User Test 4

For the user testing I conducted on the 16th of March, I asked 7 people to take part in the test. One by one, I had them fill in a photoshop document to determine what categories fit best with certain colours. While we did have a set amount of colours ready we encouraged the testers to use a colour that wasn't there if they didn't feel the given colours complimented the categories.

The testers all had a basic understanding of using photoshop, though if we were to ask more people and they were not able to use photoshop we planned on using photoshop for them and put the colours with the categories they wanted. While most of the testers used the colours given, a few used colours that they thought would work better. I also had to reset the document when a new user was using testing it so that they wouldn't have their answers influenced by the previous tester.

From the results received, two of the categories were given the same colour every time by each user, one was expected, green for nature but the other was orange for food which I thought was interesting. Leisure almost received all the same colour each time (sky blue) but two other times the other blue colour was chosen. Shopping, Bars & Nightlife and Culture had the most varying results from person to person. Several of the testers even stated that they thought Culture was the hardest one to pick for.

User Test 3

For the user testing I conducted on the 8th of March, I used a technique called "Tree Testing". I recorded five people putting features on potential pages that they felt would be on those pages. We had different options for them to choose from and also had blank pieces of paper that they could use to add any features they thought should be included on the pages.

We discovered some minor problems with some of the options given, we used a buzz word from our app that some of the users weren't familiar with and had to explain it to them but after that they understood what was meant by it. One also asked several other questions about how the pages connect to each other and was thought it could be made clearer.

The layouts that we got back were similar to the ideas we had been contemplating but with some differences and user-added features that the users came up with. We tried having the cards laid out slightly differently so that we were not forcing the users into our way of thinking. But I think that giving them the page's hierarchy would help them understand how it would work. We had one outlier that had the app laid out as more of a social media app rather than the use we have planned for it, but it just reinforced the idea that we should include a social aspect to the app.

We also included the user created options in each of them following tests and in all cases the each tester used at least one of the previous testers ideas. We weren't sure whether or not to include the users own ideas in the following tests, to see if they would come to a similar conclusion on their own, but we did end up using them to give the testers more options and not force them into using only the ideas that we had made for them. If I were to conduct the test again, I wouldn't include the user made options to see if the other testers would make similar options as the previous tester.

User Test 2

For the user testing I did on the 29th of February, I got seven people to fill out a questionnaire to several questions that we were looking for the answers to, in regards to some of the functionality of our app. When I got the questionnaires back, I recorded the data into a spreadsheet.

The testing took place in a familiar environment to the users and they filled out the questionnaire individually, I was in the room with them to answer any questions that they may have had. Several of the users had problems understanding the phrasing of one of the questions, which we ourselves had trouble writing in the first place. I explained the question to users so that they would be able to continue on with the questionnaire.

None of the answers were really all that different than what we were expecting as they questions were all quite basic like "How often do you travel in a year?". One answer that stood out to me was one for the question "What comes to mind when you hear the word Pickaxe?". The answer we got was "The sound it makes when it hits rocks". Which I thought was quite different from the other answers which were all kind of similar, like mining, gems, etc.

Terminology and wording for the app / Word association

So since my role is data layout and app content it means I am also responsible for the terminology we use within the app and to ensure the user knows exactly what each button means in the app and have a good idea of where it will take them in terms of data layout. Since our project is titled Pick Axe and the concept behind the app is a tool that helps you mine a cities "hidden gems" and unique locations we wanted to play a bit on words and bring in some mining terminology. The initial ideas were things like a location in a city would be referred to as a gem and when you found a "gem" you wanted to save you would save it in your "gem cart".  We found introducing small phrases and mining terminology like this would make the app more fun and the concept of exploring a city more exciting.

Of course this was our opinion and we knew we could easily go over board with word puns to the point the user would be confused when using the app and not understand the data interface of the app. So I looked up different talk aloud protocols to see what exercise I could preform with "potential users" to test our terminology. I decided to go with word association. I made a list of the most common words in the app and sat down with people and asked them to say back the first thing that came to mind when they heard that word. The idea would be to see how many people would think in the same way we would when hearing the words we plan on using in the app.

Here is the list of words I used in the test:
1. Pickaxe
2. Mining
3. Gem
4. Minecart
5. Discovery
6. Sharing
7. Social
8. Exploration
9. Random Search
10. Interests
11. Hidden Gems

Here are the audio recordings I took of each word association I did (since Blogger doesn't support audio files I have just included a dropbox link to all the recordings).

