Questions tagged [methodology]
Different formal and systematic approaches to improving UX and assessing its quality.
108
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Big list of UX techniques
Can anyone point to a big list of UX techniques?
I'd like to build a matrix of those I use, those I don't, along with relative cost estimates.
29
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7
answers
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Avoiding designing by committee
How can one avoid making a design that satisfies everyone, but pleases no one?
As a UI designer, you often find yourself a part of a development team, with numerous stakeholders. Now, when it comes ...
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27
votes
3
answers
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Defining "Instantaneous" as part of usability acceptance criteria
The Setup
I have run into this problem time and time again. An interface is performing slow and QA and/or Engineering come back and ask, "can you please define the acceptance criteria for how fast ...
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16
answers
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Should personal data be asked at the beginning or end of an online survey
Given a 10-step online survey (mostly yes/no radio buttons), where is it best to ask for the users' personal data e.g. name, age, contact details?
My intuition says putting it at the end will yield ...
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21
votes
3
answers
3k
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Best empirical method(s) for determining how to name something?
I'm a UX/UI designer leading the redesign of a web application that serves a primarily technical audience (DevOps professionals).
A primary goal of our redesign is to make the UI more accessible to ...
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19
votes
14
answers
498
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Is user testing a luxury or a necessity?
I understand that you should be thinking of your users all the time but given the current climate where every pound counts, is user testing just for the richer companies? Should you discount your ...
Alan Tucker
17
votes
12
answers
662
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When is automated remote usability testing useful?
There seem to be a fair few services these days offering automated remote usability testing, so I'm assuming there are a fair few people using those services, which implies that they ARE useful - ...
Andrew Merryweather
17
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6
answers
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What does it mean to 'humanise' interfaces?
When people say 'humanise' an interface, what exactly do they mean? Or is there a more formal word to this idea.
The word 'humanise' sounds vague to me. It could mean several ideas if not taken ...
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16
votes
5
answers
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Including users with disabilities in user centered design
Many of the methodologies used in the early phases of user centered design, such as card sorting and paper prototyping, are not accessible to people with disabilities. Anybody have any advice on ...
Andi Snow-Weaver
15
votes
4
answers
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What is UX strategy?
An extremely basic question I realise.
If we use Jesse James Garrett's diagram which is comprised of visual design, navigation design, information design, interaction design, information architecture, ...
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15
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5
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So are there "standards" for UX?
I'm establishing a new UX unit in our organization, and whenever I try to introduce something, I get asked about "standards". You know, questions like "So do you have any standards that you based this ...
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9
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How do you ensure that you've covered the whole site in your work?
I'm a relatively recent practitioner, and although my work's quality is pretty good, I still have one big back-draw (in my opinion): I always miss something or two when making or fixing a web site.
...
Mashhoor
14
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3
answers
4k
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How does Apple manage to deliver its user experience?
It is quite apparent that Apple puts a lot of attention in designing its products. The results are products that deliver great experience.
I want to know what Apple does, as a managerial process or ...
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13
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5
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2k
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What systematic methods there are for designing user interfaces?
I'm writing my Masters thesis about one method for designing user interfaces (GUIDe+GDD from Sari Laakso) and I would like to know what other systematic methods there are for UI design/interaction ...
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12
votes
6
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How did multi-touch interfaces become natural when it should have been unnatural?
After stumbling on a webpage that rants about the fallacy of "picture under glass", I began to wonder what was it that made multi-touch interfaces seemingly become so natural to all of us today?
We ...
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4
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Is user centered design only about hygiene factors?
There is one thing that bothers me about UX-design. One of the shortcomings of a user centered design approach, is that it only focuses on existing needs and not on new revolutionary ideas. For ...
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12
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3
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Should I ask for demographic information in a survey at the end or beginning? [duplicate]
I'm conducting a survey, and will ask for demographic information, e.g., gender, age, level of education, frequency of computer use. Should I ask users for this information at the beginning of the ...
- 603
12
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4
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What is the difference between "Task Analysis" and "User Journey"?
I been recently reading about User Journey - as a Methodology to capture how user would use a website or interface - a journey as such broadly. But is it synonymous to "Task Analysis" - because both ...
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11
votes
4
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686
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How to set up an observation room
I'm going to do user testing (usability testing, like Steve Krug does).
I want :
my co-workers to listen/watch the test live, while I'm doing it, in a
seperate room.
to record the screen and users' ...
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11
votes
1
answer
4k
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Are there any project methodologies for UI Design?
For my graduation assignment I'm going to design a completely new UI for my company's software. One of the requirements my university imposes is that the entire process be based on a project ...
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10
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2
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How do you test phrasing of labels, links, and descriptive text?
At my workplace, an academic library, we often have extended conflicts over exactly how to phrase labels, links, and descriptive text.
For example, one link on our home page goes to a list of topics, ...
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8
answers
4k
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How to measure self reported computer proficiency? Ideally with one item
For a usability test, I'd like to have a simple measure for computer proficiency, to be able to see, whether it has an impact on successfully handling the tasks.
How can we best measure that?
A ...
- 1,059
9
votes
4
answers
636
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Shouldn't UX be Lean and Agile inherently?
People describe different types of UX such as Agile UX and Lean UX. Looking at the Agile manifesto and Lean methodology, it would seem to me that a successful implementation of UX processes would ...
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How to document user interviews
What are the best practices to document interviews with users - do you just document the conclusions and take aways or do you do a full transcript or both?
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4
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How to convince stakeholders to invest in proper UX?
I'm working on a web app with a team of 5, including me. One database administrator, one project manager, two programmers and me the front-end designer. This project is an internal reporting system.
