Project Step 6:  Summative Evaluation / Usability Testing

Now that you have a working prototype, it is time to put it to the test. You will need to do an empirical usability test with real live subjects, then develop a plan for refining your prototype based on these findings.

Empirical Usability Testing:  Review your Requirements Analysis and your Design claims analysis, and generate from that a usability specification containing benchmark tasks and outcomes expected. Be sure to include a good variety of benchmark tasks for usability testing, including some easy tasks and some difficult tasks. Then, run usability tests on your prototype with at least 3 subjects using the think-aloud protocol.  Subjects should be from your targeted subject pool if possible.  Subjects should NOT be team members.  From the tests, identify and organize the usability problems.  Create refinements to your design to attempt to solve the usability problems.

Hand in a hard-copy report containing:

• Description of the test, including your usability specification and benchmark tasks.
• Describe your subjects. Were they representative of your targeted user classes? (Remember subject anonymity is important.)
• Describe your results, including the list of usability problems discovered. How do the tests confirm/refute your Requirements/Design claims analyses?
• Describe your proposed design solutions and refinements.
• How successful was the usability testing for your project? What are your reactions to this experience?

NOTE:  You may come up with design solutions that are not workable in the time remaining this semester. Report them anyway. We do expect further refinements to your project implementation before the final presentation or report, regardless.