Designing for Web Usability

This one-day course covers the human factors of web interface design. Emphasis is placed on techniques and guidelines to design and critique different web contexts including the environment, the user, the genre, the site, and the page. Concepts in interface design and testing are considered in relation to human information processing capabilities and limitations.

Objective:
The primary purpose of this course is to help participants understand principles and develop skills in the design of web user interfaces. To help acquire the needed skills, the course will focus on learning by doing. Accordingly, a major focus will be on design, critique, and evaluation projects. The lectures, book, and the handout material should be considered resources to help participants carry out projects. The underlying philosophy of the approach in this course is that concepts are learned and remembered better when they are learnt in a hands-on environment.

Topics:
1. Web Usability design strategy,
2. Web context, the environment, the user, the genre,
3. Site design,
4. Page design,
5. Aesthetics, mobile context, cultural context,
6. Web evaluation.

Outcomes (skills learned):

	Critique the design of already constructed web sites
	Perform web site heuristic reviews
	Evaluate the effectiveness of a Web interface
	Apply human factors principles to designing usable interfaces