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Redesigning the country selector

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Re: Redesigning the country selector

#101

Post by billforsternz »

awj wrote: post #64
mynegation wrote: post #16

My main complaint about old country pickers and this one is non-prioritization of countries in the list. Yes, I understand that this may be a sensitive issue, but how much likely your customer is going to be from Canada than from Cameroon. Or if I start typing 'CA' in this selector, I get American Samoa and Antarctica before Canada! Let alone my old acquaintances Cambodia and Cameroon. Same for Russia - you get Aruba…

I think that's making it too hard. Where is this information coming from? How do you update it? Instead, just order the matches like so: 1. Everything that matches at the first word 2. Everything that matches at the start of some word 3. Everything that matches at a non-start position within a word Granted, in this scheme Cameroon will still show up before Canada, but you don't have to look anywhere near as hard to f…

Compromise is the key. Use the idea, but keep it simple. Just pick a fixed list of relatively more likely countries, say the top 20 as defined by the G20. This extends and improves the traditional country selector which gives special status to 1 country (the USA) rather than 20. If you think a list of 20 needs to be more dynamic, why is it okay for the legacy list of 1 to be static ?

Re: Redesigning the country selector

#103

Post by kmort »

jgrahamc wrote: post #5

I typed UK. The only option offered was Ukraine. I'd actually much prefer a country selected that was based on geography with a Mac OS X dock-like magnification so I can choose my country easily.

Remember the old Windows time zone picker that let you click on the world map to select your zone?

Geopolitical sensitivity about precise borders forced Microsoft to switch off the region-highlighting feature.

(Info: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2003/08/22/54679...)

Also, the user may not always be picking their own country and it may be unreasonable to ask the average user to find, say, San Marino on a world map. While you could of course restrict the use of a map-style picker to only the users-own cases, it would be nice to have a somewhat standard picker for all occasions.

Re: Redesigning the country selector

#104

Post by emp_ »

Feedback I didn't find in the comments: when you blur the field without actually picking something from the list, it resets even if there is only one option. Examples:

Type: united states

Leave the field, it works

Type: united states of america

Leave the field, it resets

Re: Redesigning the country selector

#106

Post by sievert »

I still don't see how this is any more useful than just using the default auto-complete with your standard country list. The data I've measured shows that selecting your country is not often a pain point.

Also, if it's for shipping, you can often work out the country by the address, and perhaps just show the matches.

E.g. Do you mean Someplace, X or Someplace Y in a drop down.

Re: Redesigning the country selector

#107

Post by sievert »

I still don't see how this is any more useful than just using the default auto-complete with your standard country list. The data I've measured shows that selecting your country is not often a pain point.

Also, if it's for shipping, you can often work out the country by the address, and perhaps just show the matches.

E.g. Do you mean Someplace, X or Someplace Y in a drop down.

Re: Redesigning the country selector

#108

Post by astrodust »

sjs wrote: post #76
ramy_d wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

indeed, still doesn't beat typing 'c' 3 times.

That seems odd, I always just type "can".

It depends on your OS. On some you can type and have it pick the best match, on others 'C' goes to the first C, then 'A' would go to the first A. C+C goes to the second C.

Re: Redesigning the country selector

#110

Post by thatjoshguy »

Someone wrote: post #100
jisaacstone wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes this is missing the oft-overlooked option of synonyms. There is no reason why the auto-complete cannot have something like this: DE Germany Deutschland

A reason for not doing that is that it looks ugly to show multiple options for the same country. Another is that that can be confusing. Suppose I want to enter a country whose spelling/native name I am not sure of, and after a few characters, four options remain, three of which are correct, but I do not know that. That can cause a needless google to find out, say, the difference between Liberia, Libya, and Libië.

In this instance it wouldn't look ugly as they are just three different results that could show up in the search.
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