{"id":271,"date":"2021-06-08T02:29:00","date_gmt":"2021-06-08T06:29:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ericburdo.com\/blog\/?p=271"},"modified":"2021-06-06T21:31:25","modified_gmt":"2021-06-07T01:31:25","slug":"usability-and-shopping-buggies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ericburdo.com\/blog\/user-interfaces\/271\/usability-and-shopping-buggies\/","title":{"rendered":"Usability and Shopping Buggies"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

My wife recently celebrated a birthday. And she wanted to take a trip to IKEA<\/a>. We’ve never been. And the nearest IKEA to us is 4 hours drive time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, we scheduled a day to go. And drove and drove.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, my wife was the one who wanted to go. I went along because… she’s my wife, and she asked me to go. I figured I’d just wander around the store, nod my head if asked if I liked something… and maybe hit the LEGO store on the way home. :)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, I had a fun time. The store we visited has multiple levels. One floor is the “show room” and the other is the actual “shopping area”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While shopping, my wife grabbed a shopping cart (or shopping buggy or trolley – depends on where you are from).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She commented “these drive weird” and then promptly said “here, you push the cart” and resume shopping.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I quickly realised something. The IKEA shopping carts have castors on all four wheels. Most buggies are castors in the front, and fixed wheels in the back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While this initially was a bit weird to push, I quickly realised how versatile this is. You can push the cart from the side, the front, the back, at an angle, strafing… doesn’t matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As you can see here… I had a bit of fun. You can push the cart forward, do a 360 spin… and still keep walking in a straight line!<\/p>\n\n\n\n