POSTMAN, 2023
Reduced time taken by developers in discovering new content and finding team resources
My role
Team
duration
introduction
My journey in the Search team
But what is Postman?
Postman is an API platform for building and using APIs. Postman simplifies each step of the API lifecycle and streamlines collaboration so you can create better APIs—faster.
problem breakdown
So what went wrong?
Difficulties in discovery and navigation to valuable resources, including resources of the team and resources publicly present online, were uncovered by the Postman State of API report of 2022.
38%
people reported difficulty in discovering APIs they require
30%
people reported lack of knowledge of existing resources
29%
people reported lack of time to spend in discovery
It always starts from the people
It all started when I had conversations on APIs, agnostic of the Postman app, with developers in other companies
After conducting 7 semi-structured interviews with software developers and a Customer Success manager, agnostic to the Postman platform, here’s what I found:
Haphazard API communication
API resources are communicated through Slack, e-mail etc. Resources get lost easily, wasting valuable time.
Requests are documented on Google Docs/Confluence, and are difficult to find, wasting valuable time
Time wasted in finding the right API to use
Users know what result they need and what parameters they want to provide, but fail to find the API to do so. Wasting. Valuable. Time
so what to do about it?
Brainstorming and prioritisation
All design directions walked the chaotic journey of design and were morphed into stronger, holistic designs by the end of the journey.
design process of the recents section
Crafting the ideal recents section for Postman users
I revamped the Recent Workspaces section to provide a smart list of all recently used elements. A user can sift through all or filter based on category to find exactly what they need, and save time getting to the resources they were using.
The existing recents section
I revamped the Recent Workspaces section to provide a smart list of all recently used elements, which the user can categorise using filters.
I've shown few of the contesting explorations amongst many alongside the selected one.
Exploration 1
Initially, the section showed 5 recent workspaces only. Based on filters, it now shows 5 collections and 5 requests as well.
Exploration 2
A smart list that incorporates a significance measure to every result according to the user's activity and presenting findings intelligently.
Exploration 3
When filters are engaged through a dropdown component, the intelligent list adjusts to display results for a particular category, while starting off with a smart list by default.
Exploration 4
Dropping the dropdown and surfacing filters back through a more appropriate component - badge filters, and the list starts off as a smart list by default.
Other features
Recently sent requests in team workspaces
Devs usually stick to a workspace for a job they need to do. This section on the overview page of their team workspace recognises what requests a dev has sent in the past and presents it to them, saving time.
Most viewed requests in public workspaces
When users stumble upon a new public API, this section records its most viewed requests and presents them to the user, saving time spent in getting started with using the API.
Intelligent request search
Not your regular search bar, its smarter! The intelligent URL bar streamlines requests by recognising saved inputs from the user's workspace and other teams, auto-filling data for quick sending. Additionally, it offers the option to use the input for global search, saving valuable user time.
signing off!
Retrospective
This project was jam-packed with a lot of work, exploration and discussion with stakeholders. It feels almost impossible to boil down my learning, but if I had to, here they are!
Perks of being new to the domain
Doing this project was super fun and super stressful too, since I navigated a domain that I knew nothing about. I brought unbiased opinion to the table since I wasn't deep rooted in developer workflows that could tunnel my thinking
Developers are your friends
I also tackled understanding this complex domain smartly, by learning the fundamentals quickly and managing complexity by leaning on my engineers. Asking questions daily and being in constant uncertainty was my passive state throughout the internship