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Why?

Detect problems users have with your solution and correct them before the system goes live.

How?

You can use a paper or electronic prototype of your solution to test your application in an early stage. Later, you can use your actual solution and test things like interface, performance and how a user executes a typical task. Users are usually asked to think aloud, but you can also get results from automatic measurement tools (e.g. timers, eye trackers, mouse movement tracking and text logging).

Ingredients

• A prototype (paper or electronic).
• A quiet room with the user.
• Tools for automatically gathering data (may be embedded in your solution).
• Video or audio recording equipment.

In practice

Because a complete system cannot be tested far before its release, companies typically test parts or early versions in earlier stages, so there is still time to fix things as needed.

Phase(s) of use

In the following project phase(s) usability testing can be used:

• Realisation