Tutorial 17

Usability Inspection Methods

Jakob Nielsen, SunSoft, Inc.

Monday Afternoon, May 8

Objective

Participants will learn to (1) apply the heuristic evaluation method to find usability problems in their current project, (2) understand the characteristics and cost-benefit trade- offs of a range of usability inspection methods, and (3) select appropriate methods for various stages of the usability engineering lifecycle of future projects.

Content

Usability inspection is the name of a set of highly cost- effective methods for finding usability problems and improving the usability of a user interface design. Topics covered include: (1) definition of usability inspection, (2) inspection methods, including heuristic evaluation, feature inspection, consistency inspection, and pluralistic walkthrough, (3) relationships between the methods coveredin this tutorial and other inspection methods (e.g., cognitive walkthroughs), (4) relationship between usability inspection methods and user testing, (5) rating the severity of usability problems found by usability inspection, (6) cost-benefit characteristics of usability inspection methods, and (7) positioning usability inspection methods in the usability engineering lifecycle and performing inspections before a design has been implemented.

Audience

This introductory-level tutorial is intended for individuals who are new to usability and is of significant value to experienced usability professionals who have limited experience with heuristic evaluation and other inspection methods. This tutorial is not designed for individuals having extensive experience with usability inspection.

Presentation

Lecture, exercises

Instructor

Jakob Nielsen is a Distinguished Engineer for strategic technology at SunSoft (the software subsidiary of Sun Microsystems) where he works on improved usability methods, strongly object-oriented user interfaces, and the user interface to Sun's next generation of on-line documentation. Nielsen coined the term "discount usability engineering" and was the co-inventor of the heuristic evaluation methods. He is the author of two books: Usability Engineering and Multimedia and Hypertext: The Internet and Beyond. Together with Robert L. Mack from IBM, Nielsen edited the definitive volume Usability Inspection Methods.

Keith Instone / instone@acm.org / 95-01-05