Does Great Usability Equal Great User Interface Design?

By Martin Metz


What is usability?
At its most fundamental level, usability is defined as the study of the ease with which people can achieve a particular goal by operating a human-made tool or system. The central question of usability is how well can users learn and use a system or tool to achieve a goal and how satisfied are they with the process provided by the system or tool. The concept of usability can be applied to a variety of ventures people undertake in communications, software, mechanics, consumer electronics, and objects used to transfer knowledge (such as manuals and books). However, for the purposes of this brief introduction to usability, I want to focus on usability's role in computer science, specifically user interface design or ui design, in addition to giving you as a designer advice on how to create user interfaces characterized by optimal usability.

User interface design and usability
In computer science, usability, when referring to the user interface design of a software application, specifically focuses on evaluating how clearly and effectively a user can interact with the user interface. Several methods such as those subsumed under the User Centered Design method offer ways to accomplish great usability, for example by creating wireframe prototypes and conducting usability tests. These methods allow the interface designer to gather valuable user experience feedback that can be employed to improve the overall usability of a website or other type of software program. Usability.gov defines these user experience measurables as such:

• Ease of learning - How fast can a user who has never seen the user interface before learn it sufficiently well to accomplish basic tasks?
• Efficiency of use - Once an experienced user has learned to use the system, how fast can he or she accomplish tasks?
• Memorability - If a user has used the system before, can he or she remember enough to use it effectively the next time or does the user have to start over again learning everything
• Error frequency and severity - How often do users make errors while using the system, how serious are these errors, and how do users recover from these errors?
• Subjective satisfaction - How much does the user like using the system?

If you want to guarantee optimal usability in your interface design then make sure to take advantage of tools like usability testing and keep the above mentioned questions at the heart of your user experience inquiry.

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