Usability Analysis of a Client Knowlege Portal

Usability Analysis of a Client Knowledge Portal (2 of 7)

CONTENTS
Introduction
Expert review
Task analysis
Usability testing results
Survey results
Appendix A
Appendix B

EXPERT REVIEW
The following is an expert review of the Knowledge Portal, which is focused on the usability of the site. The review is based on the author’s knowledge of established usability principles as well as insight gained through observing users interacting with the site.

The review is broken down into the following:

general recommendations that are relevant for all pages
specific recommendations that are concerned with particular pages of the site
a wish list of features, which are desirable for future releases. This was developed primarily based on user feedback.
a list of bugs, which need to be addressed.

Recommendations are broken down into high priority (i.e. usability catastrophe or major usability problem) and low priority (i.e. minor usability problem or cosmetic problem).

While the main focus of this review is to improve the KNOWLEDGE PORTAL site, the author would like to acknowledge the amount of great work and thought that has been put into the site.

General recommendations
High priority

Site navigation needs to be improved. A row of buttons should appear at the top of every page (above the “breadcrumbs” and underneath the top navigation menu) except home with one linking to each channel. This will eliminate the need to go back to home in order to move from one channel to the next. When a user is on the Marketing page, for example, that button should be a different color or should be underlined.
If possible, these buttons should also appear at the bottom of the page in addition to a link to home. They should only appear when the page is long and needs to be scrolled through.
When the user accesses a particular tool, he should immediately see a brief description of the tool so he understands how to use the tool without going to help.
The user should be taken automatically to the login page when he times out with a message at the top indicating that he needs to log in again.
There are often buttons, which appear in a different location on different pages. As much as possible, buttons need to be placed consistently throughout the site.
Pages displaying error messages currently do not have the top navigation menu. This makes the page seem inconsistent and only gives the user one option in terms of where to go next. The navigation menu should appear on every page.
The number of clicks required to access information within channels needs to be reduced. The main marketing could be redesigned so that the second tier of the architecture appears on the first level as follows:

General marketing

Branding
Partners
Research

Internal Communication

The buzz

Client Collateral

Fonts
Logos
Other collateral
Presentations
Word templates

Similarly, in order to reduce navigation by one click the main Projects page could be redesigned so that it appears as follows:

Clients

0-9
A-F
G-M
N-R
S-Z

Line of business

Digital branding and user experience design

Also in order to reduce the number of clicks, both search output and document listings within channels should give the user the option to open the document or to view file details. To force the user to view the file details every time prior to opening the document is unnecessary. Two buttons next to the file name, one, which says “view details”, and one, which says “view document” would suffice.

Low priority

In as many locations as is possible, the user should be able to hit the return button instead of having to use the mouse.
The cursor should automatically appear in the name window on the login page and the user should be able to select login via the return button.
There should be a general list of stewards and their areas of expertise and/or within the appropriate channel the steward should be introduced along with an email address.
The navigation bar has patches of blue, which appear on some computers.
The green buttons could be made smaller so they take up less room.
The links on the upper navigation menu should not link back to themselves. If a user is on the people search page, the people link should not be active and if he is on the home page, the link to home should be active. This is also a web standard.
Logout would be useful if two people share one computer.
There should be a push for people filling out at least their contact information in their profile. Client executives in particular should be encouraged to fill out their profile information so that employees will have access to this important information.
An error message that appears when there is no content in an area of the site is “No content in this program.” This terminology is not meaningful to the user. “There are currently no documents in this section of the site” would be more comprehensible.
The text on channel pages is not well aligned. It is often too far to the right of the page and sometimes the font is very small.
When a document is opened sometimes a third window opens and when the document is closed this window remains and must be closed to return to the site.

Home page
High priority

A document management section on the home page is necessary because this is one of the primary focuses of the site. The section should have direct links to the following: How to publish documents (to be written), Manage my documents (currently under development), Publish a file, and Publish rich text
There should be a section on home called “Discussion groups” with a link to Discussion group index and Search discussion groups

Low priority

The “more” symbol on the home page should appear at the bottom right of each section instead of at the top right.
The stock price should appear at the top of the home page so it is easily accessed.
The Knowledge Portal icon should link back to Knowledge Portal home because this is a web standard.

