Web Site Usability Handbook (Internet Series) (Paperback)

by Mark Pearrow (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
The Web Site Usability Handbook is for individuals who evaluate and improve the usability of Web sites. It does not, as the title might imply, specifically show Web developers how to make their sites more usable.

The book explores the growing field of Web usability, with equal emphasis on theory and practicality, and focuses primarily on measuring usability accurately and applying it to formal and informal testing. The concept of a usability toolbox--a collection of tools and techniques--is presented, along with sound reasoning for the use of each component. The tools vary from index-card sorting to heuristic evaluation to focus groups. There is some fascinating material also about the human factors of usability, such as the mechanics of vision and the idiosyncrasies of human memory.

A chapter that's devoted to design guidelines includes some concrete suggestions, such as "don't overuse emphasis" and "make printer-friendly pages." This chapter contains no revolutionary ideas; instead, it's a helpful list of pointers that are worth revisiting from time to time. More elemental are the 10 usability heuristics that are presented in the next chapter and that were developed originally by usability guru Jakob Nielsen. These high-level concepts demand careful consideration, but can produce impressive results.

The Web Site Usability Handbook presents the framework for a usability lab complete with video observation, and shows how to conduct objective usability testing. Many organizations skip the potentially critical development step of usability analysis; however, if yours wants to be more forward-looking in Web strategy, this is a good guide for getting it started in usability. --Stephen W Plain

Topics covered:

• User-centered design
• Usability tools
• Human-factors psychology
• Sensation and perception
• Design guidelines
• Heuristic evaluation
• Usability lab setup
• Usability testing
• Web accessibility
• Usability statistic analysis

Product Description
Does your company Web site convey your message effectively? Are your customers finding what they need easily? Determining these factors is a difficult task that has challenged Usability professionals since the first Web page was posted.

Company Web sites aren't optional in today's highly competitive business environment and ensuring that your investment on the Web is well spent, is a challenge facing all levels of Web professionals. With the hands-on guidance and examples provided in this book, readers will find practical tools to make certain that their site is as effective and user-friendly as possible. They'll learn to create sites that are free from navigation "dead ends", difficult to use interfaces, and other barriers to usability.

All of the principals of User Centered Design (UCD) are covered along with Critical Human Factors, and guidelines for implementing a test plan. Examples of Usability issues and how they are dealt with are covered through a case stdy focused on an existing site. As new techniques and tools are introduced, the team of usability specialists will detail how they implement these new tools as they work through the evaluation, testing, and transformation stages.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 350 pages
• Publisher: Charles River Media; 1st edition (July 15, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1584500263
• ISBN-13: 978-1584500261
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.9 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,410,153 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Needed Resource, July 31, 2000

By	Scott Standridge (Fayetteville, AR) - See all my reviews

Many websites you surf into these days seem less than user-unfriendly--they seem openly user-hostile. If more web site designers made themselves more knowledgeable about usability in their design, everyone would benefit.

This book is a great introduction to web site usability. I've been interested in learning more about this subject but haven't been able to find a book (other than Jakob Nielsen's recent work) that puts all the pieces together. This book does that. The parts I found most useful were the chapter on "usability tools" and the chapters on heuristic evaluation and classical usability testing. The chapters on statistics and research design were a little on the elementary side for anyone with research or statistical background, but I can see how someone new to the topic could benefit.

The author has rather a strange sense of humor, but this keeps the material interesting--and let's face it, without a sense of humor this is pretty dry stuff. It's refreshing to read someone willing to crack a smile or give the reader a wink in such a usually arid subject. I highly recommend Pearrow's book to both novice and intermediate web site designers.

32 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Very Practical, Useful and Usable Book, August 30, 2000

By	George M. Donahue (Atlanta, GA USA) - See all my reviews

Though it's probably most helpful for newcomers to usability (I refuse to say "user experience"), this little gem of a handbook may also be quite helpful to more experienced u-pros, in that it provides a very approachable, clear and cogent discussion of usability, common usability techniques, how and when to apply them, etc., that could be shared with non-usability colleagues (or quoted from) to educate them about usability. It's greatest strength is its practicality. I wish I'd had this book four years ago. Although I don't agree with every point Pearrow makes, my hat's off to him for the contribution he's made to the field. If you only recommend one usability book this year, this is the one.

29 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars More then I expected, September 1, 2000

By A Customer

I had ordered this book a few months before I took my new job. My second day at work I was told that I was in charge of organizing the Heuristic Evaluation for a new product being developed. Since I had never even heard of a Heuristic Evaluation I was beginning to stress. I came home that very same night to find that my new book had been delivered. As I was flipping the pages I stumbled upon the chapter on performing Heuristic Evaluation. This was a godsend. The book saved me a lot of worry and stress. Since then I have refereed to almost every chapter in the book to help me with many different projects. If you are looking for something that is easy to read and explains the principles usability and usability testing then I highly recommend this book.