Design Case: Building Community in a Design Effort in a Decentralized, Individualistic Setting  

WebFeat is a web development effort by about 40 students, faculty and staff in the College of Engineering at the University of Washington. In this design environment, the challenges of building community among the members of the design team are substantial. We devised a suite of tools and processes designed to foster a sense of community and participation in the development process, as well as to lay the groundwork for participatory maintenance of the site in the future.

Ramey, Judith A. and David K. Farkas. Symposium on Designing Interactive Systems (1997). Design>Web Design>Collaboration>Participatory Design

Discovering User-Generated Metaphors Through Usability Testing

A post-hoc analysis of data collected from a usability test on the Fluke ScopeMeter 97â (a diagnostic instrument for analyzing electrical signals) revealed that subjects miss-hit certain interface keys significantly more than other keys. Comments that subjects made during the usability test through the thinking-aloud protocol led us to the hypothesis that miss-hits were caused by subjects' internal metaphors (user-generated) that were unsupported by the design of the keys. A review of literature revealed a lack of research in the area of user-generated metaphor and its effects on user performance. With further analysis we found aspects of the ScopeMeter keys and subject characteristics that provide a strong foundation for this hypothesis. We conclude that formal experiments should be set up to test this and other hypotheses that address the role user-generated metaphors play in building mental models and influencing user behavior.

Schulz, Erin Leanne, Judith A. Ramey, Maarten van Alphen and William Rasnake. City University of Hong Kong (1995). Articles>Usability>Testing>Tropes

Guidelines for Web Data Collection: Understanding and Interacting with Your Users    

The global growth of the World Wide Web challenges technical communicators to reconsider the methods we use to create designs that meet the goals and needs of our users. This article focuses on taking advantage of the Web's potential for interactivity between designers and users. It offers strategies for getting data from users of Web sites and using it for two main purposes: (1) analyzing audience and patterns of use to support continuous redesign, and (2) building a relationship or sense of community on a Web site.

Ramey, Judith A. Technical Communication Online (2000). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design>Log Analysis

Measuring the Value Added by Professional Technical Communicators    

Many organizations underestimate what technical communicators do for them. This article studies how to quantify the measure of return on investment in TC.

Ramey, Judith A. and Janice C. 'Ginny' Redish. IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication (1993). Articles>TC>Assessment

Measuring the Value Added by Professional Technical Communicators: Results of a Study  

For the past year, we have been studying how to measure the value that technical communicators add to organizations. We have been investigating questions like these: How can technical communicators show that they add value? How much difference do technical communicators make in specific cases? In this panel, we report on results.

Blackwell, C. Al, Reva F. Daniel, Denise D. Pieratti, Judith A. Ramey, Janice C. 'Ginny' Redish and Cathy J. Spencer. STC Proceedings (1994). Articles>TC>Assessment

Measuring the Value that You Add to Your Company: Planning Your Own Case Study on Reducing Support Costs  

In this interactive session, we will lead technical communicators through a process of setting up and conducting a study to find out how much support is costing their organization or their clients’ organizations. We will also help technical communicators cost-justify their work by estimating reductions in support costs. We will help them plan case studies to show how highquality technical communications can reduce support calls and costs.

Ramey, Judith A. and Janice C. 'Ginny' Redish. STC Proceedings (1995). Careers>TC>Quality

Methods for Successful 'Thinking Out Loud' Procedure

When you are screening the participants for a study, notice how they respond to your questions. Decide on a strategy for engaging the participant before they arrive for the usability study. Be careful of the social dynamics you set up with the participant.

Ramey, Judith A. STC Usability SIG (1998). Resources>Usability>Testing>Methods

More Results on Measuring the Value Added by Professional Technical Communicators  

Measuring value added is a topic of great concern to technical communicators. At the 1994 conference, represented results from a year-long project that included a questionnaire and several case studies. STC then funded a second, smaller project in which we are following up with some of the people who responded to the questionnaire and in which we are collecting new case studies.

