Usability Testing Essentials: Ready, Set...Test! [Paperback]

Carol M. Barnum (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 5, 2010 | ISBN-10: 012375092X | ISBN-13: 978-0123750921 | Edition: 1

Do you love your mobile phone? Your MP3 player? Your e-book reader? You laptop or tablet PC? There's a reason for that. Usability.

When usability testing is part of the design and development of products, the results are better products that users want and like. You may be doing testing now or want to help your company get started, but you may not have all the tools to know how to properly prepare, test, analyze, and measure the results across a multitude of cultures, generations, and countries. And you may be facing tight budgets and short timeframes for testing. If this is your situation, this essential handbook gives you a variety of options and strategies for testing in numerous situations.

Usability Testing Essentials presents a practical, step-by-step approach to learning the entire process of planning and conducting a usability test. It also explains how to analyze and apply the results and what to do when confronted with budgetary and time restrictions. This is the ideal book for anyone involved in usability or user-centered design-from students to seasoned professionals.

*Provides comprehensive coverage of all phases of usability testing

*Fully updated four color edition features important usability topics such as international testing, persona creation, remote testing, and accessibility

*Follow-up to Usability Testing and Research (9780205315192, Longman, 2002), winner of the highest-level award from the Society for Technical Communication

*Presents a step-by-step approach to the entire process of planning and conducting a usability test--an essential component of designing usable products
*Comprehensive coverage of one of the most important skills necesary for usability and user experience practioners, and the first book of its kind to include international testing
*Follow-up to Usability Testing and Research, which won the highest-level award from the Society for Technical Communication, and is already listed among the most widely recommended books in the field.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Have you been inspired to try usability testing, but not sure exactly how to go about it? Carol Barnum's book will take you step-by-step through all you need to do. Plus, she gives you a solid background in the context and history of testing - and adds a valuable chapter on international testing. Carol is highly regarded as a teacher, an academic, and a practitioner, and all three of her roles shine through in this book" -- Caroline Jarrett, User Experience and Usability Consultant, Effortmark Limited, author of Forms that Work

"Carol Barnum's Usability Testing Essentials delivers just what the title promises. Readers who are new to usability studies will find here all they need to know to design and execute a test, analyze the test data, and provide an effective report with recommendations for clients. But even usability experts will find the book chock full of ideas, insights, and suggestions that will improve their practice and their teaching in this increasingly important area of study. Barnum's expertise on the subject shines through on every page, but the book's greatest strength is its careful attention to analyzing test results, a topic that earlier texts have tended to gloss over much too quickly." -- George Hayhoe, PhD, Mercer University School of Engineering

"Usability Testing Essentials will guide you through both conducting a usability evaluation and making the decisions that will make it a useful and effective part of any user experience project. Carol Barnum places usability evaluation into the larger context of user-centered design.  It is a valuable resource for anyone getting started in usability and a excellent companion to both Letting Go of the Words and Forms that Work."-Whitney Quesenbery, WQusability

"Carol Barnum has done a wonderful job of distilling her research, consulting, and teaching experience into this very lively, practical book on how to do usability testing. You get up-to-date, step-by-step help with lots of variations to suit your own situation. You see each part in action through the running case study. If you have a global market, you'll especially want the chapter on international usability testing. This is a great addition to the usability toolkit. -- Janice (Ginny) Redish, Charter member of the UPA, author of Letting Go of the Words - Writing Web Content that Works

"Carol is a rare breed, both an academic and a practitioner. Her voice of experience comes across clearly, backed by references that illustrate where and who our methods came from. Newcomers to usability testing will find a solid introduction; while those more experienced will find unexpected insights into the field."-Carolyn Snyder, Snyder Consulting

From the Back Cover

"What makes so many products so difficult for the average person to use?"Carol Barnum posits this question in her introduction to this book. Too many perfectly functioning products are being returned because they are not usable. Strong usability testing is the key. But what do we do if under a strict budget and time constraints? How do we properly prepare, test, analyze, and measure across a multitude of cultures, generations, and countries? There are many different testing methods and numerous situations in which to test; however, all are grounded in the same basics of usability testing.

Usability Testing Essentials presents a practical, step-by-step approach to learning the entire process of planning and conducting a usability test. It also explains how to analyze and apply the results and what to do when confronted with budgetary and time restrictions. This is the ideal book for anyone involved in usability or user-centered design-from students to seasoned professionals.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 408 pages
• Publisher: Morgan Kaufmann; 1 edition (November 5, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 012375092X
• ISBN-13: 978-0123750921
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #301,760 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I love it when products work well and hate it when they don't. Back in the early 90's I discovered there was a word for this: usability. And a process for building usability into product development: usability testing.

That's why I wrote my latest book, Usability Testing Essentials: Ready, Set . . . Test! which is not the first book I have written on the subject, but which I hope you will find to be chock full of the latest developments for planning and conducting testing here, there, everywhere . . . in person or remotely. I also hope you find the new book a great read, whether you are just getting started or growing your knowledge of usability testing and your commitment to developing products with usability built in.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good text, awful Kindle presentation, October 28, 2011

By 

Vlad Golovach (Moscow, Russia) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Usability Testing Essentials: Ready, Set...Test (Kindle Edition)

The book is quite good, perfectly on pair with the green and purple ones (Handbook of Usability Testing: Howto Plan, Design, and Conduct Effective Tests and A Practical Guide to Usability Testing respectively, previous best books on the subject). And this book is much more fresh (both green and purple books was published quite a long time ago for IT standarts).

Sadly, publisher (Morgan Kaufmann) did terrible work on converting this book to Kindle. It really looks awful, it is hard to read, images are randomly cropped or displaced. I have yet to see worse designed Kindle book and I have seen alot.

Still, great deal since you can rent it. For such a price it's probably best introductory book for topic of (more or less) serious usability research.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Top-notch guide to usability testing, February 22, 2011

By 

Steve Van Atta - See all my reviews

This review is from: Usability Testing Essentials: Ready, Set...Test! (Paperback)

The author has obviously done (and taught others to do) all three elements of the book's tagline numerous times. Her choice of topics and tone provided a great balance between real-world practicality and hardcore science. Plenty of data-driven examples and tools, how-tos, and an obvious delight in helping the reader prepare for their next usability test. A wonderful reference and in-the-trenches guide.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ux testing from cradle to rave, March 15, 2011

By 

Grimmy "Grimmy" (MD USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Usability Testing Essentials: Ready, Set...Test! (Paperback)

(What's this?)

This book fills a huge gap in usability testing resources. It gives practical, real-world guidance on how to actually perform the gamut of usability testing, from discussion of advantages and disadvantages of different approaches to almost step-by-step suggestions on how to go about it - recruitment, physical setup, planning, preparation, analysis, reporting. Case studies, samples, templates, and questionnaires abound. The issues she discusses in international testing are especially interesting, although not by any means exhaustive - more like pointers to more information, which apparently would be voluminous.

Every budding Ux evaluator/designer should have this book on their shelf.