Tools
High priority

When the icons are selected the user is taken back to the “your session has ended” page.
Change password should also be an option in my profile because this is where users logically think they will find this option.

Low priority

The use of icons is misleading because only some items have a “tool” icon however all items are on the tools page.
My favorites should be changed to Manage My Favorites so it is consistent with Manage My Alerts.

Help
High priority

A search function should be added to allow the user to easily locate information.
A technical writer needs to rewrite much of the help content to make it easily understandable for users. In general the help section is written as if the user has more knowledge than he actually does. For example, there is a great deal of broad vision terminology (i.e. channels, programs), which means nothing to the average user.
There is currently no explanation of what alerts are.
There should be a link back to the site from help to prevent the user from having to switch to another window and also to prevent confusion due to help being in a separate window.
When a user chooses help and the help window is already open, this window should become active instead of nothing occurring.

Low priority

The list of help items should be alphabetized and placed on a left navigation menu which remains on the left so that the user can easily switch from one topic to the next.
Instead of appearing in a second large window, help could appear in a small floating window (as in Netscape help) so it can appear on screen at same time as site window.
When a user selects help from a specific location, he should be taken directly to the area in help, which is relevant.

Company News and What’s New in Knowledge Portal
Low priority

These two sections take up a large amount of primary real estate on the home page. As more features are added to the site, the team should consider at the very least listing less items on the home page.
When viewing an article, there should be link to “next article” and “previous article” so the user does not need to go back to home or to the article listing page to view another article.
A search function for the content of articles will be useful once there are a large number of articles. A means of sorting by different criteria would also be useful once there is a large archive.

Discussion groups
High priority

The team should consider purchasing software to handle discussion groups if this is to be a primary resource of the site.
There should only be one “new” button unless the page is long enough so user has to scroll.
Currently it is unclear whether the two new buttons will add a new message to different areas of the discussion group.
The new button should say, “add to current discussion”.
It is frustrating when the user clicks on “go to discussion” from a location in a channel and there are no messages. An indication of how many messages are within the group would let the user know whether to bother going to the discussion. The go to discussion button should remain, however, in case the user wants to add a message to the discussion group.
There should be not only a discussion group search, but also an index of all of the discussion groups (via a link from the home page) detailing the number of messages within each group and direct links to the various groups and to discussion group search.
When replying to a message, the author’s name is not documented nor is it clear to the user when he is replying whether his name will be documented or not. Therefore, he might include that information in the text leading to redundant information.
A user cannot delete a message he has added to a newsgroup or make changes to the message, which will potentially discourage users from adding messages to discussion groups.
When replying to a message, it would be useful to have the message appear towards the top of the page so the user can remember what was said in the message to which they are replying.
The user should be able to add a new discussion group.

Low priority

Sometimes there is a remove message link and an activate message link next to the discussion group messages.
When within a discussion group, the search discussion button should say, “search current discussion group” and should appear in a more central location on the page.
If there is a discussion group index page then any page dealing with discussion groups should have a link to this page.

Discussion group search
High priority

The button on the bottom of the search page is not noticeable.
The output of discussion group search needs to be reorganized by using logical grouping to make it easier for the user to locate information.
If possible, only discussion groups that have content should appear in drop-down list.
Some messages have been deactivated. If this is the case, they should no longer appear within the output of a search.
There are terms under the discussion group search drop-down menu, which are meaningless out of context such as “A-F.”

Low priority

“Search string” is a confusing label. Rename this phrase “Enter keywords”.

Submit project request
High priority

At the top of page, there should be an explanation of what a project request is, who can submit a project request, who receives the request, and how long it will take for request to be fulfilled.
Client and project numbers should be removed altogether from process. The user receives an error message when a number is not specified and so either he will not submit a request at all or will fabricate a number. The system administrator does not input this information when the request is granted so it appears to have no purpose.
The content in help is not useful- it merely restates the obvious.
There should be a link to submit project request on the main projects page.

Low priority

The user should receive an email notification when the request has been granted.
“Worldwide” and “corporate” could be added to regions.

