Heal Your Church WebSite

Tag: hallway testing

  • 12 Days of Jesus Junk – Day 4 – Unreadable at 11:23

    Even though I’m a software guy, I think if I were asked to design a religious-themed wall clock I might steer clear of some of the usability issues I find with the Jesus Christ Carrying Cross Christian Theme Wall Clock parodied below:

    12 Days of Jesus Junk - Day 4 - Unreadable at 11:23

    What usability issue? Well if I’m a user sitting across the room at 11:23, and possibly at 4:55 and 8:05, I might find it hard to see what time it is because of the dark black lines of the artwork create a dark black background for the thin black arms of the clock.

    So what has this got to do with my church or charity website? Glad you asked.

    What we want to take away from today’s example is the concept that part of a successful user interface isn’t just design that looks good (not that I find the clock artwork all that inspiring) — but also a design facilitates a positive and productive user experience.

    This can be measured in ‘conversion rates,’ that is the rate at which the user successfully uses the website (or clock) to accomplish some item of work or information gathering.

    This means we need to avoid design elements get in the way of a web page’s core functionality, otherwise we’re left with the antithesis of conversion – the user abandons the product – often quantified as the ‘bounce rate.‘

    To help avoid this common pitfall, I offer this “fast five” lists of things to remember when designing a webpage:

    1. You are not your user;
    2. solve their problems, don’t burden them yours;
    3. don’t assume all any of your users are idiots;
    4. engage in user testing – where non-geeks attempt simple, common tasks; and
    5. when a problem and/or encumbrance by a user is reported – do what it takes to provide the user a clear path to operational/work-flow success.

    On that last point, think Amazon.com, the premier example of conversion goals in action. When they hear of something that gets in the user’s way – even if it sounds stupid – they fix their site to accommodate the customer.

    I’d recommend doing the same, perhaps starting with some good-old-fashioned hallway testing and moving out from there.




  • 12 Days of Jesus Junk – Day 2 – Think Globally!

    As once again the  TSA reminds us that Christmas Snow Globes a threat to National Security, I thought it might be a good time to talk about the wide-World of bad-guys and some simple things you can do to guard your site from a potentially explosive situation.

    12 Days of Jesus Junk - Day 2 - Think Globally

    Unlike the 5.5″ The Kneeling Santa Claus Musical Christmas Water Globe parodies above, there are some real threats to your website that are an unfortunate aspect of the “World Wide” nature of the Web.

    Specifically, I’m talking about the army of professional hackers employed in far flung regions such as China, Nigeria and of course what is now the former U.S.S.R.

    For that, I recommend a modification to your  .htaccess file such as:

    <Limit GET HEAD POST>
deny from 218.25.161
allow from all
</LIMIT>

    If you look close, I’m only using 3 levels of the IP address to 218.25.161.0 through 218.25.161.255.

    And where does one get a block of  IPs to block? Glad you asked …

    Pre-fabricated blacklists to block IP addresses of entire countries:

    A bit more on .htaccess and mod_access:

    Just remember to keep good backups of whatever files you’re working on – and try not to lock yourself out while experimenting with changes!

  • 12 Days of Jesus Junk – Day 1 – Hallway Testing

    I’m sure the makers of the Gemmy 6ft Airblown Inflatable Christmas Nativity Scene parodied below were not trying to assert that Jesus was of Aryan descent:

    Avoid accidental message myopia by subjecting all your design work to hallway testing

    So how do we avoid the type of ‘accidental-message-myopia‘ that produces a design that includes a not-so Middle-East,  blond haired (and possibly blue-eyed)  baby Jesus?  Two words “Hallway Testing.”

    The Wikipedia describes hallway testing as:

    Hallway testing (or hallway usability testing) is a specific methodology of software usability testing. Rather than using an in-house, trained group of testers, just five to six random people, indicative of a cross-section of end users, are brought in to test the software (be it an application, web site, etc.); the name of the technique refers to the fact that the testers should be random people who pass by in the hallway. The theory, as adopted from Jakob Nielsen’s research, is that 95% of usability problems can be discovered using this technique.

    In short, hallway testing is the simple act of accosting … I mean drafting … I mean enlisting 5 or 6 random individuals to inspect your designs to insure among other things, you’re not overlooking some detail great or small that accidentally sends the wrong message.

    I know it’s an extra step in the web design process, but when one considers alternatives as the above parody poster depiction, it’s probably worth it.