OpenSource Usability Labs

This summer I participated in the SoU project with Gallery, the open source photo sharing software. The broad goal of the project was to conduct a survey to learn more about Gallery’s users in moving toward the release of the 3rd version of the software. The project was a success in terms of garnering useful data for Gallery, but, importantly, it was an incredibly valuable learning experience for me.

As a student working towards a masters in Human-Computer Interaction, I have learned about and conducted user research and usability studies in my coursework. But, what SoU provided me that no school project ever could was the opportunity to engage in research that has an actual impact on improving a product— and the opportunity to experience all the challenges that go along with that.

At the start of the project, I have to say I was a bit overwhelmed with what direction to take, but with the guidance of Björn as my mentor, the help of Jakob, a former SoU student who continues to work on the Gallery project, and the awesome tools of Usability-Methods.com, I soon found my way. Here are some of the lessons I learned along the way.

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Good news for all students of usability, user-interface design, interaction design,…: The initiative Open Usability has started the call for participation for the Season of Usability 2009 (a very big THANK YOU to Celeste for organizing and finding sponsors!!!).

The Season of Usability provides students the opportunity to practice what they have learned in university on a real Free/Libre/Open-source software project. The list of projects this year is great again:

• Amarok
• Drupal
• Gallery
• GeneMANIA
• Ubuntu - GNOME User Management Tool
• Kadu
• KOrganizer
• OLM
• SemNotes
• KUbuntu Add/Remove… Software

Of course I will again work as a usability-mentor for the SoU 2009. This year I am mentor for the Gallery project. This project is interested in learning more about its users. Project activities will include user research activities such as surveys, interviews, creating user groups and personas, and competitive analysis.

I will be really enjoying this job, as we have worked hard on our survey-platform Icon Test and the connected questionnaire methods. They will be of great use for the student and the gallery project.

Are any of those projects interesting for you? Then don’t hesitate to apply.

Season of Usability is one of my favorite activities of the year. But it has its downsides as well…

This year again I will mentor - together with Bodo from TV-Browser - one of the Season of Usability projects. This is great because we get the chance to spread the word about usability, help some students to gather experience and at the same time improve a great project even further!

But today was decision-day. We had to select which of the applicants we want to consider for the 2nd round of applications. And I really hate to have to say no to qualified and motivated people - but: these are the rules! So at the end of the day we have nine promising students left in the process of application for the TV-Browser. Good luck to all of them in 2nd round and to all the others: Don’t be sad… There will be other great chances for you!

The OpenUsability.org - Season of Usability (SoU) has started their call for participation. Interested students with a background in Usability, Interface Design, Interaction Design or related topics are invited to support non-commercial OpenSource-Projects with their knowledge and skills in user-centric development. The SoU is to the benefit of both:

• The student is mentored by an experienced usability professional and has the chance to practically use, what he has learned in theory.
• The projects benefit from the fresh wind of a new mind and up-to-date methods in user-centric development.

Like last year Björn is again one of the proud mentors for the students. He mentors the SoU project for TV-Browser. Björn has gone quite a long way with this project, starting work back in 2005.

The premises of this project are just great - so do not hesitate and apply for your participation in the SoU!