Interface Evaluation of Website - Literature review Example

?Running Head: Interface Evaluation of Website COMP3141 Qualitative Interface Evaluation Assignment 2 NO. : Submission Date: Graphical user interface is a program that enables interaction between human and the computer using symbols, visual displays and pointing devices(GUI, 2012). User interface is a concept in computer science is under Human Computer Interaction (HCI). This paper evaluates the interface of a web site. Usability is very important developers have realized that it needs more time because it matters how effectively the interactive system is. User interface of a given product is evaluated using various techniques. The main aim of assessing the interactivity of an interface is to see the design of that interface ensures that the user is able to accomplish their tasks. The main objective of interface evaluation is to help the designers and developers of the product to minimize the malfunctions in the system, Gould and Lewis (1985) also asserts that feedback to the developers is very critical to ensure that there is an interactive process of product development. An interface is said to be good one if the users of all levels from novice to experts are able to accomplish their tasks. User interface experts have for over years been designing the best way to evaluate the interface. The evaluation therefore defines two groups; the experts and novice evaluators where each one has their level of evaluating the product within the development cycle of the program. Interactive user interface is a part of the software or the hardware that enables the user to interact with that product or the computer. For instance, computer users interact with the computer via software interfaces. According to Melody & Marti (2002), a web site that was poorly designed reduces the revenue and the performance of an organization. The main question is which is the best design principles for a quality website. Many evaluation techniques looks at the human daily activities and habits where the website should imitate these behavior. For a website the following are some of the criteria to be used in evaluating a website. Text elements of a website are important features that evaluators check, text should be visible with high quality but very simple to understand by the users. There should be minimal text with the web page. This is called clarity and concise. The number of links are very important too they tell us how easy is it to navigate from one page to another. There should be many ways in which the user can accomplish their tasks. Too much external links make a bad website however. The colors which indicate that the link has been visited or not yet should be distinct and outstanding. The images in the site is also important the size and color adjustments should make it attractive. There should be interactive graphics which make users participate actively in the sites operations. Software guidelines and heuristic evaluation techniques will be used in the analysis of the site. Techniques of evaluating interface According to Afonso et al., (2011), evaluation of user interface entails measuring of how easy the interface is to learn by a new user and adopt to the environment. Learning outcomes are measured y how someone can be able to navigate from one level to another, the use of shortcuts and minimal errors. The user satisfaction is another factor in a good interface, if users yarn to use the interface once ore then it is a good one. Interface evaluation is a process that aims at establishing problems of the interface which is a process that requires several activities done. The techniques below are used by stakeholders of the hardware or software product at different levels such as experts and end users. Experts in UI evaluate the interface during formative evaluation while end users test the system by cognitive and pluralistic walkthrough (www.cs.umd.edu).There are several techniques used in interface evaluation such as; Heuristic evaluation Software guideline Cognitive walk-through Pluralistic walkthrough Summative evaluation Evaluating interfaces The main factors that evaluators look for while evaluating user interfaces include: 1. Language – which language is used by the interface does the user understand and does it meet the target audience or if it does convey meaningful message 2. Layout- how your interface is aligned it should be symmetrical 3. Color- the message the colors convey and their contrast 4. Tone and Etiquette- polite message and non-offensive language 5. Special considerations for instance disabilities, features, consistency and standards Heuristic evaluation This is a technique employed by expertise of the user interfaces, the specialist of the UI evaluates the system in depth whereby they look for properties that they know (Nielsen, J., & Molich, R., 1990) the main issues evaluated are effectiveness and efficiency (www.cs.umd.edu). Given favorable conditions this technique can be effective. However, there are several drawbacks in these techniques. The experts or specialists in User interface (UI) who are support to use this technique to evaluate the system are scarce. Hiring and maintaining such people is expensive for an organization. This evaluation technique must also take place after the interface is in existence therefore their recommendations may come late. Such observations will not be incorporated in the system because the system will have been already designed. These specialists if they are not part of the development team, they may not understand some decisions made basing on the technical limitations. Several UI evaluators should be used but independently. According to Nielsen & Molich (1990), five evaluators come up with 75% usability problems facing that interface. Steps in conducting heuristic evaluation (http://www.cs.umd.edu) 1. Set up heuristic evaluation guideline 2. Seek the services of at least five experts 3. Let each expert carry out evaluation independently 4. Collect and compare individual evaluation 5. If possible conduct a group evaluation with all the experts then compare the results In order to evaluate the interface, it is vital to understand some of the characteristics of a good user interface. There are eight basic characteristics that will be used to evaluate the interface. Regardless of the techniques used to evaluate the interface evaluation these are the general parameters will be looking at these characteristics. They include: 1. Clear The main aim of any interface to enable users access information and complete their tasks with a lot of ease. Icons and the menu bars with simple titles makes these website clear. If the user wants to support the museum it is faster to get to that link. From the text in the page it is clear what each link means. 