Web Design

Lecture 10 Evaluation

Introduction
The source for this lecture is again
the recommended text (A project
guide to UX design) but the
following text is also highly
recommended:
Rocket surgery made easy Steve
Krug

Introduction
During a number of the preceding
stages we have probably been
carrying out an evaluation of our
designs by:
Ourselves
Our client
Our colleagues or team members

Introduction
Ourselves possibly
subconsciously we have been
altering or limiting what we create
Client getting agreement to
things such as the mood board
Colleagues working in a team or
just informal feedback over the
shoulder

Introduction
Ultimately however we need to
involve the users (or their
representative) at some stage to
check what we have designed for a
whole number of reasons
What will we evaluate?

What can we evaluate?

The look and feel of the site
what overall impression is the user
left with is it what we intended?
Corporate, homely, professional,
clean, warm, cute, friendly,
informal, enigmatic, surprising etc.

What can we evaluate?

Mental models have we tried to
utilise a mental model to make the
site easy or intriguing to use has
this happened?
Oh yeah I see it nowits just
like.and so I think that you
can

What can we evaluate?

Interaction styles how have we
tried to let our users interact with
the content navigation, selection,
query etc.
Is the interaction working as we
intended or is an assumption
failing?

What can we evaluate?

Usability is the site (and its
concepts and structure) easy to
learn, remember, find things,
recover from mistakes, know what
youre doing and where you are?
Whats now needed to do an
evaluation?

What do we need?
Not very much
We can evaluate with very little as
long as its useful.
Obviously the more functionality
that we have, the more we can be
confident in our results

What do we need?
Creately does allow for realistic
looking pages and can add links
from one page to another
More sophisticated functionality
(dropdown menus etc) will require
proper web design tools

What can we do?

Ourselves:
Heuristic analysis
Cognitive walkthrough
Steve Krug method

Colleague:
As above but better
Act as our persona

What can we do?

Users:
Perform tasks
Quantify interaction
Answer questionnaires

Of course the users must be

representative of the people we
have designed for

Heuristic analysis
Basically a checklist of items
Nielsens is probably the best
known but not the only one
Does require some expertise
Better if done by someone
independent of the design

Visibility of system status:

The system should always keep users
informed about what is going on, through
appropriate feedback within reasonable time.
Match between system and the real world:
The system should speak the users' language,
with words, phrases and concepts familiar to
the user, rather than system-oriented terms.
Follow real-world conventions, making
information appear in a natural and logical
order.

User control and freedom:

Users often choose system functions by
mistake and will need a clearly marked
"emergency exit" to leave the unwanted state
without having to go through an extended
dialogue. Support undo and redo.
Consistency and standards:
Users should not have to wonder whether
different words, situations, or actions mean
the same thing. Follow platform conventions.

Error prevention:
Even better than good error messages is a
careful design which prevents a problem from
occurring in the first place. Either eliminate
error-prone conditions or check for them and
present users with a confirmation option
before they commit to the action.

Recognition rather than recall:

Minimize the user's memory load by making objects,
actions, and options visible. The user should not have to
remember information from one part of the dialogue to
another. Instructions for use of the system should be
visible or easily retrievable whenever appropriate.
Flexibility and efficiency of use:
Accelerators -- unseen by the novice user -- may often
speed up the interaction for the expert user such that
the system can cater to both inexperienced and
experienced users. Allow users to tailor frequent
actions.

Aesthetic and minimalist design:

Dialogues should not contain information
which is irrelevant or rarely needed. Every
extra unit of information in a dialogue
competes with the relevant units of
information and diminishes their relative
visibility.
Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover
from errors:
Error messages should be expressed in plain
language (no codes), precisely indicate the
problem, and constructively suggest a
solution.

Help and documentation:

Even though it is better if the system
can be used without documentation, it
may be necessary to provide help and
documentation. Any such information
should be easy to search, focused on
the user's task, list concrete steps to be
carried out, and not be too large.

Cognitive Walkthrough
Experts analyse the design in terms of high level
questions which focus on the cognitive
demands on the user:

Will
Will
Will
Will

users know what action is required

the users see the control for the action
they recognise the control and its effect
they get feedback to their actions

Using personas
Ask someone to act out the role of
your persona using your briefing
sheet
In this role they will effectively be
a user and can be asked to carry
out an evaluation as on the
following slides

Users doing an evaluation

Carry out specific tasks which are
feasible with the prototype (or can
be simulated)
Get quantitative data such as
completion times, success rates,
number of mistakes etc.
Get qualitative data from
questionnaires

System Usability Scale - SUS

10 statements
5 point scale
Positive and
negative
statements
Score /100

Computer System Usability Questionnaire - CSUQ

19 statements
7 point scale
No negative
statements

Questionnaire for User Interface Satisfaction - QUIS

27 judgements
10 point scale

And finally..
It might be argued that any
evaluation is better than nothing
Steve Krug is an enthusiastic
proponent of doing an evaluation
for yourself
www.rocketsurgerymadeeasy.com