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/i10jrjzzjpa4ydp/AABXaRUmgNNUFgOdFiILby8Ca?dl=0

Here are the results of the Word Association on paper:

Data layout test

In order to finalise the site map and data layout I had to test my concept of the app on people. I did this through basic paper testing. I ran the test with people who had no real knowledge of the project or the concept of the app. They literally treated it like it was their first time "opening" this app. I filmed the process each time to learn where people had trouble with the layout of the content and where things flowed smoothly.

This paper testing of the data layout helped immensely when it came to deciding what links worked and what content needed to be moved or modified to make the user experience more natural and make the app flow more.

Finalised app site map

After making a few rough sketches of the apps data layout I then created the finalised site map so we could all work off the same base point. I showed the original drafts to the team and we then decided what is woking and what can be taken away/moved. It was this process that helped us arrive at our final site map.

Early stage 1 site map:


Stage 2 site map:


Finalised site map:

User Test 1.2

For the user testing I did on the 4th of March, I got five people to fill out the same questionnaire as last week as I wanted to see if there was any big differences between lay people or people who know how to make apps might have. I did the same thing as last time, give them a description of the app ("Pickaxe is an app used for stumbling upon hidden gems in a city"). I also clarified any queries they may have had about the questions.

The questions were:

1.       List several features you think would be in this app.

2.       List those features in order of importance.

3.       When you arrive in a city, what kind of things would you like to see/do?

4.       If you had to make an account, would you prefer to log in through Facebook or make a new account?

After they returned the completed documents back from the subjects, I put the data into a spreadsheet and recorded the results from the answers given.

The experiment took place in a familiar environment to the users, we used Discord, an app that provides voice call services (similar to Skype). The subjects were all used to using this as we would use it a lot. While in a call with them, I gave them Word documents with the questions on them to fill out. They filled them out in the call. All the subjects were not a part of multimedia and they had never made an app before. While the experiment was being completed, one of the subjects asked a question and accidentally said one of his answers. While it doesn't seem to have affected the other's answers, it may be something for me to bear in mind in future tests that in something like this could happen easily in group situations. One person did misinterpret one of the questions and some of his answers for it are not relevant to the question.

Other than that, there were no big problems, but in the call one made a joke asking what another subject had wrote for one of the questions. While he gave a joke answer back to him it, it made me think that the setting was a bit too familiar as the subjects probably wouldn't  consider a group call with friends to be overly serious.

User Test 1

For the user testing I did on the 23th of February, I asked one person at a time to fill out a questionnaire of four questions after giving a brief description of what our app is. The description was "Pickaxe is an app used for stumbling upon hidden gems in a city". They then filled out the questionnaire and I clarified anything in the questionnaire they were unsure of.

The questions were:

1.       List several features you think would be in this app.

2.       List those features in order of importance.

3.       When you arrive in a city, what kind of things would you like to see/do?

4.       If you had to make an account, would you prefer to log in through Facebook or make a new account?

 After I had gathered all of the completed questionnaires from the ten subjects, I put all of the data into a spreadsheet and grouped similar answers together to see what percentage of testers want a particular feature.

The experiment took place in a familiar environment to the users, as it was a lab in CIT that they knew well. The users were multimedia students who would be familiar with app development as we wanted to see what kind of features they thought could appear in the app. I kept a record of those who took part in the user testing and what their corresponding letter in the spreadsheet, though their identities will not be displayed.  

From the results, a majority of the users suggested features we were thinking about implementing and we also got one or two ideas that we had not considered such as a "gem of the day" or displaying the best times to visit certain places.

The results reinforced several ideas we had and gave us several more options that we may explore further. I do feel that only ten people is a small number to try and get accurate readings, so I may have more users answer the questionnaire to gather as much information as possible. If I do test more users, I may try and get people who are not familiar with app development to see what the everyday user looks for in an app like Pickaxe.

We asked Question 3 to try and determine what kinds of activities users would be interested in so that we can develop set categories from the most recurring answers. Question 4 may not seem that relevant to the rest of the questionnaire, though we included it to get a general idea of people's preferences. We did this so our coder didn't waste time looking up how to do something that wouldn't be implemented later on.

Design Sketches / Wireframes

The design sketches made to-date - currently in the process of digitising these designs for purposes of working up colour scheme variations and preparing them for testing.

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