HdMore App
As part of the lecture Usability Engineering, we created a new version of our university app. We went through many steps of designing an interactive application in a user-centered process.
My role
In this project, we worked out the questionnaires and users tests together. However, I was solely responsible for creating prototypes to test them on users. We built a low fidelity and a functional prototype.
Interview & Cases
To get to know the future user better, we created a manuscript for an interview. After interviewing with several users, we summarized the results of the interviews in bullet points and structured them along the categories WHO, HOW, WHAT. We wrote each of those bullet points on a Post-it. We grouped the Post-its to find out what was necessary for the user. Based on the results of the interviews, we created several use cases and represented these as a hierarchical task model.
Open card sorting
After writing down the task models, we prepared an open card-sort study on the web platform OptimalSort. We added our functions as actions/tasks to the study, drafted a text for the introduction and drafted a conclusion text. After having the results of at least ten persons, we started with the analysis. The goal for us was to derive an optimal navigation structure from the card sorting.
Low Fidelity Prototype
With the navigation Architecture that resulted from the card sorting, we started to design a low fidelity prototype. We used MyBalsamiq for this task.
Cognitive Walkthrough
In one of the lectures, we conducted a Cognitive Walkthrough (CWT) for our app. Our fellow students inspected our prototype on usability problems. After the course, we summarized the results of the CWT and improved our prototype
the issues we found:
1. The function "scripts" in the tab bar only shows the downloaded scripts. Several users, when asked to download a specific script clicked on the icon in the tab bar. To solve this problem, we changed the script feature into a list with a segmented control navigation bar above where the user can switch between all scripts, downloaded scripts or recently added scripts.
2. Before the user test, we only had a weekly overview of the calendar. After asking the users what kind of overview they would prefer for the calendar: month, week or day, the answers were different. Based on this insight we decided to create a feature where you can personalize your overview (in the settings).
Functional Prototype
Based on our low fidelity prototype and the suggested improvements, we implemented an interactive high fidelity prototype. We implemented this prototype in Axure. As the color of the HdM is red, we kept this color scheme for the app.
