Usability chat notes for 080715
Usability
Agenda for 080715 (Week #4)
Introductions
Questions
Research
File for MnOnline UT data
Usability tasks
Group work
Introductions
What is your favorite YouTube video?
Mine is Medieval Help Desk. The Star Wars Help Desk is a distant second.
Note that a search of YouTube for “usability” provides several pages of results.
Questions
Terminology from Loranger & Nielsen
Findability (172) –
Information architecture (172) –
Minesweeping (184) –
Affordance (206) –
Acronyms (262) –
TLA
ETLA
YABA
Inverted pyramid (269) –
White paper (275) –
Dubious claims?
“In the end, you usually lost more than you gain by using duplicate links.” (189)
On MSU website, the left navigation bar and the content area frequently contain duplicate links.
“Sadly, computer screens don’t offer the typographical quality of print, so the fine
details in the serifs end up not looking so fine after all. As a result, studies of
onscreen reading find that sans serif text is the fastest to read, exactly the opposite
of the finding for print.” (232)
Is serif text easier to read that sans serif text in print documents?
“Online content and printed material require different writing styles…” (258)
See Judy Gregory’s “Writing for the Web versus writing for print: Are they really so different?”
Usability chat notes for 080715
Writing samples—before and after: How do volcanoes form?
From www.space.com:
Volcanoes form when chambers of magma, or hot molten rock, boil to the surface.
These magma chambers often remain sealed for hundreds of years between eruptions,
until the pressure builds sufficiently to break through a vent, which is a crack or weak
spot in the rock above.
Simpler version from www.encarta.msn.com:
Volcanoes form when the planet needs to let heat escape from its interior. Rocks that
melt deep beneath the planet’s surface become liquid magma. The magma rises from
Earth’s interior to spew forth from a volcano at the Earth’s surface.
Loranger & Nielsen content the second version is simpler and intended for a
general audience including children and teens. (267)
Is the second version simpler? Better? Does it contain as much info?
“There are no hard-and-fast rules about how long or short paragraphs should be,
although it’s helpful to keep them under five sentences. Each paragraph should have
one topic sentence and one idea. Too many ideas in a single paragraph increase its
complexity and make readers work to decipher the main idea. People should be able
to read the topic sentence and decide whether they need to read the rest of the
paragraph.” (282)
Is it a realistic goal to keep paragraphs to “one topic sentence and one idea”? Is that how we
write paragraphs?
Does the writer’s purpose for the content make a difference in terms of the structure and
complexity of the test?
Research
Gregory, Judy. 2004. Writing for the Web versus writing for print: Are they
really so different. Technical Communication 51 (2): 276-285.
Gregory makes two major claims:
Print and Web share many (most) of the same guidelines
Better to stress purpose and form rather than medium
Gregory reviews a number of guidelines for writing for the Web
“1. Structure and design are concerns for Web writers” (277)
Suggests that content is the primary concern for print writers.
“2. Write no more than 50% of what you would write for print” (277)
Ignores context for the writing. Note the success of the Plain Language movement.
“3. Write for scannability” (278)
Ignores research that readers frequently scan documents—both Web and print. The reader’s
purpose and the document’s structure determine the reader’s strategy—whether to skim, to scan,
or to read closely.
“4. The Web encourages restless reading” (278)
Ignores differences in the type of documents being compared.
“5. Split information into coherent chunks” (279)
This general advice applies to both Web and print documents; however, “It is possible that Web
content should be chunked differently from pint content… [because] the Web offers navigational
Usability chat notes for 080715
capabilities not available in print and a document size not limited by printing and distribution
costs. In addition, Web writers must deal with an awkward screen size and an array of
navigational furniture.” (279)
“6. Web writers can’t predict where their readers will start.” (279)
Ignores print documents that is not meant to be read linearly, such as manuals, directories,
encyclopedias, dictionaries, etc.
“7. Readers ‘pull’ the information they need from the Web” (280)
Ignores the primary similarity that in both mediums writers provide information and that readers
take only that information that interests them. “Both media simultaneously ‘push’ information,
while readers ‘pull’ what they want.” (280)
Gregory cites 5 reasons that Nielsen provides for differences between reading
from the Web and from print:
1. Reading online is around 25 percent slower than reading print
2. The Web is a user-driven medium where users feel they have to move around
3. Each page competes with many others for attention
4. Users are never sure whether they are looking at the best page for their topic
5. User don’t have time to work hard for their information 1
Gregory argues that there is some evidence for Nielsen’s first claim but little evidence for the last
four claims (or that the claims differ between reading Web versus print documents) and points
out that Nielsen seldom, if ever, provides details of his actual studies.
File for MnOnline UT data
MnOnline_results.xls
Conventions (when coding responses)
1 = yes
2 = no
3 = other
Save your file as MnOnline_results_y3i.xls, replacing the “y3i” with your
3 initials.
Usability tasks
Print out three pages of the notes form.
Instructions
As you complete each task, please voice your thoughts aloud: we are interested in what you say
to yourself as you perform the tasks that we give you. Identify (voice aloud) the objects
(buttons, icons, or links) that you click or text that you type, and as you complete each task,
explain your strategy for the completing the task based upon your use of the website.
Please indicate when you think you have completed each task or if you’d like to stop
working on a task.
Instructions for use of Acrobat Connect to share your screen
1
Jakob Nielsen, Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity (Indianapolis, IA: New Riders
Press, 1999), 106.
Usability chat notes for 080715
I will promote you to presenter. Then you should
1. Click
2. Click
3. Click
(Start my camera and voice).
(Allow).
(the Hands-free portion of
4. Click
).
.
5. In the Start Screen Sharing box, select Desktop; then, click
6. Open or select a browser window in which you’ll complete the task.
When finished,
1. Select the Acrobat Connect window from your task bar.
2. Click
.
.
Tasks
Task 1
As a student, you receive space on the MSU servers to store documents—including web pages.
Locate instructions for creating web pages. (Confine your search to the MSU website.)
Task 2
As a student, you receive space on the MSU serves to store documents. Locate instructions for
transferring files to and from the server and your computer.
Task 3
As a student, you pay fees, a part of which supports technology. In return, each semester you
receive credit in your MavPrint account, allowing you to print 300 pages. Locate information that
explains if or how 100% online learners can print copies at MSU.
Group work
Based upon your reading of Chapter 7
(“Typography: Readability &
Legibility”) and Chapter 8 (“Writing
for the Web”), evaluate the
Kato Party 411.com page.
Begin by considering your initial responses
to the following questions:
For whom is this site designed?
What are your initial impressions of the
site?
Then, conduct a heuristic evaluation of the
site based upon the advice provided by
Loranger and Nielsen. (You are welcome, of
course, to include evaluation criteria from
other chapters in their book.)
One group member should summarize the group’s responses in the body of an
email message to me: roland.nord@mnsu.edu. Use the following subject
line: “Eng 4/572 -- Kato Party 411.com” CC all group members.