Posted on Wed, Dec 19, 2007
The first test of usability, in my opinion, is this: Does the user know what the website does?
So, when you first get to a website, can you tell what its purpose?
Typically, if I have to spend time and brain power trying to figure out a sites function, I usually move on. A good website, through presentation, taglines and content, should be obvious.
Here is an example of a website, which looks like a defunct beta version (so I don’t feel so bad about picking on it) that isn’t so obvious.
Design-wise, the site looks pretty swanky. It’s certainly cool, and looks professional. But what does it do? How do I use it?
- The picture of the lady immediately gets my attention – not sure who she is. Looks like a fashion model?
- The logo and tagline should help me out (not such a great place for a logo, by the way.) “Experimental Magazine – Feed Your Emotions.” This doesn’t really help me figure out the purpose of the website.
- Scanning the navigation on the left should help me. The icons certainly look cool, but I don’t know what they do without clicking on them. Text does actually appear on mouse-over, but not on top of the icon, but below the icon navigation…strange (and small.) The more traditional navigation elements are in a hard-to-read font – again, the font is very small indeed.
- The main body doesn’t give me many clues either. The text is very small and the content is packed in tightly. It makes scanning for information rather difficult.
In actuality, the picture of the model is the most helpful at-a-glance clue to the function of the website. The rest really does require some detective work and reading.
Overall design is very important to usability. A website certainly doesn’t have to be boring, but visual clarity is essential.
Posted on Tue, Dec 18, 2007
While designing for accessibility may not be on the top of the small business persons list of things to do, it certainly should be for larger companies. Quite simply, a website that does not cater to people with disabilities could be construed as discrimination. Plus, it’s the right thing to do.
Case in point, in October of this year, the go-ahead was given by a Californian judge to pursue a class action lawsuit against Target. Originally, the National Federation for the Blind brought the case to light, stating that Target’s website violates the Americans with Disabilities Act as well as two Californian civil rights statutes.
There is an interesting article on Business Week’s website which also talks a little about the Target lawsuit but it also contains a good example of how a particular technology company tests their clients’ websites for accessibility – by user-testing with people who have disabilities. It ain’t rocket surgery but it works.
The article also addresses the point that accessibility guidelines can be somewhat fuzzy and unclear – which makes it hard for designers to interpret and incorporate into their websites. With potential lawsuits floating in the breeze, there is an obvious need to solidify what can and cannot be done.
The likelihood is that organizations will not get sued for having a website that isn’t accessible. In the case of Target, it appears as though they were made aware of accessibility issues and chose not to do anything about it.
However, I wouldn’t recommend sitting around until accessibility violations are pointed out to you. It’s certainly worth trawling through the Section 508 usability guidelines to get a jump on designing for accessibility.
Further reading: Check out this great article written by a software applications developer – I think Dominic gives a really good picture of what designing for accessibility is. Also, Jakob Nielsen has released a free accessibility report these last few days.
Posted on Tue, Dec 18, 2007
Game studies are often rushed to meet release-date deadlines which frequently results in games being pushed to market with a few rough edges. More often than not, several weeks later, a patch is released to smooth-out those undesirable scruffy edges.
Call of Duty 4 publishers, Activision and Infinity Ward, recently announced that they are releasing a patch for the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions of the game to fix a few known bugs. What caught my attention was that many components of the forthcoming patch are to address usability issues that the COD4 community has bought to the developers’ attention and not just developer bugs. To me, this is wonderful news.
Activision/Infinity Ward are releasing an update to make the game more usable and accessible – brilliant! Apparently, these guys really do pay attention to community feedback. To be honest, they could leave things as they are, people will still play and buy the game.
This update shows that the company does have a vested interest in their customers and that they want them to get the most out of their game as possible.
Merry Christmas, Activision and Infinity Ward.
Posted on Fri, Dec 14, 2007
I’ve just finished reading Steve Krug’s book, Don’t Make Me Think.
Although the book is an introduction to usability, I’d recommend that anyone in the field of usability testing read it. It’s a great sanity check.
Steve has a wonderful style of writing that I find particularly suitable for this subject. He gives you the information that you need to know, often framed in humorous examples, and uses colorful graphics and illustrations break up the to-the-point text…very usable!
Posted on Thu, Dec 13, 2007
My wife dragged me along to a casino at the weekend.
The Way of The Casino is typically this, I drink beer and my wife loses money. However, in an effort to coax me out of my non-gambling shell, my wife asked me to pick a slot machine for her to play.
I looked around the casino and saw a rather lonely looking machine that wasn’t getting any attention. “That one,” I said, pointing to the abandoned machine.
Becca sat down at the machine and I assumed the looking-over-Becca’s-shoulder-glowering pose. After Becca slides a ten dollar bill into the machine and hits the start button, we focus our attention on the screen.
As characters and pictures align themselves on the screen, and things start flashing, we realize that we don’t really know what’s going on. This game isn’t behaving as expected (everyone knows how to work a slot machine, right?)
We look to the slot machine cabinet for guidance, as most machines display a list of winning feature combinations. Nada. There is nothing on this machine that tells us what we need to know. There is no seemingly logical reason why sometimes we win and sometimes we lose.
It was at this point that I realized why this machine was so alone in this packed out casino. It wasn’t usable. The game didn’t follow typical usability standards for a simple casino slot machine and it didn’t provide any help to the user to explain how it works.
