More Axure Fun

So I have been using repeaters in a couple of prototypes in Axure. Repeaters allow creating a single element that then is linked to a data table and will repeat content based on how many rows are in the data table. This can make it much easier to automatically simulate a list/grid of search results with real content. You can also then add controls to filter and sort and paginate the list. There is also the ability to dynamically load images from an external source. All of this awesome functionality was making it fun to build out some prototypes that I had intended to do some remote/unmoderated usability testing.

Unfortunately, complex repeaters (6+ columns, external images, links/refernce pages, etc) with more than around 12 rows can substantially slow down the loading of a prototype in a browser. It gets even worse from the axshare server. Also, having more than 1 repeater widget on a page can also slow down a prototype to make it basically unusable. So I fell back to using dynamic panels with states to represent more limited simulation of filtering.

There are some ways to optimize repeaters including using the pagination functionality to load a smaller set of content. However, even after this optimization I still found my prototype pages with repeaters taking upwards of 8-10 seconds to load locally. Viewing pages from the axshare server which can be slow on its own, was often pushing 20+ seconds to load a page. For all the power they offer it was a big dissappointment to not be able to use repeaters in the prototypes for the usability testing. I am still looking further in to how to optimize things. I think it would be helpful if we could make a repeater load asynchronously and perhaps have a place holder image or group of elements.

Axure Interactions on Grouped Elements Reminder

This is a note to remind myself that interactions applied to a group folder do not work if any of the enclosed elements have an interaction. Also AxureEx is an incredibly useful set of methods for including javascript in an Axure file:

AxureEx can be found here:
http://www.dejongh.dk/wiki/doku.php?id=interaction:axure.ex_api

And the downloadable file is here:
https://github.com/Sam-Hepworth/Axure.Ex/releases

Credit to Sam Hepworth

Section 508 – more than compliance

While you can use automated validators to measure whether you meet section 508 and WCAG accessibility guidelines, often making the interface usable for screen readers requires more. The validators simply tell you if you have violated one of the standard rules. It does not tell you if the user can make sense of whatever it is that has been written.

Also it should be noted that while section 508 seems mostly focused on users who use screen readers, there are a number of other disabilities that are covered as well including cognitive and other various forms of visual impairments. To truly satisfy users who need section 508 assistance you need to test with users who represent those types of users. Truthfully with many eCommerce sites failing at this, sadly the bar is set pretty low to meet their needs.

If your site has a global presence then you really need to meet the WCAG Level A or priority 1 requirements at the least. As WCAG is the standard set forth by the W3C it is best to follow what is set as a standard by this group. A great article on the differences between the two can be found here;
http://jimthatcher.com/sidebyside.htm

Other Accessibility resources are here;
WCAG
Section 508

The Fold Zone

More and more web designers are seeking to dispel the notion of the browser fold. Yet there is still the reality that users can not see all of a page’s content if it is taller than a browser window and they will potentially leave the page before discovering the additional content. There is often an email sent from the CEO or other senior manager stating that they want some graphic or link moved above the fold. This typically ruins the layout or requires major reworking to get things to fit.

I guess I should back up a bit and explain that the fold is an invisible line where the content of the page is not visible below the bottom of your browser window (and/or to the right side if there is also more content than can fit into one screen horizontally). It is borrowed from the print world where certain print formats such as newspapers and brochures are folded. The content that was most important appears on the front page before the fold to be sure that the consumer would notice it.

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Recording and conducting usability tests on the Mac

As of late I have been looking into what ways that I could record a usability session of an application on a Mac. Windows definitely has an edge here with the Morae application from techsmith. This is a feature rich application that captures a usability session as well as make it easy to produce some nice reports. It captures both the screen and if you have a web cam, the subject. There is nothing equivalent for the Mac. However, there are a number of tools available for Mac OS X that can perform most of the functions of Morae separately.

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Stretchy = Bad… OK maybe not

Stretchy layouts are not good, yet every über techie who has a 20 inch or larger monitor wants web sites to stretch when they open their browser to the width of the monitor. Well maybe not every über techie wants stretchy layouts, but enough that comment on design related message boards that it really irks me. Why is it bad, because paragraphs that span exceedingly long widths are difficult to read. This is of course assuming they are long enough to still take several lines. A single line of text is not hard to read. And, of course, if the site is only images or video, then it is not as much an issue if at all.

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HCI 590: Navigation Test Tool

I completed the MS in HCI at Depaul with my last class being an independent study to build a tool for testing/researching navigation and how people acquire/find information from them. Actually, I have been researching this for the last year on and off so this was in a way more of a culmination of thoughts and reading. The main outcome was the development of a web based tool that could be used to present tasks to a user and collect data as they interact with a menu navigation system. Ultimately, the project was a continuation of Dr. Craig Miller’s research into how users conceptually navigate a hierarchical menu structure. He had developed several prototypes that used java and flat text files to present the data.

As with most academic endeavors of this kind I, the student, started with a fairly broad goal and needed to narrow it down. However, my goal was not exactly the same as Dr. Miller’s as I wanted and still want a general purpose tool that could be used for a variety of research activities related to testing website navigation and usability. Where as he and another researcher are seeking to better understand the conceptual model of users as they learn a menu and find information organized in that menu. For me, my practical work experience has lead me to see the need for an easy to use tool to help better organize/prepare complex menus for websites, especially after a site has launched. So I am first assisting Dr. Miller and the other researchers in developing a tool that will work for their testing, but also I am trying to develop it in a way that I can use to do basic testing of web usability in general.

I have produced a prototype tool and released it as an open source project. It can be found at the address below. It is in alpha (or even pre-alpha) phase so any recommendations, thoughts, or contributions will be welcomed.

UI Nav Test Tool

The project was written in PHP and uses a MySQL back-end. There is a demo and you can download the source plus the setup files from the site. If you have questions you can contact me via the project site. Essentially, the UI Nav Test tool is a very stripped down CMS with features for presenting tasks to a research participant and it also has a basic reporting page and allows the researcher to download the raw data for further analysis. While the appearance is very basic, this is intentional. As the purpose is to identify problems with labels and organization, not whether something looks pretty or not. The demo is set to use one of Dr. Miller’s content domains which is focused on understanding how people conceptualize the navigation steps they will take to find items.