In November 2015, as part of the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Scientific and Technical Information’s (OSTI) efforts to continuously improve their scientific and technical information offerings, a team of OSTI librarians conducted a formal pilot usability study of DOE PAGESBeta to gauge user satisfaction. This interesting information came to us from the (OSTI) newsletter in their article, “Usability 101: A Pilot Test of DOE PAGESBeta.“
OSTI is committed to developing science search tools that meet the needs of users and support the dissemination of DOE research and development (R&D) results.
So what is usability testing? It is essentially making sure something works well – that a person of average experience can use the product for its intended purpose without excessive hindrance and frustration. Products created with usability in mind are helpful to the target audience and easy to learn and navigate, and they guide the user efficiently and effectively to the information they need.
Melody K. Smith
Sponsored by Access Innovations, the world leader in taxonomies, metadata, and semantic enrichment to make your content findable.