...
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7
votes
5
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What other UX processes exist other than user centered design?
What other well known processes or approaches for creating an user experience (such as an app or website) exist except the user centered design approach and what are their strengths and weaknesses?
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4
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Should an interaction designer know how to do visual design
So, we have the long discussion about if interaction designers should know how to code. But what about visual design or GUI design?
A common team setup seems to pair a IxD guy with a graphic ...
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7
votes
4
answers
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Exact difference between User Centered Design and Consumer Centered Design?
Would like to know what differentiates consumer centered design from other design approaches eg. user centered design. What are the additional key elements that need to be addressed. Would be ...
- 151
7
votes
4
answers
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Building an archive of insights into our users
As UX Designers & Researchers we collect all this knowledge along the way, most of which is tied to specific projects. The crux though is that the insights can be highly relevant to later projects ...
- 171
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votes
5
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How do you know when an interface is complete?
Meaning that a usability test measures if an interface meets the goals it sets, but only test what is present. How do I know when an interface is complete? Meaning a test, or measure of completeness, ...
- 1,261
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3
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What is the usual way to specify a GUI?
What is the typical or most effective way to specify the design decisions and interaction patterns of a specific application's GUI?
I began to realize I do not really know what the parts of a precise ...
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1
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UX Design Processes - Differences between user stories / task Models / Use Cases etc
I'm getting really confused with the differences between some of these UX design processes. There seems to be so many methods that seem very similar (to me) and descriptions about each process all ...
- 163
6
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2
answers
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User Testing Exercise for Feature Prioritization
I am planning to run some one-to-one think aloud task based usability tests on a wireframe prototype. At the end of the test I would like to ask the users to take part in an easy exercise (something ...
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2
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Nonparametric vs. Parametric tests
I work as a UX Researcher for a mobile gaming company.
We're discussing best practices in analysis, and my colleague suggested that we always use nonparametric tests (e.g., Mann-Whitney U rather than ...
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5
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4
answers
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what question should be asked to make a persona
I am currently designing an interview plan in order to make a persona for our products(an ERP software, already online).
So here is the outline of the questions that i want to asked:
know your user (...
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5
votes
3
answers
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Wireframes first or after rough visual design sketches?
This is how I usually work:
After completed business and user requirements gathering I have a brainstorming session together with the project group to come up with big, high-level ideas about the ...
- 7,324
5
votes
2
answers
611
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How to validate large-scale IA without skewing data? Crowd-sourced techniques?
I am pitching for a job that requires validation of the information architecture of a very large health and social care website of around 6500 pages.
Here is my approach:
Analyse existing research: ...
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5
votes
3
answers
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How does the d.school's framework for Design Thinking map onto IDEO's?
Here's how I'm thinking about these DT models.
The Stanford d.school describes the Design Thinking method in (5) steps: Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, and Test. IDEO describes it in (3) modes ...
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2
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What is a simple way to explain the disciplines and benefits of UX to a client?
What is the clearest way to explain to a client the disciplines and benefits of User Experience Design?
What I've got so far...
This is the clearest definition of the disciplines I've seen, but it ...
- 1,712
5
votes
2
answers
2k
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How to group users into personas
I'm freaking out! I've read more articles about personas than I can remember but there is one thing I can't seem to understand. And that is how do you group users into personas?
What methods and ...
- 7,324
5
votes
2
answers
757
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UXD Methodology - Best practices for identifying a Global Navigation Toolbar implementation
I am part of a large webapp project, but a small UX team (we just went from 1 to 2, a few weeks ago). We were brought in terribly late in the process, to the point where there was literally no chance ...
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5
votes
1
answer
489
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Requirement gathering in absence of user involvement?
In typical UCD we begin requirements with methods that enable us to capture the wants and needs and get a fair idea about the user's mental model. Which helps us in developing the requirements for the ...
- 176
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votes
3
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What is a good method/formula for estimating how much time a usability test will require?
I was setting up a usability test at my office where we have never done much formal usability testing. One of management's first questions was, "How long will this take?" I didn't have a good answer ...
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5
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2
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How do you mitigate internal/external validity issues resulting from user assignment difficulties associated with online A/B testing?
It's reasonably safe to say that it's not possible to track a website's users accurately. You can't track users accurately with cookies, because cookies are frequently cleared; you can't be confident ...
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1
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methods for evaluating a complex information architecture
I have been asked to evaluate a clients proposed IA based. The IA is only in excel and we have no wireframes or mockups to test.
The most obvious method would be a card sort but due to the sheer ...
- 8,260
4
votes
4
answers
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Methodology to determine ideal feature mix?
Aiming for a New Target: The Perfectly Featured Product presents an argument against featuritis (and provides some explanations as to how those situations arise).
The author (John Devanney) suggests ...
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4
votes
4
answers
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Is asking 'balanced' leading questions the right way during user interviews?
It sounds a little bit counter-intuitive, but I am wondering if we actually lose a lot of the information that we might otherwise intend on finding out or capturing by not asking more direct or '...
- 27.5k
4
votes
1
answer
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What is the Design Sprints methodology?
I have started to notice people talking about this new fast method of coming up with a product/UX design called "Design Sprint".
Can anyone elaborate on what it is?
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4
votes
5
answers
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Are there good practices to verbally describe the animations in your site before coding starts?
Is there a process, tool, prefered method to describe css animations, forwards and backwards, before you start coding them? I lose a lot of time describing the animations and/or picking up feedback ...
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1
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Counting Clicks vs. Path Deviations
We're developing some metrics for upcoming usability testing. Our previous practice has been to count the number of clicks required to complete a task. This works relatively well but users that enjoy ...
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