Web Directions: UX08 » Workshops

Workshops

• Guerilla Usability Testing
• Frontiers of Javascript

Guerilla Usability Testing

Presented by Andy Budd

Melbourne Town Hall, Melbourne

Thursday 15th May 2008, 9:00am to 5:00pm

Register now

Description

Usability tests are an excellent way of discovering problems with a product or service. Commissioning a dedicated usability lab will provide a high degree of scientific rigour, but comes at significant cost. Time and again then doing any usability testing at all gets sacrificed to commercial expediency.

Guerilla usability testing offers a third, practical, way.

Instead of a single academic evaluation, why not bring your usability testing in-house and run it alongside your design and development process? Two or three quick-and-dirty usability tests will not only provide better results but will also allow you to iterate your product between tests, ultimately leading to a more refined product.

Usability testing needn’t cost the Earth. In fact, there’s no need for all that expensive equipment, a dedicated lab and or even expert evaluators. It’s entirely possible to run a test at your own office, a cafe or even your subject’s home.

Who is this workshop for?

This workshop is designed for anybody building modern websites or web apps, whether you’re an Information Architect, Interface Designer or Usability professional. As long as you have an interest in your users and want to build better experiences, this workshop is for you.

What will you learn?

By the end of this highly practical day you will be able to:

• plan your own guerrilla usability test
• screen and recruit test subjects
• moderate a usability test
• review the results of usability testing
• turn the results of testing into usable recommendations
• write usability reports and give presentations on your findings

Frontiers of Javascript

Presented by Cameron Adams

Melbourne Town Hall, Melbourne

Thursday 15th May 2008, 9:00am to 5:00pm

Register now

Description

JavaScript has been one of the fastest growing areas of web development in recent years, and the introduction of technologies such as Ajax have meant that it is allowing the investigation of whole new areas of interface development.

In this full day hands on workshop, Cameron Adams will share his love of playful code and explore the latest developments in the field of JavaScript and interface design. Bring your own laptop and by the end of the day you’ll be playing with the code like a master as well!

Who is this workshop for?

This workshop is designed for those with a strong grasp on the basics of JavaScript (particularly) and CSS. You should already have a working knowledge of:

• modifying the DOM
• the browser event model
• making basic Ajax calls

It will also be interesting for those who wish to see the possibilities of interface design with a fully featured front-end toolkit.

What will you learn?

By the end of the day you will:

• have a knowledge of the pros and cons of different libraries such as Prototype, jQuery and Dojo
• understand the capabilities of interface frameworks such as Ext and Interface
• be able to work with real-time data formats such as XML and JSON
• create mashups using APIs
• work with browser-native vector graphics (SVG/VML & Canvas)
• pick up advanced code tips
• understand why coding JavaScript is so darn fun!

The workshop will include numerous practical sessions (on your own laptop) where you will be able to apply some of the skills you have picked up during the day, with tips and immediate assistance from your host.

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