Zach Brock
Natalie Creamer
Mike Foss
Gorgonzola Heuristic Evaluation
Overview
We believe your interface for performing a degree audit is good. The user
is able to see what classes are required for a given major, and how many credits
the user has earned in each branch (AHS, ENG, etc.). While the user can
eventually gather the information they need, we believe it is very important to
make it easier to understand and recognize how to obtain the information they
want. The biggest problem with the interface right now is the coloring of each
course. The user may not be concerned with which specific semester a class
was taken. We were also a little concerned with the way you chose to display all
your information and whether it was in keeping with the goals and tasks of your
users. Overall, we believe you should concentrate more attention on how the
user is going to interact and what sort of information is important to them. We
addressed a couple of ways we thought you could do this better below.
Heuristic Violations
H1 Visibility of system status, H8 (Severity 3) (spotted 3)
The classes are color-coded by semester, but it may be difficult for a user
to distinguish between semesters 4, 5, and 6 in particular. Perhaps these colors
could be spread farther apart in the spectrum to enhance their differences. It is
possible that you can use color to distinguish only between courses needed to be
taken and those already taken. Courses that need to be taken should be in a
‘louder’ color, for instance, courses taken could be green and those necessary
for graduation could be red.
H1 Visibility of system status (Severity 3)
The number of credits taken in a given branch (AHS, ENG, etc.) are
tracked graphically, but the number of credits remaining in each branch is given
numerically. It seems that some sort of bar (like a finish line) on the graphics
could easily designate the amount of credits remaining.
H1 Visibility of System Status (Severity 1)
The option boxes under the major audits should be check boxes or
something that more clearly indicates an “on” vs “off” status.
H1 Visibility of System Status (Severity 3)
When the user clicks on a course, it is not obvious that new information is
displayed under “Course Info.” Also, it would be helpful if the course box whose
info is displayed on the left were called to attention by highlighting, for instance.
H2 Match between system and the real world (Severity 3) (spotted by 2)
The color coding is somewhat difficult to follow and doesn’t flow in a
strictly linear manner. For earlier semesters the colors line up like bands, but for
later ones they become more vertical and harder to see as a linear progression.
Also the colors can be kind of hard to differentiate. A pattern may work better
than changing the hue. Other types of displays may also be useful, maybe a
strictly linear display. The user probably does not care about when a class was
taken but that it was taken and which requirement was fulfilled. The semester a
class was taken could be displayed in the course info section instead. Think
about the primary reason people will be looking at the tool and what information
they really want quickly and easily. Knowing whether you took Bio in semester 2
or 3 is probably not as important as being able to see how close you are to
completing requirements.
H3 User Control & Freedom (Severity 2) (spotted by 2)
It is not clear that the text “show grades,” is a place to click to perform an
action. Regular text, unless underlined as in a hyperlink or called out in some
other manner, makes a user think that clicking on it would perform no action.
H4 Consistency & Standards (Severity 4)
Under the “Credits Left” heading, AHS and AHS/E! are listed separately
while the graphics have the columns AHS and E!. Sub-requirements should be
addressed (i.e. the Math part of Math/Science).
H4 Consistency and Standards (Severity 2)
Why are there two “Engineering” columns? Also, the scaling of credits is
difficult to read for individual classes and can cause strange text issues (see
“Probability and Statistics”)
H6 – Recognition rather than recall (Severity 2)
The “Course info” displays future offerings if you click on a course that you
have not taken. The current name does not imply this. It could be renamed to
“Course Offerings” when a user clicks on this.
H6 – Recognition rather than recall (Severity 3)
The audit does not distinguish between class requirement and degree
requirement (ie. Modeling and control is a required class, but design depth is a
degree requirement).
H6 – Recognition rather than recall (Severity 2) (spotted by 2)
I eventually found that the grade is displayed under “Course Info” when a
course is clicked. I would have expected all the grades to appear within the
blocks shown on the screen so that I could see them all at once. This would also
be useful when auditing a student’s overall progress, such as when a professor is
checking in.
H6 – Recognition rather than recall (Severity 3) (spotted by 2)
The axis that tells how many credits a user has completed is not labeled.
H6 – Recognition rather than recall (severity 4) (spotted by 3)
It’s difficult initially to tell what parts of the screen are interactive and which
are strictly informative. Perhaps on a mouse-over, each course block could
increase in size for feedback.
H7 flexibility and efficiency of use (Severity 2) (spotted by 2)
This system is better tailored to experienced users and does not concern
itself as much as it should with the beginning user.
H8 aesthetic and minimalist design (Severity 2) (spotted by 3)
Be careful about picking colors that are too similar. It might make more
sense to divide the colors up by year rather than semester
H10 Help and Documentation (Severity 3)
I didn’t really understand the point of the system or how the color coding
was supposed to work without reading the documentation. It seems that a lot of
the faculty options aren’t implemented or are poorly documented. What are the
“macros” they should be able to write (according to personas)?
H10 Help and Documentation (Severity 2)
It would be nice to have a sentence or two onscreen telling the user the
capabilities of the system. Even a title and subtitle at the top would be helpful.
