USeD - Usability Service enhancements to Digimap

An Introduction

Addy Pope 2011

What is USeD

USeD aims to improve the usability and learnability of a widely used research tool that provides access to valuable geospatial research data – specifically the data download of Ordnance Survey data from the JISC funded Digimap service.

What

Select 1 data product from a choice of 16

Define area

Pick data tiles

Define delivery format

21

4

3

Stats: • 48,000+ Digimap users• 74,000 data requests*• 1,000,000 data tiles served*

* Based on Jan 2010 – Jan 2011

Stats: • 48,000+ Digimap users• 74,000 data requests*• 1,000,000 data tiles served*

* Based on Jan 2010 – Jan 2011

Why

Issues with the existing system include:

• current interface infers familiarity with OS products• cannot download more than one dataset at a time• cannot save user preferences • focused on data delivery issues rather than user requirements• fails to address differences in users spatial literacy.

“Too hard to use” –

Geography and Environment

student“Too hard to use” –

Geography and Environment

student“I find it a bit complicated” –

Engineering postgraduate“I find it a bit complicated” –

Engineering postgraduate“Really like the system but find

it hard to navigate around” –

Architecture postgraduate

“Really like the system but find

it hard to navigate around” –

Architecture postgraduate

How

• Investigate current use of service and extract a number of typical user personas• Use personas to design enhanced interface and work flow process• Run user testing on new interface (iterative)• Feed output of project into the Digimap data downloader

Personas: • Should describe the main user groups from beginner to expert• Persona profiling based on:

• User engagement / User interface analysis• Existing download database logs

Personas: • Should describe the main user groups from beginner to expert• Persona profiling based on:

• User engagement / User interface analysis• Existing download database logs

Team

• Project Manager• Usability Expert• GIS analyst • Software Developers

Project blog: http://used.blogs.edina.ac.uk/