Heuristic Evaluation of the Tele-Bears Redesign Project

Erick Herrarte

 

1

[H1 Simple & Natural Dialog] (Severity 2)
  In the search tool in both the registration and sandbox areas, it is not clear if the search for courses is an ‘OR’ or an ‘AND’ type of search. Does it do a search that returns only the items that match the fields specified? or Does it do a search that returns elements that match some of the fields specified? What results does it return on when searching on Mathematics department as well as filling out the ‘course number’ field that does not match the department? One approach is to make one of the pulldowns required.
 
2

[H4 Consistency] (Severity 2)
  While in the sandbox and following the steps in task scenario one, the add button for adding the Math course has the caption ‘Add’ while the add button for adding the History course has the caption ‘Add to sandbox’. The button should have a consistent caption either ‘add’ or ‘add sandbox’. This consistency should also be kept across the website
   
3

[H4 Consistency] (Severity 4)
  While in the sandbox, the initial screen has only three of the buttons (drop, switch section, view course info) on the right side of the schedule. These buttons are disabled. After selection a course to add to the schedule two buttons appear (Change grade option, change units) and they are also disabled. For consistency and in order to minimize the user’s memory load, the buttons should always appear and the order should be kept the same in order for the buttons to appear in the same location.
   
4 [H4 Consistency] (Severity 1)
  In the search results page, the items searched for had the categories all in bold type. After selecting a course and clicking on add, the resulting page does not follow that same format. The filed names like Instructor, Location, etc are not in bold type
   
5 [H4: Consistency] (Severity 3)
  Multiple entries of the same course into both the sandbox and registration areas. When registering for a course in the registraton area by selecting a course from the list of courses from the sandbox, the sandbox area needs to be updated reflecting that the user is registered for that course.
 

6 [H5 Feedback] (Severity 3)
  After adding a course on the registration tab from the list of courses on the sandbox, there is no feedback regarding that the course on the sandbox was added. The course is added to the schedule but it looks the same on the list of courses from the sandbox area. This could cause confusion by letting the user think they can add the same course and section again. The course listing for sandbox courses should relfect that the course was added to the registration schedule. The add button next to the list of courses from the sandbox is deceiving. It suggests that the Math course just added can be added again. Should the user be allowed to add this course and a different section again?
 

7 [H6 Clearly marked exits] (Severity 2)
  After completing the search results and selecting a course from the results, the next screen displays the course selected as well as the sections to select from. The ‘Cancel’ button is confusing. It is not clear if the cancel is canceling the add or if it will cancel the search. If it is canceling the add then there should be an exit from the search. A ‘new search’ button along with the ‘add’ and ‘cancel’ butons would allow the user to go exit the process of registering.
   
8 [H9 Prevent Errors] (Severity 2)
  When we try to do a search for a course in either the sandbox or registration areas, it is not clear if the user can select anything or nothing. There is no required field nor is it clear that the user needs to select at least one field. The directions on top are not highlighted and so confusion can occur. More that describe the search functionality. The search tool should not rely on the text. Can we search on all the classes? What are the required fields?
   
9 [H9 Prevent Errors] (Severity 2)
  After displaying the search results, the results are displayed. Each result is selectable via a radio button dialogue and group as one group of radio buttons. However, there is no initial selection of a search result. So either the add button should be disabled until a selection is made (that is probably error prone and not natural with the use of radio buttons) or one of the radio button search results should be preselected or the radio buttons should be radion boxes and none selected. This seems to appear across some of radio button sections.