Learning Objectives:
1. Design a user test.        3. Evaluate a user test.
2. Conduct a user test.     4. Document results.

Task: 1 of 2

Weight: 60%

Due Date:  Week 6

Introductory page for the Web Site Usability page on your project site must include the following content:

A short explanation of what web site Usability is. 20 marks

Usability refers to the ease with which a User Interface can be used by its intended audience to achieve defined goals. Usability incorporates many factors: design, functionality, structure, information architecture, and more.

According to Redfern Services, Glossary of Terms,

"Usability is a multidimensional attribute that relates to the impact a product has on its end-users. In general it refers to the efficiency with which a customer can do their tasks with the product, and their overall satisfaction with that process. Usability should be considered from a systems perspective including the hardware and software interfaces, the documentation, packaging, and any other component of the system and processes surrounding it that affects the user."

According to the International Standards Organization (ISO),

"Usability is the extent to which a product can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction in a specified context of use."  ISO 9241-11: Guidance on Usability (1998)

Users should not have to think too hard when using a website. Usabililty Evaluation Criteria consists of the following:

1. Ease of Learning - How quickly and easily can a user - who is unfamiliar with the user interface of the website - learn it sufficiently enough to achieve basic and moderate tasks.


2. Efficiency of Use - If when a user has become experienced at how to use the interface, how quickly and easily can the user accomplish task?


3. Memorability - Once the user has visited the site and used the interface before, can they recall enough about the interface to navigate effectivey on the next visit or do they have to relearn the steps they took to complete the task previously.


4. Error Frequency & Severity - When do errors on the site occur; are they errors produced by user input or produced by a non-user fault in the interface; what is the severity of the errors occurringe and how does the system and/or users recover from these errors.


5. Subjective Satisfaction - How much the user enjoys using the site. 

 

How is it identified and/or used within the development of a web sites lifecycle? 20 marks

A usable website should follow the following guidelines:

An effective website...

• Allows customers/users to achieve their goals.
• Has a high conversion rate.
• Meets business objectives.
• Delivers a positive brand image.

An efficient website...

• Provides answers quickly.
• Follows a logical sequence.
• Doesn't waste resources.
• Requires less content management time.

A satisfied user...

• Achieves their purpose or goal in visiting the site.
• Enjoys their experience while visiting the site.
• Speak of the site to others.
• Return to the site again.

What are the benefits of conducting usability tests and to whom are the results beneficial and why. 20 marks

Web designers, coders, and developers often forget that they are not typical users, they have a far more extensive knowledge of the website than the average user will ever have. Experts in any field typically use terminology and jargon that are alien to customers. After working on a project for any time it is easy to forget that others are not as familiar with it and have difficulty following the terminology or logic. There may be aspects of the website that are confusing to customers, so it is therefore important to take a step back and check the usability of the site regularly. By doing so, and updating the site accordingly, the website interface becomes a more positive and less frustrating experience for users, encouraging them to return and become further accustomed to the site.

It should be professionally written and presented and visually this page should adhere to good design principles and correspond with the rest of your project site. The whole site must adhere to good information architectural standards. This page will have approximately 250 words.

Design and Deliver a Usability Test

Task: 2 of 2

Weight: 30%

Due Date: Week 7

Design and conduct a usability test for either a large site such as the phong.com, www.microsoft.com or a large bank. You will need to find someone in the class who does not have experience with the site you are testing to conduct the test on and also one outside participant. You must also make yourself available to be a test subject for someone else in the group.

As part of your preliminary design you must identify all of the websites businesses critical functions. You then need to conduct your usability test on 2 specific tasks which should be samples of business critical functions on 2 participants as identified above.

You must design, deliver and document your usability test according to excepted conventions and as per examples provided. After you have conducted and documented your test you must write an evaluation of your test results and include any recommendations, Identify usability problems and solutions, Identify problem severity and/or identify software bugs. You should also sort problems by priority and frequency.

User Two: Layla

Microsoft.com have a strong website with extremely efficient usability. The site appears to be very easy to navigate for users with a good general experience in locating things on websites. The site has very clear and concise navigation that is consistant throughout, following logical sequences with a quick response. Its pages are to the point and at a glance most if not all pages deliver the expected result. This encourages easy learning of navigation because the user is quickly accustomed to receiving accurate and relevant responses.

In regard to the local site search engine, while the Microsoft website returns constructive and useful results, the MSDN website is stricter on keywords which seems to inhibit lazy users. Abbreviations and slang to be included as related search terms would prove useful to pulling up relevant documents where users have entered a similiar yet different keyword. Possibilities within the easy reach of Microsoft are offered corrections of keywords as done by Google, which would help a user who is either consciously or unconsciously using a typo, incorrect or abbreviated term/keyword. Some searches threw back results with pages that were irrelevantly named, poorly described or a dreadful combination of both. Some care of file names, page titles and descriptions should be taken to assist in retrieving useful search results.

Users tested seemed highly uninterested in the site itself, and were not motivated to further explore. While Microsoft might be an effective site when the user is hunting for something known, it appears to hinder users who aren't entirely sure what they are hunting for. Of course, if a user doesn't know what they're looking for, they will either find something else and think that was it, or not find it at all. The website doesn't appeal as a site for general browsing, it doesn't have the cheer that pulls interest. Whether this is due to the corporate, liberal blue hues that the site is drenched in or a lack of excitement in the content itself, either way it does not seem to hold user interest any longer than the completion of their purpose in being there.

Overall Microsoft.com is fantastically usable to users who know what they want, and, apart from MSDN from a programmers perspective, totally mind-numbingly boring.