Improving Web usability through visualization

One reason for poor Web site usability is researchers' lack of understanding about how users surf for information. Predictive Web usage visualizations can help analysts uncover traffic patterns and usability problems. The author describes some of the techniques those in the User Interface Research Group at PARC have developed to visualize content changes, linkage structures, site usage, and so on. He explores how these techniques can be used to identify specific usability problems at large Web sites. As part of his work, he have created a predictive visualization model called Information Scent, in which simulated users help uncover patterns and deficiencies in information accessibility. He demonstrates these techniques using a prototype system called ScentViz to illustrate how Web usage analysis can be enhanced using visualization methods     

Designing for Web site usability

To attract and maintain online users, Web site designers must offer interfaces that address specific needs and functions     

Improving the usability of standard schemas

Due to the development of XML and other data models such as OWL and RDF, sharing data is an increasingly common task since these data models allow simple syntactic translation of data between applications. However, in order for data to be shared semantically, there must be a way to ensure that concepts are the same. One approach is to employ commonly usedschemas—called standard schemas —which help guarantee that syntactically identical objects have semantically similar meanings. As a result of the spread of data sharing, there has been widespread adoption of standard schemas in a broad range of disciplines and for a wide variety of applications within a very short period of time. However, standard schemas are still in their infancy and have not yet matured or been thoroughly evaluated. It is imperative that the data management research community takes a closer look at how well these standard schemas have fared in real-world applications to identify not only their advantages, but also the operational challenges that real users face.     

Improving a portlet usability model

Second-generation portals are far from being monolithic pieces of software. Their complexity calls for a component-based approach where portlets are the technical enabler. That being the case nowadays portals tend to be constructed by means of portlets, i.e. a multi-step, user-facing application to be delivered through a Web application. The proposal for and ample support given to the WSRP (Web Services for Remote Portlets) portlet standard predict an emerging portlet market. A main requirement for the blossoming of this market is the existence of portlet quality models that assist portal developers to select the appropriate portlet. This paper focuses on usability. The aim, therefore, is to develop a usability model for portlets. The paper presents such a model and its realisation for a sample case.

Improving system usability through parallel design

Companies are shortening software project schedules to introduce products more rapidly than competitors. At the same time, customers are demanding higher usability. Unfortunately, the goals of increased usability and decreased development time conflict with traditional usability engineering approaches. The design process always requires several rounds where interfaces confront users' needs and capabilities and are modified accordingly. This approach is called iterative design. Our experience indicates the need for at least two iterations, yielding three versions, before the product is good enough for release. However three or more iterations are better. The paper considers how parallel design costs more than traditional iterative design but produces results faster by using several designers independently and simultaneously. It is preferable when time-to-market is critical     

A global perspective on Web site usability

Online business failures are increasing as customers turn away from unusable or unfriendly sites. From a global perspective, usability requires cultural sensitivity in language transition, along with the appropriate use of color, design, and animation. We propose the use of a Web-based usability assessment model that promotes customer satisfaction as an integral part of online business application development. This usability assessment model is an outgrowth of our collaboration with industry in the pursuit of more effective online development efforts. From a global perspective, our work is in an exploratory phase. However, with the current expansion of online business applications in the global market, we believe our assessment findings can be useful     

Improving the usability of the source code quality index with interchangeable metrics sets

The aim of this research is to improve the usability and acceptance of the quality index in practice. The quality index (QI) that is used to calculate acknowledged project effort is empirically evaluated in order to find interchangeable metric sets that can be used when calculating QI. In the evaluation, ten metric sets with four metrics in the set were used to calculate ten different quality indexes that were then evaluated on 25 projects. The results indicate that six metric sets are interchangeable, making the calculation of the QI easy.     

基于Web语义挖掘的产品功能使用度分析*

为了克服传统问卷调查方法研究产品功能使用度时受限于样本大小和目标针对性不强等缺陷,提出了基于Web语义挖掘的产品功能使用度分析方法.运用基于人工修正的知网方法构建了关联词表,然后开发了产品使用信息系统,构建了产品功能定量化研究模型,对产品功能使用度进行分析.通过某款手机具体对该系统性的方法进行了验证,为产品功能决策提供...     

Universities of the Kyrgyz Republic on the Web: accessibility and usability

Universal Access in the Information Society - Today the Internet is the easiest way to find information about any kind of organization, and the first impression about an organization is almost...     

Improving Web accessibility

Fifty-four million Americans - nearly one in five - live with some form of visual, auditory, motor, or cognitive disability. Although great strides have been made during the past decade to accommodate those with special needs in the physical workplace, the Internet's increasing commercial prominence is raising new questions about how far this effort should extend into cyberspace. Making Web sites fully accessible benefits everyone, not just people with disabilities.     

