I think I am one short in the journal's so here goes.
This quarter had been fleeting and enlightening. In a very short time, I feel secure in being able to plan, execute and summarize a solid usability test for a medium to small site. There are several reasons for this. My role in the group was to compile information. I got to put it all together and this helped me get a complete vision of the process. Putting each part of the plan together (since we each composed a different part) gave me a good overview of the entire idea. In the testing, I observed and executed an entire test myself. Here's the rub with this one, although I got to run the show on my own, I don't think I did such a great job. I did not push my participant to keep going. I let him give up. Of course I saw this after the fact so couldn't change it, but I got a clear message on how to facilitate well. Leading the participant to complete the task is difficult so to not give the game away. Not sure how I would've done it differently but would have tried to encourage him to open more doors.
It was in interpreting the data that you really see where facilitator errors are made. It's very difficult to pigeon-hole the participants but there obvious holes to put them in. For instance, the issue we had with finding stats for a particular player, our Task A. This proved to be a pain in the ass, pardon the expression. Even my participant, who is a Braves fan, had trouble with this. At first, he thought he had it, but then I asked him, 'do you really think Gonzalez had 40 hits is yesterday's game?'. Only then did he really look at the page to see where he was and only then did he see the option for 'individual games' and only then did he find it. It very backwards in how he found it and I still think I led him too much. I am have factored in that he is a Braves fan and had been to the site before. I pigeon-holed him into already knowing where to go to complete the tasks.
As an observer in the tests with our two non-USA born participants, I found it...interesting. We had a big discussions about testing non-Braves fans and decided to go with that option. We didn't really focus on whether or not to test non-BASEBALL fans. Not sure we made a good choice there. With hind sight being 20/20, I don't think it was a good idea. I think the participants were frustrated beyond a reasonable point for this experience in that they had no idea what we were talking about. And trying to put them in a 'real-world' situation such as, a bunch of guys who know nothing about baseball suddenly decide they want to know how many hit over attempts Gonzalez had in the last game, doesn't seem likely to me. I would reject them as participants now and look for other potential users. At least users who know something about baseball. I don't even see a newbie going that deep into a site for some time after they have paying around there for awhile.
Despite the technical difficulties we had with two of our tests, I don't think I would have used Victor's nor Carlos' videos in the final result. I don't think they were representative of the typical nor potential visitor to the site. So, I guess it worked out that their videos were incomplete. Carlos' cut off about 7 minutes in (which was almost at the end of the first task) and Victor's had no audio and stopped after a little over 30 seconds. The technical issues with the lab didn't effect me until I was responsible for compiling the videos. Since I only had two to chose from, I did not make a highlight reel, rather an edit of each task I felt would best represent all the participants.
I mentioned before that I executed an entire test and I would like to go into more detail about that. On my laptop, I have a program called ScreenFlow. It is mostly used for screen capture and I found it via my video class this quarter. I used this program to execute the test with my nephew. As you can see, you can select to both capture the screen and record the user. I think in those terms it worked great! Where I was at a loss for this test, was my failure to take good notes and play the observer while facilitating. Having those HTML files the testing software gives you is a great help. Since I lost the AV from two tests, it was the HTML files gave me the data I needed. Also, since I was there to watch them, that was a big help as well. My correction for giving the test on my laptop, take much better notes.
Bringing all this together for the Results report was also huge. Recapping the plan was basic but interpreting the data became almost mute because it was so obvious. This confused me because for some reason, I thought we would uncover something no one else had seen, and maybe we did, but I had these illusions of grandeur even though here was nothing magical about it. Still, not sure why I felt I would be in some Disney movie with all this but thought there be more to it. Don't get me wrong, I do feel successful in this venture and believe we did a class-A job, but feel like there should have been little birds, bunnies and deer running around being happy. Maybe I'm just tired.
This brings me to the team. What a great team. This is the first group that I have enjoyed working with because everyone did their job! Amazing how that works, isn't it? Thankfully I had a team because I know I could not have done this on my own. This was a big job. We each had a role, we each executed that role and we all came together in the end. I think it was Alex that brought us together and I was flattered to be asked to join the them. And you know what's even stranger? None of this felt like 'homework', it actually felt like a 'job'. Does that make sense? We had a goal. We had a site to 'fix', if you will, and I think we did that! Being in this group has changed my attitude about working in group projects, I will be more adamant about who I work with in the future, now that I've been on the right side of the tracks.
So let's wrap this up before I write a novel. The first day of class you sad something to the effect of 'usability is everywhere' and you gave the bus accident as an example of usability in the world. I saw that then but I see it differently or deeper now, I guess. There is usability not only in instructions, directions, web sites but also working with people. I know this sounds shifty, but there can usability with people, in a positive way. Yes, I am familiar with the phrase 'you used me' and that is not what I am talking about. I am referring to the usability of a team or group of people. Usability can be also be using your talents and strengths to contribute to the task or to get the best out of another. In all honesty, I wasn't really sure where I was going with this entry until I got to here. After reviewing the work this team delivered, when all is said and done, it was the team that made the usability project, usable.