2. Concise This means straight to the point users do not want a lot of details in the interface. While making the interface clear one should not be trapped into adding a lot of information to overload the interface. The left side menu is not concise it has a lot of information which could be as well in a dropdown menu or side bar that hides. The subtitles make the website to wordy and not concise. 3. Familiar A good interface is one that a new user can easily learn and be able to use from the previous interfaces. While developers strive for uniqueness in their interface one thing should be clear, the interface should be familiar to the users for them to have interest to learn and use them effectively. A system that uses icons should be keen on the type of the icons they use because the context of the system is very important. The top menu of these site is designed in a manner that does not match with others. Generally the about us menu bar is second last from right after contact us while home and other menus come first from the left hand side. 4. Responsive This means that the system interface should be fast, users like an interface that enables them to accomplish tasks within a short period. It is frustrating for users to wait longer as their requests are being loaded slowly. The user should also have feedback from the system such as the percentage of work done by the system, remaining time and completion status either failed or successful. The side should show that the user is downloading a file. 5. Consistent Users will learn and advance well in their interface usage if the design system is consistent. Having a system with different interfaces for each version of the program or the product disorients the users. These site is consistent because every page has similar header, footer and the side menus. It is easy to navigate and learn since the interface is not too dynamic. 6. Attractive Aesthetics are important is fashioning the interface to make it look good and have a good feeling to the clients. The site is not very attractive because it uses static pictures. Attractive sites have flash dynamic pictures which make it attractive. The side left and right of the website is also side with no content. The designer centred the site content leaving bigger margins which have resulted to having text and graphics congested and the centre hence poor design. 7. Efficient To be able to accomplish different tasks within a website, it should be efficient for one to use. Navigating from one place to another in the interface is retrieving different functions of the application package. While designing an interface one should identify key tasks that the user will accomplish. The tasks should be easily accessible. The main tasks for this site is viewing the museum content and appealing to donors to support the organization. The links for support and purchasing materials from the site are clearly designed and placed with a different color hence easy to find. 8. Forgiving (handling of user mistakes and errors ) Provisions of how users get out of their mistakes should be incorporated in system interface functionality such as undo or go back to the last known or correct state once they make mistakes. When the users of the website enter an area they are not familiar with, the site should provide a mechanism for them to get back to the state in which they were. Site designs such as next, back, top of page are important. These site does not provide such designs but with the consistent top menu on every page one can easily go back. Conclusion The has an average design with some issues that need to be addressed. After the evaluation using the software guideline and heuristic techniques of evaluation, the site design margins on the left and right hand side should be adjusted to ensure that there s enough space for text and graphics. This is a museum site hence pictures are important hence should be more visible and large in size. Users who are used to conventional sites with top menu having ‘about us’ on the extreme right may have problems in handling this site. Therefore, the designer should redesign the top menu to have menus that are consistent and familiar. References Afonso, A.P.;   Lima, J.R.;   Cota, M.P.;   2011, Information Systems and Technologies (CISTI), 2011 6th Iberian Conference, on august 2011, Inf., ISCAP, Porto, Portuga Brown, C. M., 1988, Human-computer interface design guidelines. Norwood, N.J.: Ablex Publishing Corporation. Eight Characteristics of Successful User Interfaces, [online] Available http://www.usabilitypost.com/2009/04/15/8-characteristics-of-successful-user-interfaces/ [accessed 14 March 2012] Graphical user interface (GUI) 2012. Encyclop?dia Britannica Online. Retrieved 04 April, 2012, from http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/242033/graphical-user-interface Hewlett-Packard Company, 1990, Corporate Human Factors Engineering. SoftGuide: Guidelines for usable software, in press. Interactive Design , 2008, Journal Summary Retrieved on, 4/21/2012, http://kmastin.wordpress.com/ Lewis, C., & Polson, P., 1990, Theory-based design for easily-learned interfaces. Human-Computer Interaction,. Lewis, C., Polson, P., Wharton, C., & Rieman, J., 1990, Testing a walkthrough methodology for theory-based design of walk-up-and-use interfaces. In Proceedings of CHI'90, ACM, New York, pp. 235-242 Read More