Fast and Simple Usability Testing

Everyone knows by now that they should test the usability of their applications, but still hardly anybody actually does it. In this article I'll share some tips I've picked up for doing usability tests quickly and effectively. Relatively recent tools like Django and Ruby on Rails allow us to develop projects faster and to make significant changes later in the project timeline. Usability testing methods should now be adapted to fit this modern approach to development.

Downe, Natalie. 24 Ways to impress Your Friends (2005). Articles>Usability>Testing>Methods

Fast, Cheap, and Good: Yes, You Can Have It All

The sooner you complete a usability study, the higher its impact on the design process. Slower methods should be deferred to an annual usability checkup.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2007). Articles>Usability>Testing>Methods

Fast, Cheap, and Good: Yes, You Can Have It All

The sooner you complete a usability study, the higher its impact on the design process. Slower methods should be deferred to an annual usability checkup.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2007). Articles>Usability>Methods

Field Oriented Design Techniques: Case Studies and Organizing Dimensions  

An article of faith among members of the CHI community is that successful design stems from the synthesis of a profound understanding of users' work and the capabilities offered by technology.

Wixon, Dennis and Judith A. Ramey. Microsoft (1995). Design>User Centered Design>Methods

Field Studies Done Right: Fast and Observational

Field studies should emphasize the observation of real user behavior. Simple field studies are fast and easy to conduct, and do not require a posse of anthropologists: All members of a design team should go on customer visits.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2002). Articles>Usability>Methods

Field Studies: The Best Tool to Discover User Needs

The most valuable asset of a successful design team is the information they have about their users. When teams have the right information, the job of designing a powerful, intuitive, easy-to-use interface becomes tremendously easier. When they don't, every little design decision becomes a struggle. While techniques, such as focus groups, usability tests, and surveys, can lead to valuable insights, the most powerful tool in the toolbox is the 'field study'. Field studies get the team immersed in the environment of their users and allow them to observe critical details for which there is no other way of discovering.

Spool, Jared M. User Interface Engineering. Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Usability

Finding a Cure for Survey Fatigue  

A downward trend in survey response rates is often blamed on the fact that people simply become tired of taking surveys. Butthere are ways to avoid the malaise setting in, says Angela Sinickas, a key one being making sure thatpeople feel their opinions are actually being listened to. Here she shares three common causes of survey fatigue and how to deal with them.

Sinickas, Angela D. Sinickas Communications (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Surveys

First Rule of Usability? Don't Listen to Users

To design an easy-to-use interface, pay attention to what users do, not what they say. Self-reported claims are unreliable, as are user speculations about future behavior.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2001). Articles>Usability>Methods

Five Fail-Safe Tips When You Forget or Get Flustered During a Presentation

If you haven’t yet experienced your point of embarrassment or memory lapse, you will. When it happens, consider these fail-safe ways to regain your memory and retain your poise.

Booher, Dianna. Presenters University (2003). Articles>Presentations>Methods>Rhetoric

Five Survival Techniques for Creating Usable Products

When we ask designers what stage they spend the bulk of their time in when launching a product, the majority of designers answer, the Implementation Stage. However, our research shows that the teams launching the most usable products on schedule and on budget spend the bulk of their time in the Measure and Learn stage.

Perfetti, Christine. User Interface Engineering (2007). Design>Usability>User Interface>Methods

Focus Group

A focus group is a focused discussion where a moderator leads a group of participants through a set of questions on a particular topic. Focus groups are often used in the early stages of product planning and requirements gathering to obtain feedback about users, products, concepts, prototypes, tasks, strategies, and environments. Focus groups can also be used to obtain consensus about specific issues.

Usability Body of Knowledge. Resources>Usability>Methods>Focus Groups

Focus Groups or Individual Interviews? A Comparison of Text Evaluation Approaches    

By providing an empirical comparison of two evaluation approaches, this article aims to make it easier to choose between focus groups and individual interviews as a way of evaluating documents, and thereby to contribute to a methodology of text evaluation. The article first presents the relevant literature and then moves on to present the results of the authors' experiment. The authors find that focus groups tended to identify acceptance problems, while individual interview participants focused on comprehension.

de Jong, Menno D.T. and Peter Jan Schellens. Technical Communication Online (1998). Articles>Interviewing>Methods

Focus Groups or Survey?

This month's column is a quiz. I'll set up some scenarios, you choose which research approach you think is best. At the end, I'll defend why I think my own answers are right!

Sinickas, Angela D. Sinickas Communications (2000). Articles>Research>Methods>Surveys

Focus Groups to Study Work Practice

Focus groups are a good way to learn how people approach tasks and to get an overview of work that spans hours or days or longer periods. Focus groups can be a great way to learn about the work that occurs 'between' or 'around' the tools we build.

