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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    Re: user study
From:       Jim Conner <jconner83 () yahoo ! com>
Date:       2001-08-19 1:58:43
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Comments are dispersed throughout.


On Saturday August 18, 2001  5:56 pm, mattc wrote:
> Hi Jim.
>
> Some good points brought up here.  Here is what Jennifer and I have been
> discussing.
>
> On Saturday 18 August 2001 03:23 pm, Jim Conner wrote:
> > With this test,
>
> Semantics here, but we really want to stay away from the work "test"  This
> is not a test of the subject.  It is a test of KDE.  A better word is
> "evaluation", or "study"

Yeah, people cringe and have bad flashbacks to school when you mention the 
word "Test".

>
> >we need to collect demographics from the user.  With this
> > we can see what experience each user has with computers in general,
> > various OSes, Linux, KDE, and other desktops/window managers.
>
> Definatly.  A simple questionare before the study begins will cover this. 
> I am working on this part this weekend.  I welcome any questions that
> should be included.  "What is your favorite color?"

I'd like to see what you have when you get the questionaire done.  These 
questions should gather information about the relative computer experience of 
the user, their occupation and age group.  

>
> >This testing needs
> > to be done with the current, stable KDE2.2.
>
> This is a complicated issue.  All of the major distrubutions ship with 2.1.
> We may have to make that our standard, as upgrading is not easy. 
> Eventually there will be a web administered study where we will want
> feedback from older versions.  Knowing what version the subject is
> evaluating is crucial however.

I am concerned that if we use KDE2.1.1, developers will say that the 
usability issues were fixed in KDE2.2 concerning a certain problem.  I 
haven't seen KDE2.2 yet, but I know that some usability issues have been 
addressed, and some haven't.  If we are going to use both versions, we need 
to state what version was used for the study and write the tasks to be 
completed by the user so that they can be accomplished in much the same way 
by both versions.  If we find a task that differs greatly between KDE2.1.1 
and KDE2.2, we need to either re-evaluate the task or have two versions of 
that task.

>
> > MIT has a Usability test for Athena here:
> > http://web.mit.edu/is/usability/aui/test1.html
> >
> > The Gnome Study that you were looking for can be found here:
> > http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gup/ut1_report/report_main.html
>
> Thanks!

No problem.

>
> > Unlike the MIT test, we need to have feedback on each Task that we have
> > on the website.
>
> Kind of like a "How easy would you say this task was? (1-10)" type thing.
> Good idea.  What other things would you like to know?

I'd like a box for the user to input comments about the task.  A simple 1-10 
is nice, but doesn't tell the whole story.  Why they found it difficult or 
easy is very important.

>
>  This could be used for both a self-administered test and a
>
> > formalized study.  The information collected here could be fed into a DB
> > with either php, perl or whatever you want.  The formalized study would
> > have printouts for the person administering the test and the person
> > taking the test.
>
> Standardization is VERY important.  Comparing results is meaningless if
> there isn't some sort of uniform way to aminister the evaluations.

Wholehearted agreement here.

>
> Hope your having a nice weekend,
> Matt


Jim
-- 
 
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