Sharing designer and user perspectives of web site evaluation: a cross‐campus collaborative learning experience (original) (raw)

Usability evaluation based on Web design perspectives

… , 2007. ESEM 2007. …, 2007

Applications worldwide, Web quality assurance, and more specifically Web usability have become key success factors. Therefore, this work proposes a usability evaluation technique based on the combination of Web design perspectives adapted from existing literature, and heuristics. This new technique is assessed using a controlled experiment aimed at measuring the efficiency and effectiveness of our technique, in comparison to Nielsen's heuristic evaluation. Results indicated that our technique was significantly more effective than and as efficient as Nielsen's heuristic evaluation. First International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement 0-7695-2886-4/07 $20.00

RESEARCH PROPOSAL ON WEB SITE USABILITY

Since the explosion of the internet, web portals and their uses have become more advanced and complex. Web portals are a major source of obtaining information over the internet. It is easier and faster than looking up information in a “real” library. As distance education has moved from traditional, correspondence courses to online educational web sites, it becomes important to look at the usability or “ease of use” of these instructional web sites from the student’s perspective. This research explored what the construct of usability means for students taking online courses, this study has been performed to also analyze the usability of university web portals and how they are used by students, staff and outside visitors. Almost every university has a web portal, but how efficient they are or if they are used as they should be will be determined in this study. A portal by definition is a gateway, a front door to other portals or sites. A university portal should provide certain services for individuals depending on the needs of that user. Moreover, the content and the overall impression of the web portal can influence a potential student when choosing which university they will apply to. Every year millions of people visit university web portals looking for information. This could be, for example, students looking for course information, change in lecture times, account access or teacher contact information. It is very important that the whatever it is the user is searching for is easy to find and the content is easily understood. Although, the construct of usability is not well understood, it is apparent that usability does not reside in software alone, but instead is a construct resulting from the interaction of software design and user expectations. This study sought to understand what usability means within the context of one online and distance learning program at universities.

Usability studies of WWW sites: heuristic evaluation vs. laboratory testing

1997

This paper describes the strengths and weaknesses of two usability assessment methods frequently applied to web sites. It uses case histories of WWW usability studies conducted by the authors to illustrate issues of special interest to designers of web sites. The discussion not only compares the two methods, but also discusses how an effective usability process can combine them, applying the methods at different times during site development.

A USER-CENTERED APPROACH TO WEBSITES USABILITY EVALUATION

Usability evaluation of interactive systems has been a topical issue in human-computer interaction. People at different times and places have attempted to evaluate software, websites, and other tools to ascertain their levels of usability. The essence is to indicate the extent to which such interactive systems are easy to learn, easy to use, easy to remember as well as to determine their effectiveness, efficiency, error tolerance, aesthetics and user satisfaction. The evaluation methods applied so far have not yielded desired results in the perspective of users. This work adopts a user-centered approach to usability evaluation of two Nigerian universities’ websites (www.unical.edu.ng and www.uniport.edu.ng) by applying a systematic methodology of involving users in performing set tasks (user testing) and using the tasks completion time as metric. Data collected from the tasks completion time were statistically analyzed for usability criteria of learnability, efficiency, and satisfaction. Feedbacks were obtained from users through questionnaires on areas where improvements are desired from the sites, and the design-evaluate-redesign cycle recommended to the Universities’ Web Teams to amend poorly developed interfaces and contents. It is inferred in the paper that www.unical.edu.ng received more preference from the perspective of users due to its ability to allow quick tasks performance, fast downloads, effective navigation, error tolerance, consistency, and minimal background coloring. Keywords and Phrases: Usability evaluation, interactive systems, human-computer interaction, user-centered approach, metric

Evaluating usability evaluation methods: criteria, method and a case study

2007

The paper proposes an approach to comparative usability evaluation that incorporates important relevant criteria identified in previous work. It applies the proposed approach to a case study of a comparative evaluation of an academic website employing four widely-used usability evaluation methods (UEMs): heuristic evaluation, cognitive walkthroughs, think-aloud protocol and co-discovery learning.

Usability Engineering Methods for the Web Results From a Usability Study

The paper presents the results of a study on usability methods for evaluating Web sites. lt summarizes the "Heuristics for Web Communications, " and reports the practical experiences with these heuristics, contrasting them with the "Keevil Index " and combining them with user testing with thinking aloud. It concludes that working with the "Heuristics for Web Communications " takes more time and effort than working with the "Kevil Index," but produces more consistent results. The heuristics proved to be applicable both in heuristic evaluation and in combination with user testing. Zusammenfassung Der Beitrag präsentiert eine Studie über Evaluationsmethoden zur Web-Usability. Er beschreibt die "Heuristics for Web Communications " und berichtet von den praktischen Erfahrungen mit den Heuristiken, die mit dem "Keevil Index" verglichen und mit Benutzertests mit lautem Denken kombiniert werden. Das Ergebnis zeigt, dass eine Evaluation mit den beschriebenen Heuristiken gegenüber dem "Keevil Index" mehr Zeit und Aufwand erfordert, aber konsistentere Ergebnisse bringt. Die Heuristiken haben sich sowohl in der experten-zentrierten Evaluation als auch in Kombination mit dem Benutzertest insgesamt als geeignete Evaluationsmethode erwiesen.

Iterative Usability Evaluation for an Online Educational Web Portal

International Journal of Multimedia Data Engineering and Management, 2010

Online education is a popular paradigm for promoting continuing education for adult learners. However, only a handful of studies have addressed usability issues in the online education environment. Particularly, few studies have integrated the multifaceted usability evaluation into the lifecycle of developing such an environment. This paper will show the integration of usability evaluation into the development process of an online education center. Multifaceted usability evaluation methods were applied at four different stages of the MU Extension web portal’s development. These methods were heuristic evaluation, focus group interview and survey, think-aloud interviewing, and multiple-user simultaneous testing. The results of usability studies at each stage enhanced the development team’s understanding of users’ difficulties, needs, and wants, which served to guide web developers’ subsequent decisions.

An empirical comparison on the evaluation of web sites with usability criteria

This work presents two empirical studies on the application of usability principles to evaluate a web site. Participants learned about usability principles using two teaching approaches: one approach employed patterns and the other guidelines. The comparison required participants to perform a usability review of a web site. The web site contained simple usability errors that were specifically embedded for the task and were violating usability principles. Results indicate that novice designers are able to identify a satisfactory number of usability errors within web pages. Patterns and guidelines can successfully communicate usability principles and knowledge to inexperienced designers. Both studies indicate that there were not significant differences between the performances of the two groups. The study was successful in showing that usability based on patterns and guidelines can be very useful to novice web designers.