So, after I watched the last of our dollars vanish into the casinos mechanical pocket, I vowed that I would make an example of this nasty little machine in my blog. And I have.
Posted on Thu, Dec 06, 2007
A few days ago, Xbox 360’s across the world (apart from Canada it seems) received the Fall Update…in December(!)
Trawling around the Internet, I’ve seen concern being voiced about the appearance of too much advertising on the 360’s blades.
Sure, there is more advertising now, but it really doesn’t bother me. As long as I don’t get distracted from doing what I want to do, then I really don’t mind.
To me, the environment feels right for some subtle advertising, since I actually find some of it quite interesting – “Oooh, Asteroids Deluxe is available on Marketplace? Sweet!”
I feel that right now there is a nice balance. The advertising is there if I choose to look at it but I can easily tune it out if I don’t want to.
Posted on Wed, Dec 05, 2007
One of the key components of website usability is reporting the findings to the client.
There is no doubt that for the client to get any value out of the process, they need to know what all of the data means. As usability specialists, we all need to apply our expertise to the data that we gather.
The worst thing we can do is give the client the data (a transcript, DVD, etc) and leave it at that. I mean you wouldn’t give a complicated product to a customer and not tell them how to use it, would you?
Some usability firms don’t like to write reports at all (Steve Krug hates “big honking reports”), they prefer to present to the client directly. Some firms like to write huge reports (Nielsen Norman Group’ Intranet Information Architecture report – 1193 pages!) My firm likes to write concise and graphical reports and present the findings to the client.
The point is that we all (in our own way) interface with the client. It is our job to not only conduct the testing, but to tell the client what the results of the testing means to them. We need to translate the findings into something our clients can use, because that is where the value of hiring a third party to do it lies.
What’s the point of a usability study if the results aren’t usable for the client?
Posted on Tue, Dec 04, 2007
Apple is running a beta of their Safari browser for PC. Another browser for designers to previews their websites in – browser-joy-joy!
There are some differences that will be immediately noticeable to fellow PC users.
I think an IE7 user would be comfortable using Firefox – the two browsers appear to be similar at first glance. However, Safari immediately seems different.
The Safari interface, while incredibly simple, is a little gloomy. The grayer-than-gray palette makes me a feel a little depressed to be honest. However, the interface is tidy, and doesn’t distract me from the task at hand.
The speed of Safari is pretty amazing. It loads web pages faster than IE7 for sure, and maybe even a little quicker than Firefox (as you can tell, this is a highly scientific test.) In fact, there is a nice little speed chart on the Apple website, but I since that’s not from a third party source, I’ll ignore it.
Mt biggest gripe about Safari is the way that it renders web pages. A page in IE7 and Firefox look identical. In Safari, some strange website mojo is happening. The text appears bolder, which makes actual bold formatted text extremely fat and hard to read. There is also some “fuzziness” surrounding the text – as if the text is a jpeg. Finally, the text is smaller. Lines don’t break where they do on IE7 and Firefox.
Of course, I’ve been using Safari for all of 8 hours now, so my opinions are based on first glance – but then again, upon first glance is how many people judge things.
Posted on Tue, Dec 04, 2007
I love Facebook, I really do. Since I started using it a few months ago, I’ve been in contact with old school chums, former colleagues and good friends from Merry Old England.
However, there are a few usability quirks which tickle me with a virtual feather whenever I visit the site.
- The personalization – this is a great thing, and Facebook wouldn’t be what it is without it. However, it makes information hard to find. What’s on one person’s page may not be on another’s. Even if it is, it may be in a different position. This confuses me sometimes.
- The naming conventions – some application names are far too similar. Wall, Funwall, and Super Wall…why can’t I just have one Uberwall that does the work of all three? I don’t even know the difference between them.
- User bombardment – so many applications, so much confusion. Within a day of opening up my Facebook account, I had been roundhouse kicked, given a beer (hooray), bitten by a werewolf, asked to play poker and sent umpteen kabillion quizzes. Okay, I kind of get it now, but as a new user I sure was confused.
Had Facebook been another website, I may not have persevered and taken the time to educate myself. But, unlike most other websites, I was compelled to have a piece of Facebook because the concept was worth more to me than the interface.
I think Facebook could certainly do with a usability overhaul, but at the end of the day the tech simply works. It’s awesome.
I’m off to throw a sheep at Dean.
Posted on Mon, Dec 03, 2007
Rock Band is not only fun, it is extremely usable.
The game-play mechanics are incredibly simple. As colors appear on the TV screen, you hit the corresponding buttons on your controller. That’s it. You see a blue note on the screen; you hit the blue button on your guitar. Game learnt.
Why design a game that is so straightforward? The answer is easy. This game is designed to be accessible.
Gamers and non-gamers alike can play this, young and old – I mean, how much gaming experience do you need to be able to sing into a microphone?
The game’s extreme usability is truly wonderful. I have yet to find a game that I can play with my son AND my wife AND my buddies online…all at the same time.
However, don’t be fooled by the simplicity of the design. The game is challenging (which makes us come back for more.) In fact, some songs are extremely complex – but that’s what makes the whole experience so rewarding when you get it right.
Right, I’m off to practice my drum solos before my son kicks me out of the band.