Workshop session at IWMW 2002 on "QA For Web Sites" facilitated by Brian Kelly. http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2002/materials/napier/

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QA And The IWMW Web Site:
A Case Study (flaws and all)
Brian Kelly
UKOLN
University of Bath
Bath, BA2 7AY
Email
B.Kelly@ukoln.ac.uk
URL
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/
UKOLN is supported by:

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The IWMW Web Site

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Aims Of Web Site
The aims of the Web site were:
• To provide information about the
workshop for participants, speakers, etc.
• To provide an online booking facility
• To act as a demonstrator of standards,
best practices and innovative solutions
Subject to the following constraints:
• No Content Management System
• Limited time
• Limited software development / design
expertise

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Approach
The approach taken was to continue to use:
• The design and structure used for previous two
workshops
• The HTML-Kit authoring tool to edit HTML files
• The Xenu link checker
Innovations this year include:
• Use of HTML and CSS validation icons
• Provide an XHTML Web site
• Make greater use of CSS
• Provide a dynamically-generated RSS news feed
• Provide live usage statistics
• Access to Web site on PDAs using AvantGo
Is this approach typical of yours – incremental development of an existing
Web site, and introducing new features and more up-to-date standards?
Is this approach typical of yours – incremental development of an existing
Web site, and introducing new features and more up-to-date standards?

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Tools
HTML-kit is my
preferred editor
The XHTML and
CSS icons act as
live links
The SiteMeter
icon gives
realtime info on
usage
The XHTML and
CSS icons act as
live links
The SiteMeter
icon gives
realtime info on
usage

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Problems
Some problems:
• When updating pages, links, HTML and spelling
were not checking systematically
• When using the HTML and CSS checker the
browser could check an old, cached version
• At one stage the SiteMeter usage statistics
service was not available

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Validating In Batch
Checking (e.g. HTML and CSS validation,
links, accessibility, etc.) initial files is time-
consuming and, for large or continually
updated Web sites is not a scalable solution
Validation in batch:
• Familiar for link-checking
• Limited set of tools available for HTML validation
(e.g. HTML Validator Pro – see
<http://www.htmlvalidator.com/>
• Batch HTML validation validates files generated
from PowerPoint, over which I have no control
• Bobby batch accessibility check is now a licensed
application (but used copy downloaded in the
past)

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Maintenance
• When creating new pages, made use of existing
files and sometimes did not update the <TITLE>,
metadata, etc.
• The location of certain files was not obvious (the
size of the Web site has now outgrown the
original navigational links)

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Netscape (sigh)
User feedback revealed that:
• &pound; does not display in Netscape :-(
• The Suggestions text box and the Submit button
(!) were not displayed in Mozilla, due to failure to
support XHTML correctly
Suggestions
Submit

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RSS News Feed
The RSS News Feed:
• Provides a mechanism for syndication of content
• News feed can be viewed on other Web sites or
in other applications
The News Feed was created:
• By transforming (lightly structured) HTML from
the news page using a remote service
• A static version was also created in case of
problems with the live transformation
Problems:
• The remote service was not always available
• The static version was not always in sync with the
live version

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Online Bookings
The online booking forms:
• Were used for booking for the workshop and
choosing the parallel sessions
The backend processing:
• Is not yet fully automated to store the information
in a database
• Confirmation page did not echo the user’s data
• When users followed link to check session, input
data may have been lost
• Crashed on surnames with spaces and accents
• No validation was performed
Despite messages on acknowledgements page, some
users still expected a separate email confirmation

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What Should Be Done
Some simple things can be done for next time:
• Use of SSIs or a CMS (or equivalent ) to manage
resource fragments
• Improve the online booking system to provide:
• Validation (which will save time in administration)
• Display of user input
• Separate confirmation of entry into database
But should I:
• Recognise that minor typos, etc. will happen and,
as long as they are not critical, can be tolerated?

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What About The Processes?
What QA processes were used?
• Automated tools
• Peer review from members of the organising
committee
• Alternating between Opera, IE and Mozilla when
working on Web site
• Viewing the Web site on my Palm to:
• Allow me to work on the bus, train, etc.
• See how the Web site works on a low-spec device

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What Else Should I Do?
Additional processes I should employ:
• Reviewing by users
• Peer-reviewing (others in similar situation)
• Analysis of logs (esp. failure logs)
• Usability testing
• Multiple browser testing
• Test data with unusual entries for online forms
• Post-workshop review of Web site
• Systematic documentation of successes and failures
• Make case for extra resources, software, etc. to
implement improvements
• Documenting the architecture of the Web site
• Documenting the limitations of the Web site
• Preparing these slides!
• …

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Questions
Any questions?