Good user interface design ensures that visitors to your website do not leave it shortly after coming. How user friendly a website is usually determines its success. It is hard to imagine that a website with clumsy and complicated user interface design keeps its visitors for long. This is why usability should be the number one consideration during the entire development process, beginning with user interface prototyping. In this blog post I would like to point out the three most common usability flaws to consider during user interface prototyping.

Unclear or complex navigation is your first enemy. When a user comes to your website he has a particular purpose: find your phone number or buy a pair of sneakers. User interface prototyping is the right stage to consider how clear your navigation is. Are you using obvious labels? Is information broken into logical categories? These days many designers are obsessed with innovative navigation design concepts. It is advisable to get those tested during the user interface prototyping stage to avoid rework in the future.

Something that truly annoys me in many websites are horizontal scroll bars. You don’t have to be a usability expert or do any user interface prototyping to know it is a bad idea. Nevertheless, user interface prototyping would show you that mine is not an unusual opinion. Most importantly, many users do not bother to scroll so the information never reaches them. User interface prototyping can help you plan the amount of content that will be available on the website. Remember that in many cases less is better than more.

Lastly, I have to mention small or invisible click areas. If a user can’t instantly get where he wants to go he will probably not keep trying for very long. It is a rule in user interface design to make click areas prominent. They should be noticeable and they should be of an appropriate size for a user to click on them with his mouse on the first try. User interface prototyping and subsequent prototype testing can help you determine the right size of your user interface elements. Something else you might consider is that many users now browse the web on their mobile devices. Would the size of your links and buttons be appropriate for their screens?

Use common sense and bear these thoughts in mind during user interface prototyping.

This is the first part of my two-part blog post on psychological manipulation through the user interface design of e-commerce sites.

Psychological manipulation through design has long been a reality of the retail industry. Companies have long lavished high wages on psychologists and other professionals to figure out the best ways to get us to spend more of our money. Even if you don’t realize it a simple stroll through a supermarket will probably end up with you putting more in your shopping cart than was on your shopping list. In the same vein e-commerce sites also put just as much effort into their user interface design, so as to achieve a similar effect. In effect what they are trying to achieve through their user interface design is the justification of spending habits and getting users to feel better about their transactions.

What power does the default user interface design hold?

The default user interface design/ user experience is the UI design/ UX of a website or application that you see without you having had the chance to customize it. You can think of it as the clothes that might come with a doll from the box. According to usability guru Jakob Nielsen a large number of users will always stick to the default user interface design and settings. This “power of defaults” means that many of the customization features are untouched despite the fact that these settings could, and often do, improve the overall user experience/ user interface design. Conversely speaking the default user interface design and functionality has to be spot on. For a long time Amazon’s user interface design has been a UI design success story, constantly refined and perfected leading to increased sales. An example of the power of defaults effect on UI design that Nielsen gives is in filling in the country field of registration forms for one of his usability conferences. Instead of leaving the country field empty the location where a user is registering from can be used to, say, show the United States for someone registering from New York. The goal here is to obliterate the small frictions that get in the way of repeat purchases. One way sites like Amazon do this is to incentivize users to spend more to qualify for the omission of mental hurdle that is shipping costs!

According to TechCrunch researchers from the University of Washington undertook a study on the usability and user interface design of the Kindle among its student body.  The findings suggest the user interface design of the Kindle makes them unpopular amongst college students. The reasons for this are that the user interface design of the Kindle makes it difficult to skim through content, look-up references or even take notes. To be fair the user interface design “problems” are a little harsh on Amazon considering the Kindle was not intended for those uses. The Kindle was designed for leisurely reading and not combing through and editing mountains of academic material. One thinks of the Kindle as a vehicle for Amazon to pump out more novels and some such fodder.

How can the Kindle over come its user interface design “problems”?

This makes the Kindle an incomplete companion as students in the study were switching to a nearby computer to look up references or other such tasks. Some even would bring along extra paper since the product and user interface design of the Kindle is not suited to writing notes in the margin, highlighting key passages, and underlining etc. In effect the study seems to be calling out for the Kindle to feature more of the functionality and user interface design of the iPad. A fully-fledged tablet seems to be exactly what Amazon is working on. The rumored device is expected to feature Android Honeycomb with its much vaunted tablet-centric user interface design. Since Kindle is available as an app for desktops, smartphones and tablets it remains to be seen what the unique selling point of the Kindle tablet would be.

This is the second part of my two-part blog on ethnography and its relation to usability engineering and user interface design.