基于链接的Web网页分类

基于链接的特点,提出了获取链接信息的模型,将得到的链接信息结合对象本身的属性来共同训练分类规则。针对网页链接的特殊性,对链接有向图重新建模。实验证明链接信息的加入可以有效地改善分类的结果,链接有向图的重新建模同样提高了分类的准确性。     

Improving Web Service Discovery with Usage Data

Service-oriented computing and Web services are becoming more popular, enabling organizations to use the Web as a market for selling their own services and consuming existing services from others. Nevertheless, the more services are available, the more difficult it becomes to find the most appropriate service for a specific application. Existing approaches to Web service discovery tend to address different information-processing styles. However, Web services have functional and nonfunctional characteristics that can be difficult to present and control. Service behavior and quality-of-service (QoS) parameters can vary over time, and new services can emerge in certain business areas.     

Improving Web information systems with navigational patterns

In this paper we show how to improve the architecture of Web information systems (WIS) using design patterns, in particular navigational patterns. We first present a framework to reason about the process of designing and implementing these applications. Then we introduce navigational patterns and show some prototypical patterns. We next show how these patterns have been used in some successful WIS. Finally, we explain how patterns are integrated into the development process of WIS.     

Supporting novice usability practitioners with usability engineering tools

Although usability practitioners have successfully applied usability engineering processes to increase the usability of interaction designs, the literature suggests that usability practitioners experience a number of difficulties that negatively impact the effectiveness of their work, which in turn affects the effectiveness of the usability engineering processes within which they work. These difficulties include identifying and recording critical usability data and understanding and establishing relationships among usability data. These difficulties are particularly pronounced for novice usability practitioners. One approach to addressing these difficulties is through appropriate usability engineering tool support. We argue that existing usability engineering tools offer excellent support for helping experienced usability practitioners more efficiently do their jobs, but they provide little support for helping novice usability practitioners more effectively do their jobs. We introduce a tool feature, usability problem instance records, to better support novice usability practitioners. We describe the results of a study of this feature, which suggest that the feature helps to improve two aspects of the effectiveness of novice usability practitioners: reliability and quality.     

Improving the usability of information systems: the role of the technical communicator

A successful information system implementation requires effective logical analysis, sound technical construction, effective design for users and successful change management during implementation. If these conditions are not present then in all probability the system will be a failure. Ensuring a system is successful from a user's perspective is primarily about usability. There are many aspects of information system design that impact on usability including: online help, the design of the user interface, system and error messages. These aspects need consideration early in the development cycle. This paper discusses the need for improved usability design in information systems and presents results of recent research which examined the role of technical communicators in systems development and explored the extent to which their work improved system usability. The study found that from a user's perspective an improved system results when technical communicators are involved particularly in the early stages of the development process.     

Improving Web site design

Using quantitative measures of the informational, navigational, and graphical aspects of a Web site, a quality checker aims to help nonprofessional designers improve their Web sites. As part of the WebTango project, we explore automated approaches for helping designers improve their sites. Our goal is to create an interactive tool that helps steer occasional Web site builders away from bad designs and toward better ones - a "quality checker" tool, analogous to a grammar checker in a word processor. What distinguishes our work from most others is that this tool is based on empirically derived measures computed over thousands of Web pages. We converted these measures, which characterize the informational, navigational, and graphical aspects of a Web site, into profiles for a variety of site types. Our rudimentary design-checking tool uses these profiles to assess Web site designs; future versions will also suggest design improvements     

Improving the usability of intravenous medication labels to support safe medication delivery

Medication label design is frequently a contributing factor to medication errors. Design regulations and recommendations have been predominantly aimed at manufacturers’ product labels. Pharmacy-generated labels have received less scrutiny despite being an integral artifact throughout the medication use process. This article is an account of our efforts to improve the design of a hospital’s intravenous (IV) medication labels. Our analysis revealed a set of interrelated processes and stakeholders that restrict the range of feasible label designs. The technological and system constraints likely vary among hospitals and represent significant barriers to developing and implementing specific design standards. We propose both an ideal IV label design and one that adheres to the current constraints of the hospital under study.

Relevance to industry

Hospitals are tasked with creating customized medication labels with minimal guidance. Our process, findings, and proposed labels provide insight for similar investigations at other institutions.     

Web系统可用性自动化评估系统的设计与实现

为了从用户真实行为中挖掘可能存在的可用性问题,避免启发式评估不可靠的问题,提出了基于大量用户行为数据,面向Web系统的可用性自动化评估系统.通过自动化匹配大量用户行为数据与需求分析阶段产生的用例,发现不一致的任务和任务前后置关系进而发现可用性问题.真实项目实践结果表明,输出的异常任务和异常任务前后置关系对可用性评估人员有指导价值,可以为进一步改进Web系统提供参考.