As mentioned before in BrightGauge Web App, The meat and potatoes of BrightGauge Software was to allow customers to create and customize reports based on the data from their RMM’s and PSA’s. The early stages of this was done with the BGS Report Builder, but as our subscriber list grew, the need to offer additional gauges was apparent. We knew as a small shop we wouldn’t be able to keep up with the overwhelming demand of creating specific gauges that met all of our customers needs, so after brainstorming it was obvious what was needed we decided to create a tool that would allow them to create any gauge they wanted (and in a later release, dive into their sql db and easily create any dataset they wanted as well).
Empathy is vital when creating a great user experience. In the case of the Gauge Builder, this was difficult because I knew nothing about datasets, database configurations, joins and filters. So for me, the first step in getting this right was to educate myself on everything the user would need to do in order to create their gauges. This was a huge undertaking because the concept was foreign to me. I read , became informed and then spent countless hours interviewing my developers and customers. Once I had a good grasp on the concept I began creating wireframes. After many iterations of wireframes, reviewing the functionality with the development team and validating the designs with the users, I jumped into the UI for the tool. Below are the results.
