Uploaded byBen Woods
Usability for Web Designers
This document discusses web usability for designers. It begins with an introduction to usability, providing examples of usability guidelines and techniques for do-it-yourself usability testing. Some of the key guidelines discussed include consistency and standards, error handling, recognition over recall, and limiting unnecessary content. The document also provides a navigation stress test technique for testing usability without user recruitment. Resources for learning more about usability include research firms, books, and organizations.
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Usability for Web Designers
- 1. Web Usability forDesigners Ben Woods 09.24.2009
- 2. Topics • Usability: Whatis it? • Examples • Selected Guidelines for Usability • Do it yourself Usability Testing • Learning More • QA
- 3. User Experience &Usability INFORMATION USABILITY CONVENTIONS ARCHITECTURE RESEARCH TAXONOMIES TESTING NAVIGATION STRUCTURE USER OBJECTIVE (Content, Task) EMOTIONAL DESIGN TECHNOLOGY BRANDING RELIABILITY STYLE RESPONSIVENESS CONTENT CAPABILITY
- 4. User Experience Ensuringyour audience can achieve their goals through thoughtful, meaningful design
- 5. Usability Usability isthe degree to which something - software, hardware or anything else - is easy to use and a good fit for the people who use it. -UPA
- 6. Low Usability: Wheredoes it come from? It’s all around us, sometimes more or less obvious. Apathy Ignorance Over-Ambition
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- 16. Designing Usability • Whois your audience? • What are they trying to do? • How does your design help/hurt them?
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- 19. From can use,to want to use http://www.gearwrench.com/catalog/wrenches/ratcheting/xl_x-beam/beautyshot.jpg
- 20. Usability Pays MSRP=$25.78 MSRP=$28.42 http://www.amazon.com
- 21. Components of Usability •A design philosophy infused with usability uses different approaches throughout the design project CONVENTIONS USER DESIGN TESTING 1) Blue text for links RESEARCH RESEARCH 1) Guerilla Methods 2) Clear labels 1) User feedback 1) Task analysis 2) Think Alouds Et Cetera 2) Interviews 2) Card Sorts 3) Eye Tracking 3) Surveys 4) Observation Continuous Continuous Early Middle to conclusion
- 22. Selected Guidelines forWeb Usability ** adapted from Jakob Nielsen’s Ten Usability Heuristics - www.useit.com/papers/heuristic/heuristic_list.html
- 23. Consistency and Standards •Conventions have arisen that users have come to expect as they traverse the web • Links: Blue and underlined. • Navigation: Typically at top and/or left. • Icons: Use standardized icons (you can find these by comparing other sites). In very rare cases use without text (RSS). • Indicate when opening a native file (PDF, PPT, other) • When should new windows pop up? • Search Presentation:
- 24. Consistency and Standards •Note search box location, logo, and text formatting
- 25. Consistency and Standards •Find the podcasting icon
- 26. Error Handling: System Status,Error Prevention and Recovery • People are well adapted to navigating the physical world, and solving problems when encountered. In hypermedia - not so much • Let your users know if it a process is taking a long time • Provide error feedback in plain language • Good systems allow for quick recovery; great systems prevent it altogether
- 27. Error Handling: System Status,Error Prevention and Recovery Let’s you know it hasn’t crashed, still working
- 28. Error Handling: System Status,Error Prevention and Recovery NO! YES!
- 29. Recognition, not Recall •Applications (MS Office, Creative Suite, etc) are used repeatedly, for long durations; thus processes may be taught and learned • The relationship with a website is short-lived. Focus on making things easy to recognize, not necessarily easy to remember.
- 30. Signal Vs Noise: •Keep unnecessary content to a minimum • Every piece of information on the screen is competing for the user’s attention • Focus on guiding the user to their goal(s)
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- 32. Basic Usability testingcan be done by anyone • Keep costs low: test early, test often • Use Guerrilla Methods, Discount testing, etc. • Use paper prototypes • Testing basic interactions • Doesn’t require user recruiting • Lots of good resources for these techniques • Here’s a good technique…
- 33. Navigation Stress Test • Process • "Randomly" pick a low-level page, not a home page, from your site • Print the page out in black and white, without the URL listed in the header/footer • Pretend that you are entering this site for the first time at this page and try to answer to questions below • Mark-up the piece of paper with what you think the answers are • Have other members of your team, and people who know nothing about your site, do the stress test too. Then compare notes. Where did you agree? Where did no one agree? • For the "problem" areas, you have several choices for action to take. You may want to re-design some elements of your navigation based on what you discover with the stress test. Or, you may use it to help focus a round of usability testing (to see if it actually matters for your users). Or, you may very well know what you are doing and say "interesting to see the results of this test, but they do not apply in our situation". http://www.instone.org/navstress
- 34. Navigation Stress Test Navigation Question Mark Up on the Paper Draw a rectangle around the title of the page or write it on the paper What is this page about? yourself What site is this? Circle the site name, or write it on the paper yourself What are the major sections of this site? Label with X What major section is this page in? Draw a triangle around the X What is "up" 1 level from here? Label with U How do I get to the home page of this site? Label with H How do I get to the top of this section of the site? Label with T Circle the major groups of links and label. • D: More details, sub-pages of this one What does each group of links represent? • N: Nearby pages, within same section as this page • S: Pages on same site, but not as near • O: Off-site pages Write the set of selections as: Choice 1 > Choice 2 > .... Connect the How might you get to this page from the site home page? visual elements on the page that tell you this. http://www.instone.org/navstress
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- 37. Research Firms • UIE- User Interface Engineering: Headed by Jared Spool • NN/g - Jakob Nielsen and Don Norman
- 38. Books • Don’t Makeme Think - Steve Krug • Designing Web Usability - Jakob Nielsen • Designing Web Navigation - James Kalbach • Elements of User Experience - Jesse James Garrett
- 39. Organizations • NEOUPA -www.neoupa.org • UXNet - www.uxnet.org/cat/locales/cleveland
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