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Digital pregnancy tests have an internal paper test

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Re: Digital pregnancy tests have an internal paper test

#141

Post by Johnny555 »

srtjstjsj wrote: post #136
Johnny555 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that would solve the problem. "The word "not" is faintly showing, what does that mean?" It it was trivial to show a single clear indicator word, they could just show a clear indicator line, then there'd be no ambiguity. It's not the second line that confuses people, it's figuring out if that line is really visible enough.

But when the line is faint you get false negative from the machine.

Do you? The entire point of the machine is to read the test to the limits of what the test strip can detect.

It the digital reader can't detect the line, that should be a limitation of the test strip, not the automation. And it should do better than an untrained human.

Re: Digital pregnancy tests have an internal paper test

#142

Post by mrtksn »

srtjstjsj wrote: post #125
mrtksn wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Superior sensitivity != Superior UX. Yeah, sure if you know what you are doing observing chemical reaction can be much better. It's like the difference between consumer tools and industrial tools. Full manual espresso machines are superior from the perspective of a coffee nerd or professional. Nespresso machines with capsules are superior from the perspective of the person who wants the coffee but doesn't fancy learn…

The whole point of the paper is that it IS a consumer UX for the chemical reaction. It's just analog instead of digital.

It simply means that the paper is not as good as digital from UX perspective. This doesn’t mean that the paper is unusable but obviously creates some confusion that the digital doesn’t.

Re: Digital pregnancy tests have an internal paper test

#143

Post by captainredbeard »

thatfrenchguy wrote: post #140
davewritescode wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually saw this last night and initially had the same reaction but had some time to think on it. Remember, for a lot of people taking a pregnancy test is incredibly stressful. Reducing the complexity of reading by outputting a less ambiguous result has a lot of value to some people.

But as a society, do we want to generate additional waste for a bit of comfort ?

Society wants -- through its observed behavior -- that very much. Is it good from an intellectual perspective? Likely not, though this is a very low impact scenario compared to mass plastic convenience packaging for near daily use items. YMMV.

Re: Digital pregnancy tests have an internal paper test

#145

Post by xsmasher »

raverbashing wrote: post #102
davewritescode wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually saw this last night and initially had the same reaction but had some time to think on it. Remember, for a lot of people taking a pregnancy test is incredibly stressful. Reducing the complexity of reading by outputting a less ambiguous result has a lot of value to some people.

Then maybe something needs to be added to the manual: "If the line shows but is faded: retake the test in X days" Or maybe the test can have lines with different sensitivities.

"Fix it in the documentation" is a terrible solution to a UI issue. Fix the UI.

When the user makes a mistake it's the user's problem, but the designer's fault.

Re: Digital pregnancy tests have an internal paper test

#146

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

leto_ii wrote: post #71

Going over the conversation here I'm a bit surprised by how many people seem to prefer an unnecessarily complicated and obfuscating solution to the straight-forward one. The Twitter thread clearly points out that the electronics serve strictly as an intermediary layer between the paper test and the user. They just binarize the paper reading. This in turn gives a false psychological sense of security ("it's the comput…

> Going over the conversation here I'm a bit surprised by how many people seem to prefer an unnecessarily complicated and obfuscating solution to the straight-forward one.

Welcome to modern IT, where complexity fetishests have ruined everything.

Re: Digital pregnancy tests have an internal paper test

#147

Post by sigotirandolas »

thatfrenchguy wrote: post #140
davewritescode wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually saw this last night and initially had the same reaction but had some time to think on it. Remember, for a lot of people taking a pregnancy test is incredibly stressful. Reducing the complexity of reading by outputting a less ambiguous result has a lot of value to some people.

But as a society, do we want to generate additional waste for a bit of comfort ?

It could ultimately generate less waste, if it prevents enough misreads. The cost incurred by someone misreading a positive result as negative and having to abort later on is much higher than the premium of the digital test. I'm not sure if the numbers work out, though.

Re: Digital pregnancy tests have an internal paper test

#148

Post by zaphod12 »

sokoloff wrote: post #114
rubidium wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This exactly. I had to convince my wife not to doubt herself. “Yes that’s a line. Instructions say that if anything appears even if faint then you’re pregnant. No we don’t need to double check. Wahoo you’re pregnant!!”

We had the same conversation, followed by at least $30 worth of double-checking over the next several days...

Super glad to know that my experience is a common one - precisely the same conversations over a very faint line!

Re: Digital pregnancy tests have an internal paper test

#149

Post by moonbug »

thatfrenchguy wrote: post #140
davewritescode wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually saw this last night and initially had the same reaction but had some time to think on it. Remember, for a lot of people taking a pregnancy test is incredibly stressful. Reducing the complexity of reading by outputting a less ambiguous result has a lot of value to some people.

But as a society, do we want to generate additional waste for a bit of comfort ?

this is literally this history of civilization.
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