Summary
Heuristic
H1 (Visibility of system status) violations
H2 (Match between system and the real world) violations
H3 (User control and freedom) violations
H4 (Consistency and standards) violations
H5 (Error prevention) violations
H6 (Recognition rather than recall) violations
H7 (Flexibility and efficiency of use) violations
H8 (Aesthetic and minimalist design) violations
H9 (Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors)
violations
H10 (Help and documentation) violations
Violations
4
1
1
2
0
5
1
1
0
Severity Type
Severity 1 (Cosmetic problem)
Severity 2 (Minor usability problem)
Severity 3 (Major usability problem; important to fix)
Number
1
7
7
2
Severity 4 (Usability catastrophe; imperative to fix)
2
Recommendations
You may want to implement a method to convey what prerequisites are
required to take certain classes, especially major-specific ones. Also, a section
with the projected number of credits remaining to be used by classes would be
helpful. For example, a sophomore in the fall would have approximately 96
credits remaining, assuming that 16 credits are taken each remaining semester.
Other recommendations were provided with many of the specific violations. See
above. We also didn’t see a lot of evidence of the faculty side of the interaction,
but that probably just hasn’t been implemented yet.
Appendix: Individual Heuristic Evaluations
Zach Brock
1. [H1 Visibility of System Status] (Severity 1)
The option boxes under the major audits should be check boxes or something that more clearly
indicates an “on” vs “off” status.
2. [H2 Match between system and the real world] (severity 2)
The color coding is somewhat difficult to follow and doesn’t flow in a strictly linear manner. For
earlier semesters the colors line up like bands, but for later ones they become more vertical and
harder to see as a linear progression. Also the colors can be kind of hard to differentiate. A
pattern may work better than changing the hue. Other types of displays may also be useful,
maybe a strictly linear display.
3. [H3 User control and freedom] (severity 3)
It’s difficult initially to tell what parts of the screen are interactive and which are strictly informative.
4. [H4 Consistency and Standards] (severity 2)
Why are there two “Engineering” columns? Also, the scaling of credits is difficult to read for
individual classes and can cause strange text issues (see “Probability and Statistics”)
5. [H6 Recognition rather than recall] (severity 3)
Displaying grades is not natural and requires a lot of memory from the user. Rather than having
to click through each individual class to see the grades, displaying them in the boxes on the right
would probably be easier. This would also allow the professor to quickly see the overall progress
and status of the student.
6. [H10 Help and Documentation] (severity 3)
I didn’t really understand the point of the system or how the color coding was supposed to work
without reading the documentation. It seems that a lot of the faculty options aren’t implemented
or are poorly documented. What are the “macros” they should be able to write?
Natalie Creamer
[H1 Visibility of System Status] (Severity 3)
I was not able to really notice if the Course Info information
had changed. In accordance with this, I had trouble finding which
course I was just looking at. Suggestions for this could be to make the
course name under Course Info bigger and bolder, and also highlight on
the actual box for the course that I want displayed.
[H2 Match between system and the real world] (Severity 3)
It seems that the main goals of this system is the know what
classes I have taken, need to take and what requirements they fulfill.
As a possible user I don’t think I would as concerned about when I took
the course and find it hindering my main goals. Perhaps if I clicked on
the course info, there it could display when I took the course.
[H3 User Control and freedom] (Severity 3)
I can’t really tell what parts are interactive. I don’t really
know if I can plug in anything or if it is necessary.
[H4 Consistency and Standards] (Severity 0)
Consistent in it’s own way.
[H5 Error Prevention] (Severity 3)
I can’t tell if the page has noticed my command or when I click
on the box – why is it not showing the course info. It would be nice to
implement a mouse over when going over the course boxes to know which
one I am looking at and not allow for errors.
[H6 Recognition rather than recall] (Severity 4)
What am I looking at? I had difficulty deciphering what each
section was for. There aren’t any labels for the axis telling what they
are for. If I didn’t read the walk through I wouldn’t know what they
meant. Also there’s a difference between course info and degree info.
The course info, degree info, and course selection needs to be more
distinguishable.
[H7 Flexibility and efficiency of use] (Severity 2)
This system is better tailored for the experienced user and does not
concern itself as much as it needs to for the beginning user.
[H8 Aesthetic and minimalist design] (Severity 3)
So many colors is distracting especially when they are slightly
similar.
[H10 Help and documentation] (Severity 2)
The system needs some documentation to explain what the system
does or perhaps a brief sentence that tells some directions.
Michael Foss
Problem #1 – Visibility of System Status (severity 2)
I eventually found that the grade is displayed under “Course Info” when a course
is clicked. I would have expected all the grades to appear within the blocks shown on the
screen so that I could see them all at once.
Problem # 1 – Visibility of system status (severity 1)
The classes are color-coded by semester, but it is difficult (for me) to distinguish
between semesters 4, 5, and 6. Perhaps these colors could be spread farther apart in the
spectrum to enhance their differences.
Problem # 1 – Visibility of system status (severity 3)
The number of credits taken in a given branch (AHS, ENG, etc.) are tracked
graphically, but the number of credits remaining in each branch is given numerically. It
seems that some sort of bar on the graphics could easily designate the amount of credits
remaining.
Problem # 3 – User Control & Freedom (severity 2)
When I looked at the text “show grades,” it was not clear that this was a place to
click for an action. Regular text, unless underlined as in a hyperlink, makes me think that
clicking on it would perform no action.
Problem # 4 – Consistency & Standards (severity 3)
Under the “Credits Left” heading, AHS and AHS/E! are listed separately while
the graphics have the columns AHS and E!. These are inconsistent; a good fix might be
to have both sides just have the designation AHS/E!.
Problem # 6 – Recognition rather than recall (severity 2)
The “Course info” displays future offerings if you click on a course that you have
not taken. The current name does not imply this. It could be renamed “Course Info /
Offerings” or something similar to make this useful information more intuitive.