Defining Usability How Library Practice Differs from Published Research

Library/information science professionals need a clearly articulated definition of usability/ Web usability to implement intuitive websites. In this study, the authors analyzed usability definitions provided by the ARL library professionals and those found in the library/information science and computer science-information systems literature. Quantitative and qualitative methods were used to identify similarities and differences between the attributes emphasized by the two sets of definitions based on information behavior models and human-computer interaction (HCI) frameworks. Results indicated that both groups overlooked critical usability elements, such as environment and information objects/content/resources. Thus, the authors proposed a working, multi-faceted definition that presents a holistic view of usability

What is Usability? A Characterization based on ISO 9241-11 and ISO/IEC 25010

According to Brooke* "Usability does not exist in any absolute sense; it can only be defined with reference to particular contexts." That is, one cannot speak of usability without specifying what that particular usability is characterized by. Driven by the feedback of a reviewer at an international conference, I explore in which way one can precisely specify the kind of usability they are investigating in a given setting. Finally, I come up with a formalism that defines usability as a quintuple comprising the elements level of usability metrics, product, users, goals and context of use. Providing concrete values for these elements then constitutes the investigated type of usability. The use of this formalism is demonstrated in two case studies. * J. Brooke. SUS: A "quick and dirty" usability scale. In P. W. Jordan, B. Thomas, B. A. Weerdmeester, and A. L. McClelland, editors, Usability Evaluation in Industry. Taylor and Francis, 1996.Comment: Technical Report; Department of Computer Science, Technische Universit\"at Chemnitz; also available from https://www.tu-chemnitz.de/informatik/service/ib/2015.php.e

Usability Definitions in a Dynamically Changing Information Environment

The authors compared Web usability definitions, collected from library professionals at academic institutions of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) through online surveys in 2007 and 2012, to determine whether library practitioners’ perspectives had altered as information technologies evolved during this time. The authors applied three techniques of statistical data analysis— t-tests, cluster analyses, and the Mantel test—for comparisons. The results indicated significant increased emphases on the Interface/Design and Effectiveness attributes in the 2012 data set. This increase may be due to the rise in the use of mobile devices for information access, driving practitioners to place a stronger emphasis on these attributes

The Cognitive Atlas: Employing Interaction Design Processes to Facilitate Collaborative Ontology Creation

The Cognitive Atlas is a collaborative knowledge-building project that aims to develop an ontology that characterizes the current conceptual framework among researchers in cognitive science and neuroscience. The project objectives from the beginning focused on usability, simplicity, and utility for end users. Support for Semantic Web technologies was also a priority in order to support interoperability with other neuroscience projects and knowledge bases. Current off-the-shelf semantic web or semantic wiki technologies, however, do not often lend themselves to simple user interaction designs for non-technical researchers and practitioners; the abstract nature and complexity of these systems acts as point of friction for user interaction, inhibiting usability and utility. Instead, we take an alternate interaction design approach driven by user centered design processes rather than a base set of semantic technologies. This paper reviews the initial two rounds of design and development of the Cognitive Atlas system, including interactive design decisions and their implementation as guided by current industry practices for the development of complex interactive systems

Evaluating system utility and conceptual fit using CASSM

There is a wealth of user-centred evaluation methods (UEMs) to support the analyst in assessing interactive systems. Many of these support detailed aspects of use – for example: Is the feedback helpful? Are labels appropriate? Is the task structure optimal? Few UEMs encourage the analyst to step back and consider how well a system supports users’ conceptual understandings and system utility. In this paper, we present CASSM, a method which focuses on the quality of ‘fit’ between users and an interactive system. We describe the methodology of conducting a CASSM analysis and illustrate the approach with three contrasting worked examples (a robotic arm, a digital library system and a drawing tool) that demonstrate different depths of analysis. We show how CASSM can help identify re-design possibilities to improve system utility. CASSM complements established evaluation methods by focusing on conceptual structures rather than procedures. Prototype tool support for completing a CASSM analysis is provided by Cassata, an open source development

Issues in Evaluating Health Department Web-Based Data Query Systems: Working Papers

Compiles papers on conceptual and methodological topics to consider in evaluating state health department systems that provide aggregate data online, such as taxonomy, logic models, indicators, and design. Includes surveys and examples of evaluations

User-centered development of a Virtual Research Environment to support collaborative research events

This paper discusses the user-centred development process within the Collaborative Research Events on the Web (CREW) project, funded under the JISC Virtual Research Environments (VRE) programme. After presenting the project, its aims and the functionality of the CREW VRE, we focus on the user engagement approach, grounded in the method of co-realisation. We describe the different research settings and requirements of our three embedded user groups and the respective activities conducted so far. Finally we elaborate on the main challenges of our user engagement approach and end with the project’s next steps

A heuristic-based approach to code-smell detection

Encapsulation and data hiding are central tenets of the object oriented paradigm. Deciding what data and behaviour to form into a class and where to draw the line between its public and private details can make the difference between a class that is an understandable, flexible and reusable abstraction and one which is not. This decision is a difficult one and may easily result in poor encapsulation which can then have serious implications for a number of system qualities. It is often hard to identify such encapsulation problems within large software systems until they cause a maintenance problem (which is usually too late) and attempting to perform such analysis manually can also be tedious and error prone. Two of the common encapsulation problems that can arise as a consequence of this decomposition process are data classes and god classes. Typically, these two problems occur together – data classes are lacking in functionality that has typically been sucked into an over-complicated and domineering god class. This paper describes the architecture of a tool which automatically detects data and god classes that has been developed as a plug-in for the Eclipse IDE. The technique has been evaluated in a controlled study on two large open source systems which compare the tool results to similar work by Marinescu, who employs a metrics-based approach to detecting such features. The study provides some valuable insights into the strengths and weaknesses of the two approache