6.831 User Interface Design & Implementation
Fall 2004
HW2: Heuristic Evaluation
Due 1:00 pm, Wed November 10, by email
In this individual assignment,
you will do heuristic evaluation on two computer prototypes developed
by your classmates.
You will receive your two assignments by email. The email will
include the GR4 report for each project, which will give you
instructions for running the prototype and background information about
the project. This is not an anonymous evaluation, so feel free to
contact a project group directly if you need more information than you
were given.
As soon as you receive your prototype
assignments, try to download and run both prototypes. You
don't have to do your heuristic evaluation right away, but poke around
a bit and make sure the prototypes appear to work. If you have
any difficulty getting a prototype to run or finding a suitable
platform to run it, send email to the people who created it, and cc:
Prof. Miller and Min Wu on your email. Do
this trial run by Friday, November 5. We need to get
logistical problems out of the way as early as possible, since
everybody else is going to be working on heuristic evaluations too.
Follow the heuristic evaluation procedure to evaluate both interfaces
carefully. Make a numbered list of usability problems and
successes you find. For
each problem or positive comment, you
should:
- describe the problem or positive feature
- identify the relevant usability heuristics (from Nielsen's
Ten Usability Heuristics, or any other guidelines we've discussed
in class)
- estimate its severity (for problems, use cosmetic, minor, major,
or
catastrophic; for positive comments, just say good)
You aren't required to recommend solutions for the problems, but any
ideas you have
would no doubt be appreciated.
Be thorough. You should
have at least 20 useful comments (positive or negative) about each
interface that you evaluate.
Write your reports in a readable style. The usability of your
report to its recipients will matter in your grade. In
particular, don't bury the problems you found in reams of free-flowing
prose. Where
possible, include screenshots to
illustrate the problems you found. In general, make your report easy to
read and understand.
What to Hand In
By 1:00 pm on Wednesday,
November 10, you should hand in two
reports, one for each interface you evaluated. Each report should
be a separate Postscript or PDF file,
so that we can distribute them electronically to the appropriate
groups. You can attach both reports to the same email message.
Your reports wil be graded by us. We will also forward copies of
each report (without our grading feedback) to the appropriate group.
Send your reports by email to rcm+handin@graphics.csail.mit.edu.