Week 4

I found this honeycomb diagram from Morville(2004) about user experience design while looking around for usability info. It's an outgrowth the the 3 circles (content, context, users) of information architecture. It is a handy resource to use as we think of the desirable balance when creating a site.

Morville, P. (2004) User Experience Design Retrieved March 24, 2008 from

http://www.semanticstudios.com/publications/semantics/000029.php

Week 3 - Designing a Questionnaire

Leung (2001) gives suggestions for designing a questionnaire :

• Use short and simple sentences
• Ask for only one piece of information at a time
• Avoid negatives if possible
• Ask precise questions
• Ensure those you ask have the necessary knowledge
• Sensitive issues - hard to get truthful answers to sensitive questions
• Minimize bias

Format can be open or closed. Closed is easiest to fill in. It is a structured response where subject chooses between predetermined responses. Open Form - the subject writes in any response.

Order of questions is significant. I'll note the guidelines below:

• general to particular
  
• easy to difficult
• factual to abstract
• start with closed format
• start with questions pertaining to the main subject
• do NOT start with personal or demographic questions

The survey should begin with an introductory letter detailing the purpose of the survey. The survey can either be self administered or interview administered. Multiple choice questions are easy to lay out on a written survey. The respondents can pick the best answer or answers from among all the options. Make sure to give directions about how many answers to select after the question. Use the Likert scale to assess a person's feelings about something.
(Encylopedia of Educational Technology, 2008)

InfoPoll Survey tips include:

• short questionnaire
• use simple words
• relax your grammar
• assure common understanding
• start with interesting questions
• don't write leading questions
• avoid double negatives
• balance rating scales

Avoid using difficult concepts and making the list of choices too long. Put the questions in logical order and name the survey to pique interest. Pretest the survey.


Leung, W. C. (2001) How to conduct a questionnaire. Retrieved March 14, 2007 from http://student.bmj.com/back_issues/0601/education/187.html

Waddington, H. (2000) Types of survey questions Encylopedia of Educational Technology. Retrieved 3/16/08 from http://coe.sdsu.edu/eet/Articles/surveyquest/index.htm

InfoPoll Survey (1998) http://www.accesscable.net/~infopoll/tips.htm

Site Research

Back to researching sites. I have spent this week searching sites with obvious usability flaws. This might be an example of the most cluttered site I have ever seen. I have gone to the extreme picking this one. http://www.havenworks.com/ I don't think the tag line, if you even notice it, helps. I'm confused as to what it even means. This page definitely needs to be simplified and given a clear visual hierarchy. My only positive usability comment would be that it is obvious what is clickable.

I do a lot or work with resources for teachers and so I think I will put my focus on similar pages.

Sites for Teachers http://www.sitesforteachers.com/

• the first thing that jumps out on this page is the ad on top, not the logo. Moving the logo to the left would make it noticeable.
• the logo is the only working home button. I would add one to each page other than the home page.
• the visual hierarchy is not obvious. The ads on the left overshadow the main menu links.
• it doesn't appear to have a user centered design
• it would help to break up the links into defined areas of interest rather than one endless list of page links. The main menu could be expanded to include the categories mentioned next to the logo - reading, mathematics etc using tabs across the top
• Some text size options would be good
• make page easier to scan

Educational Websites for Teachers http://www.camden.rutgers.edu/~wood/edwebsites.htm



Eduscape http://eduscapes.com/

• a resource site that simply links the viewer to other teacher resource sites they recommend
• home page is very noisy
• there is a logo however with all the other graphics of equal size, the logo does not stand out well
• a navigation bar of some kind would be helpful
• the logo is the only functioning home button
• the pages are not consistent in design layout
• advertisements are mixed in with links to legitimate educational resource sites
• the Eduscape News is somewhat more valuable to the teacher, but I would doubt that the teacher would have found the link.