Favorites
High priority

On the My Favorites page, there should be no distinction between channels/programs favorites and contents favorites because this means nothing to the user.
The green “My Favorites” bar on the home page should link to a “Manage My Favorites” page.

Low priority

The user should be given the option to change the name of a favorite so it is easier to remember what the link refers to when looking at the home page. Alternatively, the default title of the favorite could be the document title if this is what is being bookmarked.
When there are no favorites selected, there should be a page, which is primarily empty except for a message, which says, “you have no favorites selected”, instead of a page which has column headings but no content.
If you have bookmarked a favorite and the document has moved or been deleted, nothing should appear on the home page but on the Manage My Favorites page a message should say “(title) is no longer available.”
The “remove favorites” button on the My Favorites page is very far to the right so a user might not see it.

Alerts
High priority

The user should be able to add alerts at levels high in the hierarchy. For example, if there are any changes in digital strategy documents, the user should have the option of being alerted.
Nowhere in help is there an explanation of what alerts are. This must be added.

Low priority

If a user does a search on “strategy” and the output is 30 documents, there should be a button to add them all to alerts.
On manage my alerts page, “programs” should read “Alert” and “channels” should read “location of alert”.
When My Alert messages is selected from the home page there should be a message at the top of the next page, which says how many alert settings there, are. While the message might say, “you have no alert messages” there should be a definite indication that there are alert settings, which have been selected.
There should be a link to the Manage My alerts page from the My Alerts page.

Profile
High priority

Change password should be found here.
The level of detail in terms of how much information to submit is not specified.

Low priority

The edit button should be located at the top as the default and at bottom as well if the page is long enough to need to scroll.

Publish
High priority

A tutorial/demo is needed.
What if users cannot find a logical place to publish their file? If they are only given a few choices: FAQ, links, etc. and none seem to be a logical choice and they cannot publish to a level which is higher in the hierarchy, then they either will not publish at all or will publish in a place that is not suitable. This should either be addressed on the publish page, in help, or should be remedied. Perhaps a category called “other” can be created for all of the categories?
There is no indication when the user publishes from tools where he can and cannot publish. Sometimes the user is given an error when he tries to publish to a high level in the hierarchy but this message is not very clear. Currently it appears that a user can publish anywhere in the site because he sees all of the choices on the choose categories listing.
Sometimes it appears that the user has published but the document cannot be viewed because he did not publish to the lowest level in the hierarchy. If he tries to publish again he will get an error that says the name of the file already exists.
The file size window should be removed.
The two pages of the publish process should be combined onto one page so that the user can add the file and not need to go to a second page to do so.
The user should be given the option to upload the file now because if he has set the calendar so that the file goes online in a week, the file will need to already be uploaded for this to occur. If it is not possible to have the user upload the file at this time, then a unique message should appear which tells the user that he will need to upload the file at a later time. The documentation in help, which relates to this issue, needs to be updated.
Keywords should be standardized. When publishing a document, user #1 might categorize a document using certain keywords and user #2 might search for the document using different keywords and therefore will not locate the document. If a window with a list from which a user can choose multiple items is provided and the user has the option of adding additional words, this should help to standardize the process and make searching more fruitful.

Low priority

The choose categories applet is extremely slow to download. This should be remedied if possible.
The choose categories applet doesn’t open in Explorer on a Mac and in Netscape appears off-center. On a PC, software must be downloaded to view the applet in Explorer. Users should be warned that if using Explorer they might need to download software.
For document type, user should be given the option of choosing more than one type.
When a user receives a message confirming that the document is published, he should be given the option to go home or to go to the Manage my documents page.
The file details page should show where in the site the document is published.
On the attach file page, the previous button should say previous page.
When publishing files off-line, the user expects to have to upload the file when selects “next” but instead he only gets a message saying that file has been uploaded successfully.
There are other possibilities for document type, such as press release, draft press release, client interview, cost estimates, and legal agreements. If there were a space for “other” so that user could fill in what type of document they are publishing, this would give team feedback as to what categories of document type to add to the list.
There are other file formats such as Photoshop format, bitmap, and Illustrator.