Ramey, Judith A. and Janice C. 'Ginny' Redish. STC Proceedings (1995). Presentations>TC>Assessment

Rolling Assessment: Observing On-Going User Responses to a Next Generation Internet Telemedicine Application Through Successive Stages of Development  

Industry and academia have developed disparate models for evaluating the success of a given project. Academia applies a scientific research model, with an emphasis on environmental control and static reproducibility. Industry, software development in particular, has employed a more user-centered approach, gathering user feedback to inform successive waves of redesign. This study describes how the blending of these two approaches can result in quantifiable descriptive data, which can be immediately applied to the design process.

Eliot, Matthew J., Tristan Robinson, Robin Maberry, Judith A. Ramey, Brent Stewart. STC Proceedings (2002). Articles>Usability>Assessment

A Selected Bibliography: A Beginner's Guide to Usability Testing    

Many people interested in learning about usability testing have trouble finding an entry point into the literature of the field. This bibliography offers to help.

Ramey, Judith A. IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication (1989). Resources>Bibliographies>Usability

Usability Progression: Catching the Main Currents in Usability  

This Progression explores usability issues and techniques for the novice usability professional. Topics covered include: how to identify usability test issues; usability issues for visual communication; the importance of starting your project with a usability test; rating the importance of user tasks; low-cost, high-return techniques for gathering usability data; selecting participants who accurately represent your target audience; effective usability testing for the Web; conducting a heuristic review; creating scenarios to direct design and development; “toys” of the trade; and special considerations for testing in a low-tech lab, room, or closet.

Ramey, Judith A. STC Proceedings (1999). Presentations>Usability

Usability Progression: Making Smart Choices in Usability Testing  

This Progression focuses on usability and usability research for the novice usability professional. Topics covered include special considerations for testing in a low-tech lab, room, or closet; how to identify usability test issues; heuristic evaluation vs. laboratory testing: when should you use these methods?; focusing on testing documentation; using a SuperTester for early error detection; using field research, and alternatives, in the design process; low-cost, high-return techniques for gathering usability data; questions you should ask when you’re interviewing for a usability position or thinking about trying to create a usability position; selecting participants who accurately represent your target audience; and usability testing as co-design.

Ramey, Judith A. STC Proceedings (1998). Presentations>Usability

WebFeat: A Case Study in Learning through Design in Technical Communication  

WebFeat, a project that involved 40 people from six departments in the College of Engineering at the University of Washington, taught the participating students skills of two kinds: technical skills and process skills. The process skills they learned were how to manage a project, how to work on a cross-disciplinary team, how to do audience and task analysis and define requirements, how to consider life-cycle issues in design, and how to document and deliver a product. The value of the project derived from the fact that students had to integrate the skills they had learned in the separate courses they had taken and from the fact that students had a 'pilot' experience that will help them be effective in the workplace.

Ramey, Judith A. STC Proceedings (1998). Articles>Education>Web Design

What Technical Communicators Think About Measuring Value Added    

As part of an STC-funded research project on measuring the value added by technical communicators and information products, researchers designed a questionnaire to get a view of current thinking in the profession about the issue of measuring value added.

Ramey, Judith A. Technical Communication Online (1995). Articles>TC>Assessment

What You Can Learn From Analyzing Artifacts and Outcroppings in Field Studies  

Two often overlooked sources of data in field studies reside in the physical dimension of the workplace: artifacts and outcroppings. Artifacts are physical objects in use at a site: tools, forms, reports, templates, etc. Outcroppings are noticeable physical traits that mark or characterize the site: size of cubicles, whiteboards and what’s written on them, uniforms worn by certain classes of personnel, etc. These two sources of data can greatly enrich the overall understanding of the site. This paper describes artifacts and outcroppings found in the workplace, what you can learn from them, how to collect data about them, how to analyze the data, and how to report what you’ve learned. The points are illustrated with examples from three case studies.

Ramey, Judith A., Denise Carlevato and Erin Leanne Schulz. STC Proceedings (1996). Presentations>Usability>Assessment