Discovery Education http://school.discoveryeducation.com/

• logo clearly defines the purpose of the site
• the visual hierarchy clearly describes "school resources" in large font
• menu on the left is simply presented and the categories are those teachers will be interested in.
• advertisements are present but do not take away from the content.
• the site search is clearly marked and no login is required
• the content submenus are very clear and the page design is consistent
• professional look and design
• on other pages links are not only marked with a bullet, but are also underlined
• certain pages use moving elements to attract the viewer
  
  

PBS Teachers: http://www.pbs.org/teachers/

• easy to navigate site
• the visual hierarchy is well-defined with the larger fonts introducing prominent menu items.
• the site ID is clear
• there are no breadcrumbs or text size options.
• the page design is consistent
• main resource menu is always on the left
• each page has an advanced site search and each subject area page has a search function allowing for search by grade level and content area
• visited links do not change colour.

Edutopia http://www.edutopia.org/
This is a George Lucas Educational Foundation Site - so no lack of money or talent to spend.

Usability Research Continued

Nielson (2005) also recommends content specifically written for the web should be:

• short
• able to be scanned
• to the point
• answer users questions
• uses common language

He also suggests using contact info and liquid layout for page resizing.



Nielson, J. (2005). Top ten web design mistakes of 2005. Retrieved March 12, 2008 from http://www.useit.com/alertbox/designmistakes.html

Assignments - Week 2

Usability Research Scrapbook:

This blog is going to be my usability research scrapbook. I have only done one blog before this so hopefully I will not make too many mistakes. At least blogger seems pretty easy to use.

Market Research for Proposed Project:

I did ask this question in discussion but I'm still not sure. Are we to find a site we think has a usability problem and make suggestions for redesign after testing 3 similar sites? OR do we decide on a website we'd like to design and then find similar 3 sites to do usabilitytesting on? I don't know yet what I'll base my website on but I have started looking. So many choices! I'm still confused on the problem solving idea?

Usability Testing Video & Written Report:

Luckily I have a video camera, though I imagine I could do it with my web cam as well. I think
my friends are going to have to be my guinea pigs for this assignment. I will try and follow/adapt Krug's testing techniques and script. He makes it look easy, but I'm sure it's not.

Final Documentation:

I'll use Krug's "Don't make me think" to get ideas so I can get started on this assignment.

Research notes:

Krug (2006) has quite a lot of practical suggestions for successful site usablility. I''ll make notes of them here for quick review and a checklist to use. He suggests:

• A clear visual hierarchy
• the use of accepted web conventions
• each page should be clearly defined
• it should be obvious when something is 'clickable'
• include a search box on each page
• keep pages simple without much noise, not too busy
• use breadcrumbs (so that users can easily see where they are and how they got there). He suggests the greater than symbol > in between levels. For example Home > Subject > Category > This Page
• clear global navigation
• home buttons on every page
• importance of site ID - use logo and taglines
• distinct sections and utilities
• well thought page names
• likes use of tabs

Some additional things to watch for:

• low contrast text
• text that can't be resized or that can be and in so doing causes the content to disappear. http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/200711/common_usability_problems/
• differentiate between visited and unvisited links(Nielson, 2005) http://www.useit.com/alertbox/designmistakes.html

Krug, S. (2006) Don’t Make Me Think, A common sense approach to Web Usability, Second Edition.
Berkeley: New Riders Publishing

Nielsen, J. (2008) Current Issues in Web Usability,
Retrieved March 10, 2008 from: http://www.useit.com/alertbox/


Identify a problem:

So I need to create a questionnaire and distribute it to help identify the problems. Still looking for site theme to focus on.

Usabilitiy - Week 1

"Matching the user's natural flow is just one challenge a web-based application developer needs to address" (Spool, 2008, para.5) . I found this useful. Can you find the application, is it what you expected, does the order flow as you thought?

I read through Krug "Don't make me think" and found it very easy to read - unlike most of my readings in other classes. He seems very practical and states things simply. I wish most text books followed his style. I changed my own site after reading it and added a site search to each page. I will probably add a site map too. It is making me critique sites I visit with his suggestions in mind.


Spool, J.M (2008). Important Usability Challenges for Designing Web Apps. Retrieved March 6, 2008 from http://www.uie.com/articles/web_app_challenges/

Student page

Yesterday I uploaded my student web page to webct.

Module 1: Usability Background

Starting with Module one I hope to keep a record of my research for this class here.