testingsense.com

pratap · Joined: 31 Aug 2007 Posts: 6

Usability is what's needed more ?

sachdeva · Joined: 29 Aug 2007 Posts: 25

Using the proper icons, fonts, and colors is a no-brainer. " I haven't seen many apps that I consider "great looking", let alone using the proper fonts, icons and colors! Most app's, especially open source, are ugly as hell, which is the first usability concern. The metamorphosis demo was not (from my knowledge) designed to show you how to do usability testing, but basically takes an application from the state most are in, to a more professional looking application. Usability testing on the whole is pretty simple. Good old nielsen said it best when he made the comment "testing with 5 users finds 95% of the problems" (or something to that matter). Al you need to do is use some software that records user interactions + audio, give them a list of tasks, and let them loose on your software. You would be amazed at how many simple things you can find using this technique. There are no hard and fast rules for every application - if there were, usability would not be an issue - so you just need to take the time to do it for each application you create.