Questions discussed in our presentation

At the end our our concept presentation we presented some questions that we discussed with our contact person from the ministry on Friday. After our discussion we have a pretty good view on how we are going to proceed.

The questions we presented and the answers to those are presented below.

1) How to show detailed results on the map?

How to indicate to the user what location you have chosen to view, if you cannot display information based on named areas? E.g. “Chosen location” vs. “Helsinki, Finland”
--> We won't show the user the name of the place (s)he has chosen, but will rely on their knowledge of geography. We will also display the names of major cities on the map (similar to google earth, for example).

What is the most user friendly way to move from the map view to viewing detailed results? So when will the clickable symbols appear, and from which range will reviews be displayed from?
We have been benchmarking different solutions in for example hotel booking portals and the Urban Mediator app that was recommended for us to check out. We haven't found out what the best solution would be yet, but decided to try to discuss with people who have experience in creating similar apps right when the spring's course has started, and we know what kind of resources we have during the spring.

2) Color schemes? 

Are we going to separate the expert data from common user data by using different color schemes? If so, how does the user understand the idea?
We will be using the same color schemes for both reviews, displaying them in the same view. The expert data is different from the common user's opinions essentially because this data is from country level, but it will be good to have at lest some data in the beginning, so the results section isn't completely empty, and all parts of the world have been rated at least once.

3) Logging in?

To view “my review history”, the user has to be log in. Also, (s)he has to be logged in for the ratings to appear here. At which point is the user offered the opportunity to log in?
The user will be asked to log in only when trying to access the "review history" section. This is not relevant to those users who do not want to record their own review history, but may be an interesting option for frequent users.

At this point, we have a pretty good idea on how were going to proceed next year. Only thing we need now is more information on next years course, e.g. what kind of resources and time frame we are going to have. No one of our group knows how to code, which will surely make things more difficult.