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Usability with Project Lecture 4 – 19/9/08

Danish students conducting a project on British produce evaluate a website to determine if British food is as unhealthy as it sounds. They book a flight to the UK, hire a car, and explore the culinary delights of England. The exercise involves analyzing the website's usability shortcomings, categorizing the problems based on usability heuristics, and providing suggestions for improvement.

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Usability with Project Lecture 4 – 19/9/08

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  1. Usability with ProjectLecture 4 – 19/9/08 Dr. Simeon Keates

  2. Exercise – part 1 • Each group will be given a web-site on which to perform a heuristic evaluation • Analyse the site for the particular task that you have been given • Work as a group to analyse the site and identify as many usability shortcomings as possible

  3. Task • A group of Danish students working on a project about British produce decide to find out if British food really is as unhealthy as it sounds… • […and to bring some back for their lecturer!] • The 4 (or 5) students book a cheap flight with Easyjet / Sterling / SAS to Stansted / East Midlands / Heathrow and want to hire a car for 3 days to explore the culinary delights of England • Car needs to be large enough for all 4 (or 5) plus luggage. • Also needs a child safety seat (for testing the baby products) • And 0 GBP insurance excess collision damage cover

  4. Exercise – part 2 • Prepare a presentation for Friday morning • E-mail it to me by Thursday lunchtime at the latest! • Presentation must address: • Name of site • Type/purpose of site • Task analysed • What you liked about the site • What you did not like about the site • Problems found (number, type, severity) • Suggestions for fixing the problems

  5. Use of the heuristics Use is two-stage 1 – To indicate the types of areas to consider when looking for problems 2 – To classify the problems when you find them Remember – look for problems, then classify • Not the other way around!

  6. Your presentations • Over to you…

  7. Approaches to design

  8. Approaches to design (source: Keates and Clarkson “Countering design exclusion”)

  9. A stage-based model of the design process (source: BS7000: 1 “Guide to managing innovation”) No representation of “iteration”

  10. An alternative stage-based approach • Clarification of the task • Take vague idea/market need and identify true requirements and constraints • OUTPUT: “Design specification” • Conceptual design • Generate concepts with the potential to meet the functional and phsyical requirements in the design specification • OUTPUT: “Concept” • Embodiment design • Lay foundation of detail design through structured development of concept • OUTPUT: e.g. detailed layout drawing • Detail design • Specify precise shape, dimensions, tolerances, etc. • OUTPUT: e.g. “blueprints”

  11. Better models of design • Stage-based models typically focus on modelling process of design • More emphasis needed on meeting the product’s acceptability targets • Need to add 2 important questions: • Verification: “Are we building the product correctly?” • Validation: “Are we building the correct product?”

  12. The waterfall model

  13. A “systems” approach to designing • Evaluation of acceptability (verification and validation) is crucial • Provides evidence of “performance” (whether good or not) • Additionally, evaluation of product must be done in context of its use • For genuine usability (and inclusivity): where the product is part of a system, the entire system should be evaluated • Where the product is a service, the entire service delivery chain should be evaluated

  14. An example of a systems approach: The “V-model”

  15. Iterative models of design • Most “classical” models still represent design as largely “linear” • In reality, most design is iterative (design, evaluate, design, evaluate…) • Newer models reflect this…

  16. Shigley and Mischke – Optimisation and iteration

  17. Other approaches to design • All models so far are “engineering” models of design • Focus on “practical acceptability” • Alternative approach from “product” design • More focus on “social acceptability”

  18. A practitioner’s model of design – The IDEO approach

  19. Another view of design • A product-centred approach: • A user-centred approach: Product Product

  20. The user-loop: A model of user involvement in design

  21. Heuristics as a design approach

  22. Setting the scene • “Rehabilitation Robotics in Europe” c.1997 • EU funded many projects under TIDE initiative • LOTS of money!!! • Projects generally major disasters • Let’s see why…

  23. An example – The EPI-RAID robot

  24. EPI-RAID failed because… • No in-built market to sell to • Had to sell on its own merits • Too expensive • (~5000000DKK) • Overtaken by new technology • Internet • Not enough consideration of what it was to be used for • Too much focus on the technology Needed a user-centred design approach!

  25. Question • Can we use Nielsen’s heuristic in the design process? • i.e. not just for post-hoc testing

  26. Exercise

  27. Exercise – part 1 • Work as a group • Write a script (ask analysis) for how you envisage each of your personas would use your site • Try to follow that script using your site • Log any problems you encounter • Then try another group’s site (more if you have time) • Make any changes to your site based on your evaluations

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