How to conduct an ethnographical usability test

Ethnographic studies tend to be relatively costly to conduct, as an observer needs to care for planning and logistical costs. Other associated costs include the resources needed to create, design and publish results (usually in a comprehensive report with artifacts). The participant fee and refreshments (for both observer and subject) for the duration of the observation also add to the costs. However when done well, ethnographic studies are appropriate for qualitative endeavors, aimed at understanding the circumstances and environment users and customers are engaged in when making decisions. They’re also very important for understanding the localization factors with products and services with an international reach. James Hom’s Usability Methods Toolbox (usability.jameshom.com) provides a good example of how to carry out a usability test using the ethnographic method of inquiry.

1. Choose your participants

The first step is finding a wide but representative sample of various users of the product your interface design intends to address. This means selecting participants from “different workplaces, industries, and backgrounds”. Once the participants have been identified, proceed to schedule the observations, in their native environment of course.

2. Interview participants

A vital part of field observation is inquiry. You should interview the respondents regarding the interface design in question. Why do they use the interface design? How do they use the interface design? How does the interface design relate to their personal life and/or professional life? How do they think their environment and personality influence the way they use the interface design. Getting answers to questions like these allows the observer to gain valuable user experience feedback right from within the context of the users’ native environments.

Identify artifacts and outcroppings

The observations and remarks of the subjects sometimes do not fully paint the complete picture needed for a comprehensive understanding of the context of use. To ensure adequate data collection, you can identify as many artifacts and outcroppings as possible. Artifacts and outcroppings are the little observations that help complete the puzzle, as it where. What exactly are artifacts and outcroppings?  Artifacts are physical objects used at the site (notebooks, forms, walls, desks, chairs, pens, computers, etc). Outcroppings are the noticeable unique physical traits of the site (size of cubicle or desk, notes that are written on forms, etc). Understanding the artifacts and outcroppings contribute to a better overall understanding of the user’s native environment and what tools are at the user’s disposal.  However, do not go crazy collecting this information. Collect and observe only what you think really affects the user’s interaction with the interface design.

Use tools to collect data

The data that make up the interviews, artifacts and outcroppings are collected and catalogued using various tools. The most rudimentary of these is the anthropologically tried and tested paper and pen combination.  Advances in technology have inevitably increased the arsenal of recording tools that now includes audio recorders, photo and video cameras or specialized software. Each of these tools has its pros and cons and often a combination of these is used during a field study. Some tools are more appropriate for recording particular aspects, for example, the use of photo cameras being well suited for recording artifacts. Video cameras can help overcome observer’s bias and so on. Using these tools will help you amass empirical data that can be easily utilized during the data analysis phase of your ethnographical usability test.

Data analysis

Once you have collected your empirical data from interviews, artifacts, and outcroppings you can then make an analysis of your findings. Explore the ways in which each different user group used the user interface design differently. See to what degree their unique native environment influenced this. As always, compare and contrast the users but also look for similarities and a unifying pattern, something that embraces the user’s differences.  This will be what helps you find a strategy for creating an interface design that provides optimal usability to the target users.

This is the second part of my 2-part blog on Gender HCI, starting with a continuation of topics explored in Gender HCI.

What topics are explored in Gender HCI?

In addition to the aforementioned studies on willingness to try out new and different features on a extant and familiar interface design and performance of tasks on large vs. small user interface displays, Gender HCI has delved into further topics. An example of this is with studies on confidence as related to problem solving tasks on a given interface design. Research shows that differences exist with regard to males’ and females’ self-efficacy in using user interfaces, and that low self-efficacy can be correlated with working less effectively with problem-solving features available.

Gender HCI also looks at general attitudes towards interface designs, web apps, and how and why people use them as well as reactions to graphic designs. While many of these issues can be analyzed through other usability methods, it is interesting to note gender differences because many user interface designs have users comprised mainly of one sex or the other. For example, designers of a wedding dress retailer would benefit from understanding the patterns of use that women employ when using interface designs. In addition, context-aware or context-sensitive systems have long been of interest, since they allow to adapt systems to the specific context of their users, such as location, usage behavior, time, or even gender and mood. Understanding how men and women differ in their requirements and usage would allow better targeting to their needs and hence potentially improve the gender-specific usability of an interface design.

