Graduate School of Library and Information Science

LIS 753 Universal Usability Issues

By: Yijun Gao Jan 30, 2015

What is “Usability” I

• As a measure of effectiveness, it describes how effective tools and information sources are in helping us accomplish tasks.

• The more usable the tool, the better we are able to achieve our goals.

• Help us overcome physical limitations by making us stronger, faster, and more sharp-sighted. Can also be frustrating or disabling.

What is “Usability” II

• In designing web sites we must reduce functional limitations through design.

• Try to improve the quality of life for more people, with the help of universal usability

• Bad usability: either because it is poorly designed or because its design does not take into account our needs

Web Accessibility Initiative• Universal Usability Includes *** Accessibility + Usability + Universal Design

• Web Accessibility Initiative promotes best practices and tools that make the web accessible to people with disabilities.

• Accessible designs can be accomplished using current and future web technologies.

• The more usable the website, the better we feel about using it, the more likely it is that we will return to the site. (Loyalty matters!)

Quantitative v.s. Qualitative

• Different ways to judge a design’s effectiveness

• Quantitative usability metrics: how quickly we complete tasks and how many errors we make in the process (use numbers to describe!)

• “Learnability”: how quickly we learn to use a tool & how well we remember how to use it the next time

• Qualitative measures: how much satisfaction we derive in using a website (to describe verbally)

User-Centered Design Methods

• Starting from: task analysis, then: focus groups, and user testing to understand user needs and refine designs based on user feedback.

• Determining: what functionality users want in a product and how they will use it. (Touch Screen)

• Design, testing, and refinement cycle: make sure users like and will be successful using our design.

• Our system must be: easy to learn and use by a diversity of users, platforms, and usage contexts.

Universal Design• Incorporates access requirements into design,

rather than providing separate designs for the handicapped

• Less costly: anticipating a diverse user population often have unanticipated benefits…

• For example, curb cuts in sidewalks are intended to help mobility- and vision-impaired users, but many others benefit, including people making deliveries, pushing a stroller, or riding a bike.

Universal Design PrinciplesUniversal Design Principles

• Principle One: Equitable Use Provide the same means of use for all users:

identical whenever possible; equivalent when not.

For example: An online book can be made larger, smaller, colored, copied, printed, read aloud.

The flexibility of the web provides an excellent opportunity to design for “same means of use.”

Principle Two: Flexibility in Use

• The web users have choice regarding platform, software, and settings (Mac or PC)

• Users can view web pages without images or in a variety of layouts and typefaces. (I disabled Flash to avoid ads )

• The same page can be accessed on a cell phone or printed on paper. Thus, the page must be: responsive

Principle III: Simple & Intuitive Use• Design must be: easy to understand, regardless

of the user’s experience, knowledge, language skills, or current concentration level.

• Eliminate unnecessary complexity and arrange information consistent with its importance.

• Simplicity and direct access to salient features and information is an effective design strategy.

• Bad: Much of the page given over to organizational identity, advertising, and navigation…(example?)

Principle Four: Perceptible Info.

• Use different modes (pictorial, verbal, tactile) for redundant presentation of essential info. and provide compatibility with a variety of techniques or devices used by people with sensory limitations.

• Text on web pages is machine-readable and can be adapted to different contexts. For instance, text is accessible to people who can’t see because software can read text aloud.

• Alt-text for images, captions for spoken audio, and audio descriptions for video files.

Universal Usability Guidelines

• Designers need to “support a wide range of technologies, to accommodate diverse users, and to help users bridge the gap between what they know and what they need to know.” (Ben Shneiderman)

• It’s important to think about universal usability as a goal and not an outcome.

Why? See notes below

Moving beyond “typical” user• We are NOT working for a “typical” user

• Universal usability accounts for users of all ages, experience levels, and physical or sensory limitations.

• Users vary widely in their technical circumstances: in screen size, network speed, browser versions, and specialized software such as screen readers for the visually impaired.

• Each of us inhabits multiple points on the spectrum, points that are constantly shifting as our needs and contexts change…

User control

• Design from a fixed environment will exclude some users.

• In the web environment, users have control over their environment.

--- Manipulate browser settings --- To display text at a size --- They find comfortable for reading

Keyboard functionality

• Interaction is crucial component Users navigate and interact with links, forms, and other

elements of the web interface.

• For universal usability nowadays, these actionable elements must be workable from the keyboard or touch screen for the mobile users

• Not all users use mouse or touch screen: make actionable elements workable via the keyboard to ensure that the interactivity of the web is accessible

Usability In Design Process

• The best method: a combination of design best practices and familiar web layout conventions + developed in consultation with users at each stage.

• Involving users in the development process helps us understand user requirements, which allows us to make informed design decisions more effectively.

Web Analytics---very important

• Collects metrics about users: --- Operating system & browser used --- Screen resolution / Size --- Page users visited before landing ours --- Defining the audience for our web site. --- Why users visit our site, --- What they hope to find --- What they actually checked/clicked --- expert or novice, young or old.

• Must work with interview, survey, field study

Identifying Target Audience

• A group of users critical to the success of our site. They may share common interests, but they are not likely to share access requirements.

• Some may be experts and others first-time users. Some may be have low or no vision, and others may have mobility or dexterity issues.

• The same person may access site on a laptop, PC, or smartphone. Although we target a certain audience, others will come. (see notes below)

Do NOT Exclude Users

• Even if our data show that only 2% of our users use a specific brand of browser, don’t using technology to exclude those users.

• It’s bad business to exclude anyone from access to your information and services, and there is no way to place a value on those users who you have excluded.

• Our next major donor might be one of the 2% we turned away…You never know