Evaluating the design without users
 Book: "Task-Centered User Interface Design"  

  1. When and why is it useful to perform software evaluation without users?

  2. Compare the 3 approaches for evaluating an interface in the absence of users. Can we find the same problems with each approach or can each approach uncover different problems? What is the authors' recommendations on how to use these approaches in the design process?

  3. What are the risks associated with any of the "without users" evaluation techniques? How could one alleviate such risks?

  4. How can the design of personas help a designer to perform a effective walkthrough? Provide one or two examples. How can a paper interface help a designer during a walkthrough evaluation?

  5. What are the four things you need before you can perform a cognitive walkthrough?

  6. What are the four things you should look for at each step of a cognitive walkthrough?

  7. Given a 2 column by 4 row table in a spreadsheet program, perform a cognitive walkthroughs for creating a bar-graph based on this data. Perform a heuristic analysis for the same task.

  8. How much can the designer experience (both in general and with respect to a specific group of users) influence the result of "without users" evaluation? Why? Does it depend on the technique?

  9. Looking at these techniques, how useful will it be for a young designer to be attentive to every mishap that happens to him/her and people around him/her? Explain your answer.

  10. Explain the difference between evaluating and validating an interface.

  11. What are the 9 heuristics proposed by Nielsen. For each heuristic, describe one example where the heuristic has been respected, and one when it has been violated. In both cases, explain the impact on users. What class of problems will these heuristics have difficulty to identify? Why?

  12. Compare and contrast the use of the "formal" and "back-of-the-envelop" action analysis. In particular which one is most likely to be used as a validation technique and which one is most likely to be used as an evaluation technique? Perform a back-of-the-envelope action analysis for taking a picture with your cell-phone (or playing a given piece of music on your MP3 player).