Ede, Meghan R. Useit (2002). Articles>Usability>Methods>Focus Groups

Focus Groups to Study Work Practice

My definition of focus groups is very broad. I consider focus groups to occur whenever a group of people are invited to participate in a moderated discussion on a specific topic. I usually use focus groups very early in the design, to better understand potential users of a product or service. This differentiates usability focus groups from marketing focus groups, which often seek to learn reactions to a finished product. Focus groups differ from usability studies in that the participants are not asked to use a product. They differ from participatory design sessions because the participants are not asked to contribute or comment on design ideas. In a focus group, all I want participants to do is talk.

Ede, Meghan R. Usability Interface (1998). Articles>Usability>Methods>Focus Groups

Following a Fast-Moving Target: Recording User Behavior in Web Usability Testing  

Presents techniques for capturing user behavior accurately and completely in real time.

Kantner, Laurie. Tec-Ed, Inc. (2002). Articles>Usability>Methods

Formal Usability Inspections

Formal Usability Inspection takes the software inspection methodology and adapts it to usability evaluation. Software inspections, more commonly known as code inspections, started at IBM as a way to formalize the discovery and recording of software problems ('defects' in quality jargon, 'bugs' in the vernacular). The technique also provided quantitative measurements that could be tracked using statistical process control methods. Code inspections were also adapted to check and track documentation defects, and usability defects were a logical next step. Formal usability inspections include aspects of other inspection methods too. Heuristics are used to help non-usability professionals find usability defects. Inspectors walkthrough tasks with the user's goals and purpose in mind, similar to cognitive walkthroughs, although the emphasis is less on cognitive theory and more on encountering defects.

Hom, James. VWH.net. Articles>Usability>Methods

From Essential Use Cases to Objects  

One of the main motivations for essential use cases was the context of user interface design. We, however, have been exploring the application of essential use cases in general object-oriented system development. Our experience has been very positive, and we found advantages to essential use cases that assist in both analysis and in design. This paper outlines two techniques involving essential use cases: use of role-play in requirements analysis, and distribution of system requirements from essential use cases to objects.

Biddle, Robert, James Noble and Ewan Tempero. Constantine and Lockwood (2003). Articles>User Interface>Methods

The Gentle Art of Questionnaire Design  

It is important for us to gain knowledge about our audiences before we start developing our information packages. It is equally important for us to get feedback after we have produced our information so that we know how well it was received by our audiences.

Ridgway, Lenore S. and Roger A. Grice. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Research>Methods>Surveys

Get Out of Your Lab, and Into Their Lives

We need to practice research methods that accept the complexity of customers' technological world, and take it into account. Monolithic solutions are giving way to smaller point solutions, people are saving their information in a variety of places (personal computer, websites and hosted applications, handheld devices, print-outs), and reliance on stored passwords and favorites is deepening. And yet, in this climate, we still invite folks into a foreign lab, to use a computer that isn't theirs, to leave behind their files, papers, and Post-It Notes, and then ask them to engage in a scripted series of uninterrupted tasks.

Merholz, Peter. Adaptive Path (2006). Articles>Usability>Methods

Get The Credit You Deserve From Surveys

The wonders of technology have opened up easy-to-use on-line survey creation and analysis. Yet if you take the numbers the surveys provide at face value, you may be under-representing your audience's true responses. The following examples demonstrate how to phrase questions for more accurate results.

Sinickas, Angela D. Sinickas Communications (2002). Articles>Research>Methods>Surveys

Getting Design Done

Here's how to apply the principles of a well-known productivity system to your creative process. The resulting creative habits can boost your design skills while they reduce stress and free your mind to tackle big problems.

Robinson, D. Keith. Creative Pro (2007). Articles>Graphic Design>Methods

Getting Started with Performance Management  

What are some ways to effectively track and manage a group’s performance? Wiley examines a way to do so using specific requirements designed to measure the success of an STC SIG.

Wiley, Ann L. Intercom (2006). Articles>Project Management>Collaboration>Methods

Getting the Most Use Out of Research Results

All too often companies conduct a survey and do nothing with the results. This problem can be avoided by making sure that management is committed to acting on the findings before you even conduct the research (the topic of this month's column) and developing highly actionable research tools (covered last month).

Sinickas, Angela D. Sinickas Communications (1999). Articles>Research>Methods

Getting the Most Use out of Research Results

All too often companies conduct a survey and do nothing with the results. This problem can be minimized through developing a highly actionable survey in the first place (the topic of this month's column) and making sure that management is committed to acting on the findings (to be covered next month). Here are some suggestions for developing a survey that leads to highly actionable results.

Sinickas, Angela D. Sinickas Communications (1999). Articles>Research>Methods>Surveys