Did my first proper user test over the weekend. Gave it to a pretty tech-savvy friend. It didn’t go so well but learnt quite a bit…

The device only works on 2Ghz WiFi networks. I put a pretty visible note about this on the WiFi connection page but for some reason he didn’t see/read it and tried to connect to a 5Ghz network. It works as expected here but the UI clearly needs some work if this issue is happening.

Bluetooth and net connections’ timeout handler wasn’t working. If it was, with decent error messaging, perhaps point one could’ve been resolved by the user himself.

He plugged the device into a power brick which was already drawing too much power. He also plugged it into some dodgy USB-C hub. This resulted in some kind of “squealing” from the device which is pretty terrible. When he plugged it into a proper outlet, the problem went away. I’m not sure how I can resolve this issue except through better troubleshooting tips/FAQs within the app.

Eventually the thing stopped working after it got banged about a bit. It was down to a wire coming loose on the IR LED… I knew the version I gave him was flimsy. The plan to meet him and therefore chance to give it to him for testing came up all-of-a-sudden. So I rushed to get it ready, working all night on it and it just wasn’t in the state it needed to be.

The device did work for him for a while at the beginning so it’s encouraging the actual IR communication is working. Just that the combination of poor build quality and bad choices of power supplies with no in-app advice on resolving it let me down.

The system of fetching all the device-specific API keys from Firebase using the setup code worked perfectly. I was really happy with this aspect.

The point above about rushing the thing out the door to him was bad in one way (the thing stopped working!) but I wanted to get test feedback as soon as possible and essentially I learnt a lot. Next version should be better.