Website portal creation report - Assignment Example

? WEBSITE PORTAL CREATION REPORT XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX Outline I. Introduction II. Web Portal Design III. Evaluation Techniques: Justification of the interface choice IV. Analysis V. Resource requirements VI. Improvements and developments VII. References Introduction In recent times, website portal development has set a new platform for new patterns of interaction and communication: new user requirements, goals and behaviors have emerged. In development, eliciting user’s needs must rely on a thorough understanding of the multi-faced context of how users perform their activities and use of information web portal s nowadays. This is in order to establish usability requirements and design scenarios for future web portal s (Robertson and James 106). The created webportal is an information source. It is providing an integrated solution for International students where they can get information on accommodation, living environment, courses etc. Basically, it is aiming at equipping a student or guardian with enough information to make the decision to study. For instance, the VISA application procedures are links on the web portal. A desired functionality in a web portal is that it be effective to use. This goal focuses on the ability of the web portal to produce the intended result. Another usability requirement is web portal that is easy to learn and remember how to use. The goal for this is to have a web portal that is easy to use on first hit and one that the users can reestablish proficiency. In addition, a web portal should have good utility and safe to use. The goal here would be to evaluate if the web portal has what the users wants. Web Portal Design The webportal has been designed as an online application and is accessed by use of a browser. It is compatible with Mozilla 3.5, Internet Explorer 7.0, Opera browser, Apple safari and later versions. It has a functionality that it provides and for this it provides pages with the concept of user interaction. The portal offers information to students, international and deals with all student affairs such as accommodation and living. The website has been developed using several supporting technologies, such as HTML and CSS. Choice of color brought harmony to the content displayed. In addition, there were concept graphics that represented different ideas on student programs and how they could obtain information. The intuitive design guided by user interface principles aimed at giving the user little to think about and make everything appear usual. The portal’s success depends on a clear, concise and balanced arrangement of the information using the basic tools of design: editorial format, typography and programming technique. Using a simple visual design which clearly states what the organization is about is important to the browsers visiting the site. The website is pleasing in the sense that colors complement one another. This website intent and purpose provides information to the users. The first requirement is a visually attractive site that creates a good first impression. This has a memorable URL, full view of the home screen, contacts and short download time. Additionally, this website should demonstrate use of technology by having advanced functionality that can allow user interaction and overall design experience. The navigation and structure of the website should be simple and straight forward with neat content organization. I recommend including attractors in the website, this will keep the user coming back to the website. The attractors are features like newsletters, career options, polls etc. Evaluation Techniques: Justification of the interface choice There are a number of evaluation techniques that can be applied to test usability and functionality of the web portal. These techniques evaluate the design and implementation and the goal is to access the extent of the web portal functionality (Bevan 15). They also access the interface effect on the specific problem. For this web portal, I would use a heuristic evaluation. This technique, heuristic evaluation, is a method for structuring critique of a web portal using a set of relatively simple and general standards set by experts in user interface design. The first task in evaluating the web portal was to choose a group of users, in this case I settled for six. The users were selected from different age groups and both sexes. The aim of this was to have a heterogeneous group to evaluate the prototype. The evaluation focused on usability criteria points identified by experts and the design examined to see violation of these cases. The aforementioned criteria, for example, automation of unwanted work, reduced uncertainty, use of meaningful aids, flexibility etc. The group of users used the web portal and experienced the functionality then gave feedback. The goal of this exercise was to find usability problems in the web portal easily and make corrections or improvements. For a successful outcome, the needs and wants of the user must be satisfied on the completion of the application development. The user needs should be elicited by techniques such as focus groups, group surveys, interviews etc. (Beyer and Holtzblatt 79). The needs however should reflected back to users by simulations to prototype the user requirements. This changed as the web portal developed and a real user evaluation was done. Cognitive walkthrough In the cognitive walk through, I used the inspection to identify usability issues in the portal. The evaluation focused on how easy it is for users to accomplish tasks with the website. This method is task-specific and is rooted in the idea that web users prefer to learn a web portal by practically using it to accomplish tasks. For instance, checking date or information on a particular course or residential area. I chose this method since it is a low cost solution and it generated results quickly, most importantly, it could be used in the initial design phase. Analysis The first impression the portal gives is important and it often influences the visitor’s interest in the website. Many international students seek updated information and the aim is to maintain current information for students and their guardians. The portal does not have its own information sources and has to rely on other feeds for this information. The design of the portal classifies the information, static in categories and uses specific links to access the information. A highly functional portal will anticipate the diversity of the user requirements from file format, file size and download speed and specific requirements. These provisions for the different categories of users, novices, intermittent and expert users. Last but not least is the interactivity and overall experience. This is the way that a site allows you to achieve an intended goal. Allowing a user to give and receive and having the user participate is important. A user with a good overall experience comes back regularly, places a book mark, participates, stays for a while or signs up a newsletter etc. Resource Requirements Developing the website required two solutions; a local server and a remote server. The local server was a necessity for building, coding, the pages and preliminary tests. In developing this, I choose XAMPP a local server solution that provided a server environment. In addition, I also used Adobe Dreamweaver IDE for the development and Fireworks for creative graphics development. During hosting, this came at the final stage. After choosing the URL, I had to determine the webserver space specifications in terms of the hard disk space, bandwidth and technical support. The following table summarizes the cost anticipated during the entire project ACTIVITY ESTIMATED COST in USD Computer Dell speed 2.8ghz, 1gb RAM, 160gb HDD. 500 USD Software costs (Adobe Dreamweaver, Fireworks) 900 USD Travelling costs 200 USD Miscellaneous 200 USD TOTAL 1880 USD Improvements and developments User experience Prioritizing information will help users in achieving the set goals. I recommend a site that has knowledge of users. This feature makes the portal adaptive and provides important statistics on students. I would recommend additional polishing of the site structure to reduce the graphic amount but keep the good visual design. Increase the wording and depth of the portal will cater for new users and first time users. Also, the portal lacks a visitor counter. This makes it hard to monitor the web site traffic and gauge the relevance of the provided information. The length of the home screen is also not appealing since the user has to scroll down to see the information on hidden from the screen. Additionally the portal cannot be easily found using a search engine with keywords that could interest a student. In my opinion the it has been professionally designed but needs a little adjustment to make it fully user friendly. The portal has very few graphics and this has served the user with a lot of prose. It makes the overall user experience boring and users are likely to spend very few seconds browsing the website. I would recommend an overhaul of this current design where useful visual aids, concept images, audio or video would be incorporated. Further, I would recommend use of technology to add functionality to the website by considering the user needs such as booking and inquiries. Also the website should provide the option to choose the options that the user would like from the list through online services. In addition to that, it should provide a map showing the locations. What I would say in the end about this site that it has been designed in a manner considering its users. References Beaird, J 2007, The Principles of beautiful web design, SitePoint, New York. Beyer, Hugh and Holtzblatt, Karen (1997). Contextual design: Defining Customer-centered Web portal s. San Francisco: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers. Bevan, Nigel. “International standards for HCI and usability.” International Journal of Human-Computer Studies 15.1 (2001):14-16. Print. Kurose, J.F & Ross, W, K. (2004). A Top-down approach featuring the internet. Boston: Addison Wesley. Krug, S 2005, Don’t make me think: A Common sense approach to web usability, New Riders Press, California. Johnson, J 2010, Designing with the mind in mind: Simple guide to understanding user interface design rules, Morgan Kaufmann, Massachusetts Robertson, Suzanne and Robertson, James (1999). Mastering the Requirements Process. California: Addison-Wesley Professional. Read More