CSCI 4800/6800
Proect 2B and 2C: Paintbox

Note: You must submit your "application to engage in course-directed human subjects activity" AND receive approval prior to engaging in human subjects activity (evaluating your HTML Editor) and no later than April 4th.

Goals:

• have learned and applied some basic evaluation techniques
• have applied the results of the evaluation, in order to achieve a more usable GUI

The Project:

1. Ask 5 or more people to use your tool to perform a well-defined set of tasks using your Paintbox program.
2. Observe the users as they use the editor. Ask the users to "talk aloud", describing what they're trying to do, the problems they run into, etc. Don't tell them how to use it -- you're merely an observer. Keep track of:
   • the number of times each operation is performed (the operations will vary depending on how you chose to implement the user interface). I suggest you create a list of operations in advance and merely add a stroke each time the operation is performed is created.
   • the time required to perform each of the tasks.
   • the problems they encounter.
3. At the end of the evaluation session, use a written survey form to get the user's opinion and to solicit suggestions, questions, complaints, and comments.
4. Based on the feedback from the users, redesign/reimplement all or some of your program. (This is project 2C.)
5. Re-evaluate as above, with 5 different users.
6. Prepare a report document that includes your record of the user feedback, describes the changes that you made in response to that feedback, and discusses the change in usability as measured by your evaluations.

How will this be graded?

• the completeness and correctness of your human subjects paperwork (15 points toward Project 2B)
• the quality your task descriptions and survey instruments (15 points toward Project 2B)
• the report document and procedures you describe (20 points toward Project 2B)
• completeness and usability of your UI (50 points, Project 2C)
  -- your users will be the TA (Yin Xiong) and/or Eileen Kraemer. We should be able to use each of the features with no special instructions. The features must also be "robust" -- it shouldn't matter what the previous operation was, what direction we drag the mouse in, etc. That is, you should prevent error and anticipate the variety of user interactions that may occur. -- Some people call this making it "idiot-proof" :^)

Other Useful links

• See the Questions and Answers
• See the Submission Instructions for details on how to submit your project.
• Human Subjects paperwork