Web usability standards and guidelines 26

Usability refers to an attribute that assesses how easy user interfaces are to use. Nielsen states that usability is defined by five quality components (Nielsen, 2003b):

• Learnability: How easy is it for users to accomplish basic tasks the first time they encounter the design?

• Efficiency: Once users have learned the design, how quickly can they perform tasks?

• Memorability: When users return to the design after a period of not using it, how easily can they re-establish proficiency?

• Errors: How many errors do users make, how severe are these errors, and how easily can they recover from the errors?

• Satisfaction: How pleasant is it to use the design?

Another important factor in usability is utility. Utility refers to how well the site performs what the user needs. According to Nielsen, it does not matter if a site is easy to use when it does not do what the user wants (Nielsen, 2003b).

Usability is important as it forms the survival condition of a site. If a site is not usable, does not answer the user’s key questions or allows the user to get lost, the user will leave. The user’s first line of defence against usability difficulties is to leave the site (Nielsen, 2003b).

For intranets, usability is a matter of employee productivity. Time wasted by users being lost on an intranet or pondering difficult instructions is money wasted by paying them to be at work without getting work done. For internal design projects, think of doubling usability as cutting training budgets in half and doubling the number of transactions employees perform per hour (Nielsen, 2003b).

Nielsen suggests the following ten general principles for interface design (Nielsen, 2005):

• Visibility of system status - The system should always keep users informed about what is going on, through appropriate feedback within reasonable time.

• Match between system and the real world - The system should speak the users' language, with words, phrases and concepts familiar to the user, rather than system-oriented terms. Follow real-world conventions, making information appear in a natural and logical order.

• User control and freedom - Users often choose system functions by mistake and will need a clearly marked "emergency exit" to leave the unwanted state without having to go through an extended dialogue. Support undo and redo.

• Consistency and standards - Users should not have to wonder whether different words, situations, or actions mean the same thing. Follow platform conventions. • Error prevention - Even better than good error messages is a careful design

which prevents a problem from occurring in the first place. Either eliminate error- prone conditions or check for them and present users with a confirmation option before they commit to the action.

• Recognition rather than recall - Minimize the user's memory load by making objects, actions, and options visible. The user should not have to remember information from one part of the dialogue to another. Instructions for use of the system should be visible or easily retrievable whenever appropriate.

• Flexibility and efficiency of use - Accelerators, unseen by the novice user, may often speed up the interaction for the expert user such that the system can cater to both inexperienced and experienced users. Allow users to tailor frequent actions. • Aesthetic and minimalist design - Dialogues should not contain information

which is irrelevant or rarely needed. Every extra unit of information in a dialogue competes with the relevant units of information and diminishes their relative visibility.

• Help users recognise, diagnose and recover from errors - Error messages should be expressed in plain language (no codes), precisely indicate the problem, and constructively suggest a solution.

• Help and documentation - Even though it is better if the system can be used without documentation, it may be necessary to provide help and documentation. Any such information should be easy to search, focused on the user's task, list concrete steps to be carried out, and not be too large.

Furthermore, Microsoft Network (MSN) Usability Research provided Web usability guidelines to aid in designing a site that provides a high-quality user experience and that appeals to users. Appeal refers to whether people enjoy and become engaged in an experience. Appeal should translate directly into repeat website visits. MSN theorise that there are five main attributes of appeal that increase site use (Keeker, 1997):

• Provide relevant, high-quality content; • Make it easy to use;

• Promote effectively, both on the site and in other media; • Make the experience unique to the medium;

• Evoke emotion.

The guidelines (summarised in Table 3.1) based on usability and marketing research on the MSN are the following (Keeker, 1997):

Content Quality

Criterion Checklist To improve

Relevance • Interesting topic; • Easy to learn. • High-quality content; • Market research; • Inform audience; • Identify important topics or tasks.

Attractive use of media • Appealing graphics; • Pleasing audio; • Appropriate mood or emotion; • Enjoyable experience without media. • No replaying of media; • Use subtle variations; • Coordinate audio and

video;

• Warn people before using media;

• Provide cues as to which stimulus should have the user’s

attention;

• Use low-tone sounds; • Use professional-quality

sound;

• Consider the emotions invoked in users when using media.

Appropriate Depth and Breadth

• Variety for the subject matter; • Articles' lengths; • Expansion on depth of topics. • Additional high-quality information;

• Link directly to relevant content;

• Consistency when moving from site; • Appropriate content

breadth;

• Searchable content. Timely/Current Information • Latest information;

• Inform users of updates.

• Visual design cues of timely information; • Content to current real-

world events; • Highlight timely

content;

• Highlight fresh content; • Notify users of exiting

future events.

Ease of Use

Criterion Checklist To improve

Structure • Communicate the site's core activities;

• Communicate the consequences of actions;

• Core activities location; • Control the pace of

sequences.

• Navigation pages should not scroll;

• Do not overload with navigation choices; • Content pages should

contain one conceptual unit of content;

• Name the actual content;

• Provide context for links; • Distinguish between decorative and functional graphic elements; • Group navigation elements; • Consistency of navigation elements; • Easy to locate home

base;

• Break text in mid- sentence;

• Do not scroll to

important information; • Avoid page-load tricks; • Provide instructions

and/or help;

• Use multiple-choice for difficult tasks.

Feedback • Page headings should

indicate location; • Confusion or frustration

by uncertainties

regarding page-loading.

• Navigation - use highly visible page headers, distinguish major page sections visually and use plain language error messages;

• Wait-time – Inform users of long downloads and page-loads, give the user sub-tasks during long loads and give snippets of the download as it progresses. Promoting Content

Criterion Checklist To improve

Promoting Content • Site name to be remembered after promotion; • Promotion should

highlight tangible, valuable site content; • Appropriate user

prompts to get to the promotion.

• Advertise the site in related media;

• Identify the site's target audiences;

• Convey the site's basic attitude;

• Use fresh promotions for each update; • Let users know what is

coming soon on the site; • Emphasise important

dates;

• Emphasise any celebrities associated with your site;

• Use one distinct area of the page to do

promotions; • Encourage users to

interact with online advertisements;

• Distinguish promotional sites from actual sites. Made-for-the-Medium Content

Criterion Checklist To improve

Community • Opportunity to feel like part of a community; • Interface to support the

social goals of users; • Users to represent

themselves; • Users to express

themselves freely; • Users to be able to find

out about others; • Provide something to

talk about;

• Site to promote a sense of group identification. • Introduce topics; • Have moderated conversations; • Organise different conversations into topics;

• Have users fill out profiles;

• Encourage users to send in pictures;

• Make sure that uses can tell each other apart; • Enable nicknames or

avatars; • Enable filters.

Personalisation • Respond to each person as an individual;

• Be able to create and interact in a manner that is unique;

• Users to be able to tailor the look and feel of the site.

• Highlight the person's particular interests; • Enable customisation; • Refer to audience members by name; • Speed up or customise frequent actions; • Make the program

accessible to all computer users.

Infinite Refinement and Addition of Content

• Structure to enable the addition of new information;

• Users to know exactly when new information is available;

• Provide new content on a schedule that is appropriate to the subject matter.

• Use persistent article locations;

• Organise archives by topic, author, and date; • Provide links to relevant

past content in current content.

Emotional Response

Emotional responses of challenge, plot, character strength and pace are not applicable to the NMMU staff portal and will not be investigated in this research.

Table 3.1: MSN usability guidelines