Once you have a prototype, a logical audience for it is its intented users- the product or service should be tested with users. This process is usually called "user testing", but that s really a misnomer; its the product that's being tested, not the users. ...you go to the users, you talk to them, you write things down. . .testing is best done in the subjects own environment: on the subject's computer, in the subject's home or office. Testing Labs have one advantage:efficiency. The designer can quickly see many subjects in a single day, one after the other, without having to change location, and there is only one set up. . . Ideally, designers will carry a set of wireframes and other docs during testing and make notes right there about any patterns they see. . . Most experienced designers know one truism: you seldom get it right the first time. Testing will reveal flaws, both known and unknown.
...watching for patterns.
-DAN SAFFER, Designing For Interaction, 2006
Testing the New Skin
User Testing for bSpace's new skin will seek to measure how well people use bSpace. If the user testing uncovers difficulties experienced by users of the new bSpace skin then the design should be improved and tested again. We will observe people using the product for its intended purpose in as realistic a situation as possible, to discover errors and areas of improvement. The aim is to observe how people function in a realistic manner, so that our design team can see problem areas, and what people like.
Measuring the success or effectiveness of a new skin is difficult. It is hard to identify the specific influence(good or bad) that the visual design exerts on users. This difficulty stems from the fact that other attributes of a web application such as information architecture, interaction design and tool functionality also exert their own influence on the user. It is vital that the user tests focus on measuring the value of the new skin and that participants should be tested with questions and tasks that can effectively distill their specific opinions/impressions about the new skin and not about the overall system.
Two types of the user tests are to take place:
- an assessment test where users are observed following predetermined tasks using the new skin
- a comparative test based on a University of Michigan Comparative User Test conducted in 2004 where users are divided into two groups and each group evaluates paper prototypes of the new skin or the current skin using
