had a relatively small number of features because they were going for a broad, non-professional audience that needed something simple. Understanding the use case for a potential product is imperative before building that product. How is the user going to use the software? What problems are they trying to solve? What are their goals? How tech-savvy are they? ## The Assignment For this assignment, there are three hypertext notetaking systems you'll review: Obsidian, RemNote, and Notion. You will explore and learn to use each product and complete 3 tasks: 1. Create a **dimensions matrix/radar diagram** for each system (like the ones we discussed during lecture) 2. Pick one use case from the options we give you, and evaluate how well each system supports the use case using a **comparison matrix** 3. Write a **one-pager** to justify your decision based on the use case. ### Resources You will need the following software. Below are links where you can create free accounts: - Obsidian: https://obsidian.md - Notion: https://notion.so - Remote: https://remnote.com You can find the templates for the radar diagram and the comparison matrix in [this Google Sheet](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1TgTijCz20HjFgZRkUShaJTm2ERWEVE_qkLGoO49s-8k/edit?usp=drive_link). (There are two tabs in the sheet.) Please make a copy (File > Make a copy) as you only have read access to this file. ### 1. Rating Dimensions This first exercise lets us compare each system with the other systems we have looked at in class. You will be creating a “Radar Template” (you should use the template found in the first tab of Google Sheet above). As we’ve done in class, fill out the “click stops” (25%, 50%, 75%, 100%) for each dimension. This will automatically create a radar diagram for each system. Note that you should only be updating cells C3:E14, and that all values you find on the template are dummy values and have no meaning. Below is a picture of the click stops we discussed in class that you should use when filling out the “Radar Diagram” sheet: ![](https://hackmd.io/_uploads/HJyxyfjep.png) ### 2. Competitive Analysis for Specified Use Case #### Pick your use case For the 2nd and 3rd tasks, you will choose from one of the following 3 use cases: :::info **Research** - Melanie is brainstorming for her IAPA (International and Public Affairs) class. She is interpreting the law as expressed in judicial opinions, with an emphasis on the opinions of the Supreme Court of the United States. - She needs not only to jot down her ideas/opinions, but also relevant facts and links to past opinions/documents. - Melanie has time to carefully format her notes for this class, but this is also her way of procrastinating. (No judgment.) ::: :::info **Business** - Idaho needs a fast way to jot down their ideas for the startup they’re working on at B-Lab. - Idaho needs to list potential clients, business partners, bills, and ideas. - They don’t have time to format the ideas (too busy trading stocks), and they need the notes offline as well as online. ::: :::info **Classwork** - Godfrey is taking a biology class and needs to take notes. - There are a lot of related concepts and he’s having trouble linking them up in his mind (the pre-meds are ruining the curve). - It would be great to do some exam study eventually (maybe with pdfs from the textbook or flash cards). ::: #### The Comparison Matrix For this second task, you will be working in the “Comparison Matrix” tab of the spreadsheet based on the use case of your choice. 1. Define 6-9 features by which to evaluate each product based on the user specifications. Each required feature should support one of the problems you are trying to solve for the user (e.g. if the use case says “the user needs to allow people to add their comments to each lyric but not change the lyrics themselves,” the feature requirement might be “must be able to support-annotation only access rights.) 2. Rank each required feature on a scale of 1 to 3 (1 being the most important and 3 being the least important). We’ve built a scoring system into the sheet that will auto-populate a score for each system that you can use to help you make a decision about which system to recommend. Note that the lowest score is best. 3. Rank each product on how well it fits each feature. See the example in the template to get a better idea of how to think about defining your required features, ranking importance, and deciding what made the best product in each row better than others. Note that you should delete those values when you are filling out for your own use case. ### One-Page Recommendation Your final task is to write a **one-page** recommendation to your user / client about (a) which system they should use for their specific use case and (b) how and why you came to that decision. Here are some questions to help you start thinking: - Why did you choose one product over the others? - Which capabilities of that product catapulted it to the top of the list? - If other products had one of those capabilities, why did they lose in that category? - What features that weren’t necessary for your use case intrigued you the most? - What features do you think are superfluous (i.e. they were put in because they were cool, not really useful)? #### Page limit We are very strict about the one-page limit (single-spaced page, about 500 words)! It is crucial to learn how to write succinctly and convincingly so that others adopt your product recommendation. In many cases, even a page is a lot to ask a client, manager, executive, etc. to read. #### Writing a Good 1-Pager If someone exclaims “as [Mark Twain | Winston Churchill | Albert Einstein] said…,” you can almost be sure that none of the three ever said it! One quote, falsely attributed to Twain is “I didn’t have enough time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one.” (The phrase is actually traced back to Blaise Pascal, who created the Pascaline, one of the first mechanical calculators.) The gist of Pascal/Twain’s quote is that a really good piece of writing is crisp and clear at the beginning as to what its intent is, as well as clear at the end as to what the reader should take away; the middle provides the evidence to get from here to there. At first, it is hard to write these: one can’t just blather and hope that something will interest the reader. Rather, one needs to hone in on the salient points and make sure that what you are writing doesn’t have extraneous passages that distract the reader. A quote not quite as old as Twain or Pascal comes from Sgt. Joe Friday from the 1950/60s TV show Dragnet. “Just the facts ma’am.” Whether you are a student, or a professor, or an engineer, or an executive, you are likely very busy, so unless it is a research paper or thesis which requires a huge amount of evidence and substantiation, keep it targeted towards the end goal—getting your most significant points across. # Submission 1. Make sure your name isn't included anywhere on your spreadsheet/one pager. 2. Download your 3 deliverables as PDFs: - radar diagram spreadsheet - comparison matrix spreadsheet for your use case - one page recommendation based on your use case 3. Submit each of the PDFs to [Gradescope here](https://www.gradescope.com/courses/592164/assignments/3478313).