Ever since publication, A Practical Guide to Usability Testing has maintained its position as the premier text in the field. This revised edition preserves the straightforward approach of the original, and an extended preface brings it up to date with all recent developments.
Written in plain English and filled with examples, the book begins by defining usability and explaining methods of usability engineering. Readers are taken through all the steps for planning and conducting a usability test, analysing data, and using the results to improve both products and processes. Included are forms that can be used or modified to conduct a usability test, and layouts of existing labs that will help readers to build their own.
Designed for readers-
considering introducing introducing usability into their product design process; who are product designers, software engineers, or documentation specialists, trying to make their products more usable; incorporating usability into a course on human factors, human-computer interaction, or document design.
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 4.5 / 5.0
Dumas was a lousy usability professor in my MS program:
I had Dumas (one of the authors) for a Testing & Analysis master level class at Bentley College (the semester before he retired; I wish I could have waited, so I actually would have gotten something for my 3000+). He was a horrible teacher, the worst in the program. Reminded me of Ferris Bueller's "Anyone, anyone?". I thought this book was redundant and not very helpful. If you already have QA experience, you'll probably find this book a waste of money. It's out of respect for Hackos' work that I'm not... more info
Great First Book or Referesher for any Usability Engineer:
These folks know usability testing; they have a lot of experience with a wide variety of systems. Their backgrounds in linguistics and in psychology inform their process making it a highly effective and very user-centered process. This book is easy to follow and comprehensive. A great first read or refresher for any usability engineer.
A Practical Guide to Usability Testing:
This book is real thorough, right up to the point of listing suitable topics for small talk with your test subjects :-) If you are doing guerrilla usability testing, most of the forms and checklists in this book may be overkill, but there is still a lot of useful information... I appreciated a lot that statements are in general backed up with literature, not just common sense reasoning. The only drawback of this book is that it feels a bit dated (i.e. pre-Web). It does seem to have been revised and puts... more info
A classic:
This is a classic in the field, written by two highly-respected usability specialists. I was fortunate to read it as one of the textbooks in a class on usability testing taught by Dr. Dumas. It is a very practical book, covering planning, testing, and reporting the results. The strengths and weaknesses of usability testing are discussed, and there is some information about other usability evaluation methods and basic design principles.
This is a republication, with only slight changes, of the 1993... more info
