A Primer on A/B Testing. Data is an invaluable tool for web designers who are making decisions about the user experience. A/B tests, or split tests, are one of the easiest ways to measure the effect of different design, content, or functionality. A/B tests allow you to create high-performing user experience elements that you can implement across your site. Article Continues Below But it’s important to make sure you reach statistically significant results and avoid red herrings.
What is an A/B test? In an A/B test, you compare two versions of a page element for a length of time to see which performs better. Split testing can also help when you’re making drastic design changes that need to be tempered, such as a homepage redesign. Results of A/B tests have lasting impact. Data also plays very well with decision-makers who are not designers.
Decide what to test#section3 First, you need to decide which page element you would like to test. Implement your test#section4 On version B I would use: A/B test examples#section6. Quick and Dirty Remote User Testing. Although more web people have basic design training nowadays, many are still unfamiliar with how to conduct user research, which is an important part of the design process. Fortunately, the internet makes it easy to get direct feedback from real users with quick, cheap, guerilla-style usability testing. Using some of the new web applications popping up, you can effectively do remote user research—that is, user research conducted over the phone and your computer. As Dana Chisnell points out, usability testing only takes a few steps, and it’s easy to do remote testing with minimal cost and preparation time. Article Continues Below There are three basic approaches to conducting quick remote interface tests, whether you’re testing live websites, designs, wireframes, or prototypes.
The approach you take will depend mostly on how you feel about people—do you want to talk to users face-to-face, or use one of the many new UX tools and let computers gather the information automatically? Articles & Slides – Older Adults - Redish and Associates. Reports of studies funded by AARP AARP Audience-Centered Heuristics: Older Adults .
(pdf, 106 Kb) Twenty heuristics, each with several questions, from the following two studies. Other publications from the AARP studies Chisnell, D., Redish, J. C., Lee, A. 2006, New Heuristics for Understanding Older Adults as Web Users Technical Communication , 53 (1), February, 39-59. Chisnell, D. and Redish, J. Other articles originally on the AARP site, olderwiserwired Tullis, T., 2003, Eight Lesson Learned and Design Implications . Other useful resources on older adults Arch, A., Abou-Zahra, S., and Henry, S. Chadwick-Dias, A., McNulty, M., and Tullis, T., 2003, Web Usability and Age: How Design Changes Can Improve Performance, Proceedings of CUU '03, ACM Digital Library. Chadwick-Dias, A., Tedesco, D., and Tullis, T., 2004, Older Adults and Web Usability: Is Web Experience the Same as Web Expertise?
Gazzaley, A., 2009, The Aging Brain , User Experience , 8(1), 10-13. Gregor, P., Newell, A. UPA User Experience Magazine: Volume 8, Issue 1, 2009. User Experience Magazine: Volume 8, Issue 1, 2009 Feature Articles: Usability and Older Adults What Do We Know about Older Users? How Old is Old? By Nancy Frishberg Full text - members only (PDF 352Kb) We ask the question, “What do we know about older users?” The Aging Brain: At the Crossroads of Attention and Memory By Adam Gazzaley, M.D., Ph.D. (PDF 376Kb) We’re all aware that the population is aging. Our expectations of aging have also changed. Design for the Aging Brain (Commentary of Dr. (PDF 340Kb) Aging is accompanied by a complex set of physical and mental changes. This brings us to the burgeoning field of cognitive neuroscience and the work of Dr. Dr. Conducting Field Studies with Older Users: Lessons for Recruiting and Testing Older Users By Kris Engdahl, Kristen Leclerc, and Beth Loring (PDF 416Kb) Conducting research with older adults poses unique challenges for user experience practitioners, both in recruiting and interacting with participants.
(PDF 360Kb) (PDF 280Kb) (PDF 332Kb) 17 Web Resources for Improving Your Design Skills. 508 Tutorials, Guidance, Checklists. WebAIM Section 508 Checklist. You are here: Home > Articles > Section 508 Checklist Part 1: HTML The following standards are excerpted from Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, §1194.22. The pass/fail criteria in this document represent an interpretation of Section 508 web standards. This checklist is NOT official Section 508 documentation. For the full text of Section 508, please see the official government 508 web site.
Note 1: Until the longdesc attribute is better supported, it is best to use it in conjunction with a standard link to a longer description. Note 2: Standalone media players are usually more accessible than embedded media players. Note 3: A PDF file can be made accessible to screen reader users, but it may be best to include an accessible HTML version of a document instead of or in addition to PDF. Part 2: Scripts, Plug-ins, Java, etc. 5 Tips for Aspiring Web App Developers. So, you're not content with just using the social web; you want to be part of building it, too. As a budding or beginning web app developer, you've got a difficult but rewarding path ahead of you. You have to master (or at least attempt to master) the intricacies of OOP and scripting languages, learn to build web apps the hard way (practice, practice, practice), and network your way into a few job opportunities. You must also decide whether you'd like to work as a solo/consultant/freelancer, a startup employee or founder, or a rank-and-file developer at an established company.
Here are a few tips and words of advice that might make your individual path a bit easier and hopefully a bit shorter. We've also compiled a gallery of 140-character tips from veterans at the end of this post. If you've already found success as a front-end web dev, we welcome your suggestions in the comments, as well. 1. 2. "Fish where the fish are" is an old advertising axiom. 3. 4. 5. Development Job Listings. In Defense of Readers. The best readers are obstinate. They possess a nearly inexhaustible persistence that drives them to read, regardless of the circumstances they find themselves in. I’ve seen a reader absorbed in Don Quixote while seated at a noisy bar; I’ve witnessed the quintessential New York reader walk the streets with a book in hand; of late I’ve seen many a reader devour books on their iPhone (including one who confessed to reading the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy while scrolling with his thumb).
And millions of us read newspapers, magazines, and blogs on our screens every day—claims that no one reads anymore notwithstanding. Article Continues Below What each of these readers has in common is an ability to create solitude under circumstances that would seem to prohibit it. Reading is a necessarily solitary experience, like dying, everyone reads alone, but over the centuries readers have learned how to cultivate that solitude, how to grow it in the least hospitable environments. How to Best Market Your Web Site Relaunch. The Freakonomics Guide to Making Boring Content Sexy.