Controversies surrounding Gender HCI

Gender HCI is still a nascent field and by its nature is open to controversy. In this day and age gender is being understood in more sociological terms rather than as an inherent biological binary switch. Many people find Gender HCI to be a method of reinforcing stereotypes and categorizing users based on gross generalizations. Thus, there is a large number of people that find Gender HCI to border on the offensive and perhaps even a pseudo science. Still, controversy does not automatically render this usability method invalid. Controversy may in fact turn out to be beneficial to Gender HCI since controversy is often one of the best marketing tools around and a surefire way to capture the interest of a broader audience, in this case the broader audience of computer scientists, web designers and interface designers.  Certainly it is commendable to look at research that seeks to give further insights into end-users and how to tailor products to them.

Desirability and usability as a design team

According to John Soellner’s article “Design, Usability, Desirability, What’s The Difference?” desirability design is “about expanding on the idea of what human factors are” in order to better understand what drives users to employ interfaces based on their interest level and personal satisfaction.  Desirability can be functional and emotional.  Functional desirability is almost interchangeable with usability in that it means users desire to use a site because it is usable and well organized.  Emotional desirability breaks away from usability because it seeks to understand a user’s emotional reaction to the aesthetics of a user interface: the look, feel, and even the content.  Emotional desirability concerns itself with the intangibles and emotional human factors that Soellner refers to above.

Desirability works well in tandem with usability because it measures the intangible aspects of user experience such as fun and enjoyment, aspects that usability itself usually cannot address.  Desirability helps designers discern whether or not their user interface is enticing enough for users to want to employ, reaching beyond whether or not it is easy and functional enough for users to want to use.  “Desirability design techniques supply the X Factor which motivates users to make usability matter” says Soellner.

This blog post is the second in a series of two about Human Computer Interaction (HCI)

Principles of User Interface Design for HCI systems

Since I am looking at HCI relative to interface design, it is important to underline how to improve the quality of user interface designs.  Thus, as interface designer one should be mindful of the principles of user interface design. According to Larry Constantine and Lucy Lockwood, these are:

1.    The structure principle – This is concerned with the overall user interface architecture and layout. An interface design should be organized in a way that is clear, apparent and intuitive to users. In other words similar things should somewhat resemble each other. For example, toolbar buttons should all look like toolbar buttons.

2.    The simplicity principle – The interface design should make simple, common tasks easy, communicating clearly and simply in the user’s own language. For example a search bar with the word ‘Search’ is usually better than the convoluted ‘Quick Keyword Search’.

3.    The visibility principle – All the options and tools needed to accomplish given tasks should be visible and easily accessible on the interface design without distracting the user with redundant information.

4.    The feedback principle – A good interface design should keep users informed of actions or interpretations, changes of condition or errors that are relevant through clear and concise language. This helps users feel in control of the process by being aware of their actions.

5.    The tolerance principle – The interface design should be able to accommodate a certain amount of failure from users (users, just like interface designers, are not infallible). A wrong click or some such other should be rectifiable. Undo and redo features that allow users to effectively time-travel through their steps are a good example of this principle.

6.    The reuse principle – An interface design should reuse internal and external components and behaviors, maintaining consistency with purpose rather than merely arbitrary consistency, thus reducing the need for users to rethink and remember. This is also referred to as the memorability of an interface design.

How to ensure that User Interface Design principles lead to optimal HCI systems

To ensure that these principles guide the interface design process and lead to optimal HCI systems, the use of wireframe tools can be useful. Often, the large number of stakeholders with various levels of technical expertise in the design process requires the use of such tools for visualizing requirements and concepts. Tools suitable for wireframing, such as Pidoco, a cloud-based rapid prototyping tool that works through a browser, allows interface designers to create wireframe prototypes of graphical user interfaces with simple drag and drop handling without the need for any programming. Interface designers can use this system to collaborate within a team through the cloud and get feedback from sharing prototypes, even going as far as conducting remote usability testing. This type of approach makes optimizing human computer interaction much simpler and safer and leads to more reliable results.

This blog post is the second in a series of two about accessibility design as a usability method

The aims of accessibility design

Accessibility design is specifically targeted at designing user interfaces that assist people with various disabilities.  The needs relative to disabilities that accessibility design specifically addresses include the following four categories:

•    Auditory: Creating interface designs that are user friendly for those who have hearing impairments.
•    Cognitive/Intellectual: Creating interface designs that are user friendly for those with developmental disabilities such as dyslexia or cognitive disabilities that affect memory, attention, developmental maturity, logic and problem solving skills etc.
•    Motor/Mobility: Creating interface designs that are user friendly for those with difficulty or inability to use their hands (people with Parkinson’s disease etc.)
•    Visual: Creating interface designs for people with various visual impairments.

