[thelist] links for how to do useability testing?

[chris]

Hi chris,
I don't think there is a quick and easy answer to your question. You may
want to do a search for "usability testing", "human-computer interactions",
"human factors", "information architecture", "user task analysis",
"ethnography + usability", "interface design", "use case studies"... 

A lot of the standard task analysis techniques are drawn from cognitive
psychology research, so that's another subject area to sniff around in.  

Here are some references that I've found helpful:

Books:  
Usability for the Web by Brink, Gergle, and Wood
User and Task Analysis for Interface Design by Joanne Hackos
Information Architecture 2nd ed. by Rosenfeld and Morville
(obligatory reference) Designing Web Usability by Jakob Neilson
Elements of User Experience by Jesse James Garret
http://jjg.net/elements/resources/
Cognitive Psychology by West
Statistics for Behavioral Research by Nowaczyk
Craft of Inquiry by Alford  

Websites to read through:
User Interface Engineering
http://world.std.com/~uieweb/

Posted results of usability testing a flash site
http://www.dack.com/web/flashVhtml/page1.html

A presentation on how to apply GOMS testing
http://bmrc.berkeley.edu/courseware/cs160/spring97/discussions/GOMS/sld001.h
tm

A simplied 12-step guide for usability engineering
http://www.pcd-innovations.com/fear/id13_m.htm

Other suggested readings
http://jthom.best.vwh.net/usability/biblio.htm

A comparison of usability evaluation methods
http://www.userdesign.com/usability_uem.html