WEB USABILITY TESTING

Christian Osterbauer (Christian.Osterbauer@blackbox.net), Monika Köhle (monika@ifs.tuwien.ac.at), Thomas Grechenig (grechenig@viveka.tuwien.ac.at), Vienna University of Technology, Institute for Software Technology, Favoritenstr.11/188, A-1040 Vienna, Austria

Manfred Tscheligi (mt@ani.univie.ac.at), Vienna University, Institute of Computer Science and Business Informatics, Lenaug.2, A-1080 Vienna, Austria

Keywords

usability, web usability, usability testing, design mistakes, scenario-based testing

Abstract

In this paper we argue in favor of usability considerations and usability testing in general and in the case of the WWW in particular. Based on related work in the field of WWW usability testing, we present a usability evaluation of selected Austrian web sites of the three areas of industry: banks, daily newspapers, and insurances. Accordingly, methods like scenario-based testing were applied in this empirical web usability study. We present the results for the two criteria, navigation and graphics, and reveal general tendencies.