Usability Evaluation - Technical User

Technical User

The technical user we have chosen for the paper prototype evaluation is a 3rd year student at Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology. The user has a very sound background at handling websites and services since he is currently maintaining his own web portals and he is a web developer too.
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1)      I asked from technical user to download php introduction course materials

2)      Then he clicked the course category from the main menu bar

3)      After that he clicked the information technology category from dropdown list

4)      Then he clicked the php for beginners sub category from dropdown list

5)      After that he select PHP intro from right side menu list

6)      Then he clicked the download link to download php course materials

7)      Website show error message that you must be logged in first

8)      Then user click the registration button and create a new account. He did it successfully

9)      After registration PHP download link is disappeared. So user have to find download link again. He said “I lost my part so I have to go from beginning”

10)   Then I said “What are you going to do now”

11)   User said “Now I am going to search”

12)   Then he use search function to get PHP introduction course content. (He didn’t use the previous main menu to get download link instead of going through navigation he use the search function )

13)   After that he click search result to get download link and press the download button

14)   I asked him to become a student of this web site

15)   Then he clicked Student & Teachers Corners widget from the top three widgets.

16)   After that he fill the form and press the sing up button. He did this without any doubt

17)   I asked him to find out most recent posts

18)   Then he clicked Top Posts widget from the top three widgets

19)   I asked him to contact administrator of the website.

20)   He fill out the correctly

21)   I asked him to add some feedback

22)    He did take a little bit of time to find the feedback button. But he did it any way

23)   I asked him to find details of this website

24)   He clicked the About Us link located in the bellow

25)   I asked user to find online users

26)   He found the online users list without any problem

27)   I asked him to find upcoming events

28)   He did that without any hesitation

29)   I asked user to find News Feeds

30)   He did it without any hesitation

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Usability Evaluation

#	Prototype Screen	Name of Heuristic	Reason for negative feedback / breakdown	Scope	Severity (High/ Medium/ Low) and Justification for giving it that rating	Way(s) to rectify and any Tradeoffs (i.e., why the fix might not work)
1	See Picture 1 See Picture 2 See Picture 3	Consistency and standards	After registering as a new member the download path is lost and the user had to start downloading the content from the beginning.	Three pages	High Because the user has to find the downloadable contents again by following the previous lengthy path.  It’s a waste of time.	The activity session should be stored on the page and the user should not be redirected to the main page after the registration. The user should be remained in the downloadable contents session.
2	See Picture 1	Recognition rather than recall Match between system and the real world	User couldn’t identify the feedback button on the main page.	This specific page	Medium The user should have the facility to complain or share thoughts with the administrators	Feedback button should be specifically larger than the current button and should be quite visible.
3	See Picture 4 See Picture 5 See Picture 6	User control and freedom Consistency and standards	Had to  press back several times in order to go back to the home page.	Throughout the website	High User has to go back over and over again to go to the home page	A consistent ‘Home’ button should be provided throughout the website so that the user can go back to home page easily
4	See Picture 1	Visibility of system status	User could not find the past news feed but only the latest news feed on the main page	This specific page	Medium User should be able to know what happened when he was not online by looking at the past news feed. Not only the latest news feed	There should be a scroll down and additional ‘more news feed’ link.