Quick Search
High priority

QS should output not just document information but any content on the site.
QS are currently case sensitive. This either needs to be remedied or explained in help and/or About QS.
Quick search outputs different results than Search. This should also be explained in help and About QS.
The words that were used to search should appear at the top of the search output page.

Low priority

The button at the bottom of the search output page should say, “new search”.
It is unclear to users whether Boolean searches are allowed.
“No rows selected which meet your criteria” is not a meaningful error message. “Your search yielded no results” would be better.
When there are no relevant results, document search should appear below the message on that page so the user does not need to go back to home.

Search
High priority

The scope of search needs to be modified so that it outputs more than document listings. Search output needs to reflect all of the content on the site, including category headings so that a user knows that a category exists even if there are no content available or even terms such as “discussion group” or “project request”. If search must remain a document search it must be labeled so and Quick Search should then cover all of the content on the site.
Search output gives no indication of where in the site a document is located. This could help the user determine whether the document is relevant to what they are searching for. At the very least the channel should be specified.
It would also be useful to see the type of document so the user can judge whether it is relevant and useful.
The words that were used to search should appear at the top of the search output page.
Boolean searches are not supported by search function. This should preferably be changed or it should be specified to the user that this is not an option.
“No rows selected which meet your criteria” is not a useful error message. “Your search yielded no results” would be better.
When there are no relevant results, document search should appear below the message on that page so the user does not need to go back to the search page.

Low priority

What is the % in the left column referring to, exactly? This should be documented in help.
The button at the bottom of the search output page should say “new search”.
For document type, instead of “select document type” as the default, which puts no constraints on the document type being searched, “all” should be used.
Users should be able to search on more than one document type at a time.

People search
High priority

The button at the bottom of the search output page should say “new people search” and take the user back to people search.

Low priority

When a user searches by a person’s first name, the resulting list is not alphabetized by last name.
The words that were used to search should appear at the top of the search output page.
City and state should be specified in the output of people search because some might not necessarily know, for example, where Downer’s Grove is located.

Process
High priority

This section needs easier navigation. Hitting the back button and scrolling up and down should never the primary means of navigation. Since this section is essentially a micro site it needs its own navigation to make it easy for the user to move quickly through the content. A navigation menu on the left, which links, to the primary areas of the micro site is recommended.
This channel is very slow to download. This should be remedied if possible.
Since this channel is essentially a subsite a search function would be helpful.

Wish list

Searching for people by their education or past employers
Official org chart informatio—currently information is specified by employees themselves and some people say that they are in more than one line of business even if officially they are not.
On profile page it would be helpful to have a quick summary of each employee that could be cut and pasted into proposals, etc. if needed.
Resumes that could be cut and pasted or a hotlink to a resume that is in Client format that could be given to clients, etc.
Results of employee surveys posted on site.
A service to employees, which would allow them to request that a survey, is done on a certain topic with the option to target a particular region.
When next phase is being developed, come up with a list of possible functionality to be added and have employees rank in order of importance to assess what should be addressed first.
Bulletin board/classifieds
Posting a URL directly without text
Having system remember login name via a cookie
More information provided regarding how to publish documents
Company culture section by location
New channels: competitors, market research, sales, finance (executive reporting), and investor relations
Partners information and vendors information
For file formats, should be able to choose what version of a program you are using
International section- less “North American-centric” view
Incorporate International buzz information
An expert cross-reference tool that would allow one to search for some to email for example with a specific question. A person would specify himself as an expert and would perhaps document what he would be willing to do as an expert such as answer email, present at meetings as an expert, etc.
Community information that would be useful is an employee was thinking of transferring to another location
A job opportunities page for all of Client’s locations. This would be beneficial for transferring or for referring colleagues who live in other cities.
Regular (monthly) communications from Client executives
List of sites/products we have developed
Access to extranets that could be used for project management via the web
Ability to create mailing lists

Problems/bugs

When the hammer icon next to my favorites in tools is selected the user is told that he is inactive and has to log in again.
When on a discussion group search output page, if browser back button is selected a “page is expired” message appears.
When a people search is carried out and the user is finished looking at a person’s profile, selecting back does not take the user back to the search output. Instead a “page has expired” message appears (in IE).
When the icons on the tools page are selected the user is taken back to the “your session has ended” page.

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