Why is accessibility design an important usability method?

Aside from the egalitarian implications, accessibility design is crucial to usability because it creates an interface design that can attract an even wider range of users and thus ensure more success for the website.  There are many users who are disabled and if a website is not designed with them in mind, they will not be able to use it.  This can be especially dangerous in the context of e-government where equal access is a must. It can also help to integrate accessibility design into the web development process because in addition to diversifying the number of users, it also makes for a development process that is suffuse with simplicity, as designers must find way to create a site that is universally usable for users of all abilities, thus diminishing their ability to create user interface designs that are too convoluted or contrived.

In this blog post, inspired by a German blog by Christian Seifert, I shall look at some of the interface design challenges that interface designers encounter when porting a website over to its Chinese version.

One of the very first things to consider is the text. In Chinese, the text length differs dramatically.  Chinese text takes up far less space than the Western script. This means you may have to rearrange parts of your interface design layout. So expect your translated text to do much more with much less on your interface design.

Furthermore, the calligraphy can be read in any direction but the familiar Western layout of horizontal rows from left to right, read from the top of the page to the bottom, has become more popular.  Nevertheless, it may not suffice to translate the text of your website into one Chinese version. In order for your interface design to succeed in China, a localization and adaptation to the expectations of Chinese users is required.

The images will also have to be different to reflect the Chinese market. Websites in China tend to be more colorful than those in Europe or North America. Bright, cartoony colors abound on Chinese websites. So, be sure not to simply retain the “Western” interface design asthetics, but rather do some research on the perceptions held by Chinese users. Utilizing usability tests may be a powerful avenue.

Interface designers would do well to follow Chinese design conventions. An example of this is with Yahoo. To a European-language speaking eye, the Chinese version of Yahoo looks very noisy and busy. In addition, a European reader may find the contrast of colors within the interface design astonishing. Yet, this style is customary in Chinese websites and will have to be emulated in your interface design to appease a Chinese audience.

In addition to the purely software-related factors, you need to consider the technological environment in which your Chinese website will be used. One important example is that your interface design should be optimized for Internet Explorer which is far and away the most popular browser in China.

Besides interface design concerns, other things to consider include hosting your website on local servers in china to ensure faster access. As far as search engine optimization goes Baidu.cn’s 62% market share dwarfs Google’s so you can’t afford to overlook it. Furthermore, websites ending with a .cn domain name are ranked higher on Chinese websites.

As is true so often in multi-cultural contexts, whenever in doubt, you may consider involving experts, both in questions of porting the website into Chinese and testing its usability with Chinese users.

In part 2 of this blog post on context of use I shall look more intricately into the relationship between context of use analysis and user interface design.

Context of use analysis and user interface design

The importance of understanding the context of use when producing successful interface designs has lead to the creation of a usability method called context of use analysis that is commonly used by interaction designers and interface designers. Analysis is arrived at via a brainstorming methodology in order to devise successful usability tests during the development process of a website or application. Successful user interface design requires the analysis of user experience feedback in order to create a user interface characterized by optimal usability. However, collecting meaningful user experience feedback and interpreting it is not always simple, especially when interface designers lack a solid methodology or have not thoroughly thought through their usability tests.

The name of the game here is to be well prepared. Being able to define a site’s target users or knowing what kinds of tasks they will need to perform and what types of goals they want to achieve through the interface design is key. When interface designers are unclear about these salient usability test questions, creating a test that is realistic and relevant and results in meaningful knowledge about the new interface design concept becomes difficult. Without knowing about the context of use, interface designers run the risk of creating interface designs that do not satisfy the requirements dictated by the way the products will be used in a real-life context.  The resulting interface designs are often not sufficiently usable. This is why context of use analysis is a crucial usability method: it allows designers to create tests based on predetermined context-specific user needs and performance paradigms. Thus, designers not only learn what user experience feedback to elicit and how, but also have a framework to interpret the feedback in order to create a solid interface design that works for the user.

Why is context of use analysis a vital usability strategy?

When developing a website or application interface designers need to uncover crucial usability “probe” questions that speak to the usability heart of the matter. These questions seek to ascertain valuable information and insight that may not yet have been thought of by the interface designers. These questions, often derived through collaborative brainstorming sessions, help interface designers to tackle critical usability issues head-on when they design and distribute their usability tests. The deeper understanding of the design of a system relative to the context within which it is used can be a vital contribution in saving time and money during the testing and development process. It can also lead to significantly more successful products.