All posts about
Usability

Usability is the ease of use and learnability of a human-made object. (source: Wikipedia)

Why it makes sense to do both Expert Review and Usability Testing

“(…) doing both ER followed by UT optimizes the return on the usability investment. ER identifies fundamental or generic challenges within the user experience. Usability Testing highlights contextually specific gaps between the user model and the site model. Executed together, UT builds on the ER, providing complimentary feedback supporting focused and actionable design recommendations. Thus, the power of combined usability review techniques is significantly enhances the power of the review.” (Kathleen Straub – The UPA Voice) – courtesy of step two design

Usable GUI Design: A Quick Guide for F/OSS Developers

“Professional UI designers tell us that user interfaces should be the first thing designed when we come to develop an application, and that programmers are incapable of doing this kind of design. They say it can only be done by the professional UI experts; OSS projects don’t have access to these kind of people, and therefore can never be truly usable.” (Benjamin Roe) – courtesy of slash dot org

OpenUsability.org

“(…) a project that brings open source developers and usability experts together. The idea behind is simple: There are many usability experts who want to contribute to software projects. And there are many developers who want to make their software more usable, and – as a consequence – more successful.” (Open Usability Projects) – courtesy of slash dot org

Using Language to Improve Usability PDF Logo

“Usability: The extent to which a product can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction in a specified context of use. Document design: The field concerned with creating texts (broadly defined) that integrate words and pictures in ways that help people to achieve their specific goals for using texts at home, school or work.” (Whitney Quesenbery)

The End of Usability Culture

“Usability culture has unquestionably made the Web a much more usable place. Given the way the Web generally worked just five years ago, the role of usability and related disciplines to the evolution of the Web was vital. But usability culture has steered the Web development ship long enough. It’s time for a new approach. To understand the urgent nature of making that shift, we need to understand how we got where we are today.” (Dirk KnemeyerDigital Web Magazine)

Oops! They Forgot the Usability: Elections as a Case Study PDF Logo

“An election is a perfect usability case study. It bring together large numbers of diverse voters, an unfamiliar interface and an outcome that shapes the future of our society. With such a seeming simple task, usability was not on the curriculum for elections officials. However, despite the focus on technology and security, it was poor information design and usability in the 2000 Palm Beach ballot that taught us all new words like ‘chad’ (hanging or pregnant).” (Whitney Quesenbery)

Why simplicity?

<marketese>”The digital revolution is supposed to have made our lives easier, but studies have shown that’s not the case. (…) Our research showed that we had a unique opportunity to answer your need for simplicity, while strengthening our brand in the minds of consumers and customers everywhere.”</marketese> (Royal Philips Electronics)