Laurie Lee Moses's List: Usability

• action research into user-centered Web site redesign processes
• the impact of user-based design principles on organizational politics
• focusing on novice users
• overarching goal of the redesign: to focus on the end-user.
• The redesign team did not personally pass judgment on staff feedback but submitted it directly to user testing.
• user surveys, interviews, focus groups, think-aloud protocols, card-sorting, prototyping, server-log analysis, and formal usability testing.
• User preferences almost universally reported in these case studies include a desire for small chunks of information, consistent navigation, standard link attributes, and a single search box. Common findings are that users are often confused by library terminology, assume a single search box will search everything, and do not read screen text.
• small cycles of testing, modification, and retesting
• six core user profiles (see Figure 2): researchers; faculty; general information and novice users; off-campus users, including medical school affiliates; external relationships, including alumni and donors; and library staff.
• Research shows the current generation of undergraduates is more likely to initially turn to Google and other easy-to-use sites than the library for their information and research needs.²¹ We decided to focus on undergraduates, who are generally novices with underdeveloped information-seeking skills and general research needs. We determined that initially addressing this group's needs would have the greatest impact across all groups by creating a site that was accessible, attractive, and easy to use.
• First, it is difficult to generalize users into a set of single user preferences.
• students want easy access to the best tool for the job at hand. They want to know how and where to find things.
• adding a “how-to” guide on the homepage
• frequently used links, such as the library catalog, Brown's collection of electronic resources, and library hours, were difficult to find, and core services, such as the availability of subject librarians, were virtually invisible to users.
• Student interest in the idea of course pages and their surprise that a librarian knew about their subject area suggest a need to market library course-resource guides better.
• relabelling of elements requires additional testing
• allow users to select their top resources to appear on a personalized homepage, cross-search different types of resources at once (Web site, journal articles, books), and add functionality to the FAQs such as an I-don't-see-what-I-want link that would search the FAQs. Users also suggested that they would like to be able to compile a list of books and e-resources, similar to Amazon's “Wish List” feature. They wanted more visible news and announcements and requested we add more graphics to the site.

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• Permitting paper sources to be overshadowed by electronic ones does a tremendous disservice to all disciplines, in particular the social sciences and humanities. Content and quality, not format, should be the determining factor for inclusion in any library resource system.
• After two years of offering electronic reserves, the University of Rochester Libraries decided to remove e-reserve materials out of the course reserves module in Voyager, the Libraries' catalog, and instead link the material from a digitized copy of the professor's syllabus. The expectation is that by accessing the reserve materials by way of the professor's syllabus, students will experience less confusion identifying the correct reserve readings for each assignment. Moving e-reserves from the generic catalog to course specific syllabi meant that the Libraries' redesigned website would have to include the ability to navigate to course-specific webpages. This led librarians to explore other course-related materials they could provide to students.
• In essence, a relational database of "best library resources" and course offerings was created. A library resource could be a book or journal in paper or electronic form, an article database, an article index, a website, a multimedia item or a librarian.
• Once a CoURse Resources page is created, the subject specialist often invites comments from the professor of the course. This has greatly increased the dialog between faculty and librarians, which in turn has led to other faculty/librarian initiatives. Moreover, through the process of preparing the pages, the subject specialist develops an even greater awareness and understanding of the courses being taught and course materials used in his/her respective departments.
• we see the library becoming more deeply engaged in the fundamental mission of the academic institution — i.e., the creation and dissemination of knowledge — in ways that represent the library's contribution more broadly and intertwine the library with the other stakeholders in these activities. The library becomes a collaborator within the academy, yet retains its distinct identity.
• continued refinement of vocabulary used on the page and checked to ensure that the core items students want were indeed prominently displayed on the screen.

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