Thursday, March 21, 2019

Heuristic Evaluation on Course Hero Website

By Qi Guo



Introduction


Course Hero ( https://www.coursehero.com/ ) is an online learning platform where users can access over 25 million course-specific study resources contributed by a community of students and educators. Users could find practice problems, study guides, class notes, and step-by-step explanations for every subject they're studying. 


I evaluated Course Hero using heuristic evaluation. By using the Nielsen's 1990 heuristics, some usability issues have been found. I analyzed each issue and proposed effective solutions. 

Usability issues


1. Bad unlocking for new users

Users can choose to recharge their accounts to view and download files. New users tend not to top up directly, but to experience whether the site is worth using.

Fig. 1. The interface of previewing the document.
In figure 1, users find a document they need and find that they can only preview two pages of the document.

Fig. 2. The button for viewing full content.
So they click the "Subscribe to Unlock" button in figure 2.

Fig. 3. The interface after pressing the “Subscribe to Unlock” button.
The new interface is shown in figure 3. Users realize that if they want to see the full document for free, they must upload a learning resource of their own. So they clicked the "Upload Now" button.


 
Fig. 4. The interface of uploading documents .
The new interface is shown in figure 4. Users find that they have to upload at least 10 documents to get 5 unlocks. They don't have any way to get just 1 unlock. In addition, after uploading the file, users need to wait at least one hour to get unlocks.

It breaks the heuristic of "Provide feedback"and "Prevent errors". Poor feedback causes these error. These happen to every new user. This setting let users with no motivation or patience to continue using the site. User are not informed until the final upload page appears. If the user gets this information in the first place, they will have more options.

For most new users, they want the opportunity to try out the site's features. If the feature is attractive, they are willing to recharge accounts. Although this setting allows users to get unlocks for free. But the process is too complex and time-consuming. For new users, they may choose to leave the site at this step and search for other resources on the Internet.

Suggested improvements to resolve issue

1. Maintain this setting. There are several solutions:
a. Inform the user how to get free unlocks when the new user completes the first registration and enters the home page.
b. Set up an information bar on user's home page to mark relevant content.
c. On the document page, there will be relevant information about the unlocks near the unlock button .
2. Change this setting. Give new users several free unlock opportunities. And when the new user unlocks for the first time, the user will be prompted with information such as the total number of free unlocks and the number of free unlocks left.

2. Cannot change and delete rating and comment

Fig. 5. The interface of rating.
As shown in figure 5, users can choose "Helpful" or "Unhelpful" to rate a document.

Fig. 6. The interface after rating.
 After the rating, the interface is shown in figure 6.


At this point, users have a problem. They can only rate once and they cannot change or delete their rating.

The same problem occurs in user comments.

Fig. 7. The interface of comments.
The comment interface is shown in figure 7. User kkerris7 comments the current document. There are no buttons for the user to change or delete his comments.

It breaks the heuristic of "Provide clearly marked exits". Functionality defect causes this error. This happens to every user. In daily use, users may inadvertently press the wrong button or change their minds after viewing the entire document. Users have the right to change ratings or comments. This ensures that the rating or comment of the document is credible and helps other users to choose whether or not to use this document.

Suggested improvements to resolve issue

1. After user rating, the rating buttons will not disappear. The users can change the button they selected. When the user presses the selected button, the user cancels the rating.
2. About user rating, except button option, the scoring mechanism can be added. User ratings range from 0 to 5. 0 is very useless, 5 is very useful. Display the average score next to the name of the document.
3. About the user comments, set two options. The user can edit comment by "Edit"  option and delete comment by "Delete" option.
4. A "Like" option can be set beside the user's comments. If a user supports another user's opinion, he can click on the "Like" option. This will avoid repeating too many comments.

3. Ambiguous file name 

Fig. 8. The interface after downloading the document.
As shown in figure 8, when the user downloads the document, the default document name is "docx.docx".

It breaks the heuristic of "Minimize memory load". Functionality defect causes this error. This happens to every user. At this point the user needs to remember the general content of the document they downloaded. If a user downloads many documents, multiple document names that are similar without any hint of content can confuse the user. Users spend a lot of time distinguishing between documents they download which adds a lot of unnecessary work.

Suggested improvements to resolve issue

When a document is downloaded, setting the default document name as the document title name.

4. Violation of general operation

Fig. 9. The interface when returning to homepage.
As shown in figure 9, When the user needed to return to his home page, he unconsciously clicked on the avatar. Because in most web design, users can click on the avatar to access the personal homepage. The user found that there was no homepage option in the avatar picture bar and clicked the icon of "Course Hero" to return to the homepage successfully. 

This issue breaks the heuristic of "Be consistent". Inability to recognition causes this error. This happens to some users. Although this problem won't make much difference, improving the design can better serve users.

Suggested improvements to resolve issue

When the user clicks on the avatar, the drop-down menu appears. Add a "Homepage" option.

5. Disappearance of the original content 

Fig. 10. The interface after viewing the question in homepage.
When users viewed the questions they asked on their personal home page, the interface looks like figure 10. Users could see the problem content. There was a "Edit" button. Users wanted to use this button to edit their problems. 

Fig. 11. The interface after pressing the “Edit” button.
After clicking the button, the interface is shown in figure 11. There was nothing in the input box. That is to say, users cannot modify their problems based on the original ones.

If the user asks a long question and wants to change only one sentence, he needs to copy his question in the interface shown in figure 10 and paste it in the interface shown in figure 11. This operation is time consuming. If the user does not notice information about the problematic content in the interface in figure 10, he will need to re-enter his question in the interface in figure 11. This requires the user to either keep the question in mind or keep a backup copy in the local. It breaks the heuristic of "Minimize memory load". Functionality defect causes this error. This happens to every user.

Suggested improvements to resolve issue

When users modify their problems, the original problems' contents will be left in the input box.

Conclusion


I evaluated Course Hero using heuristic evaluation. Course Hero provides rich learning resources that attracts a large number of students to use it. At the same time, it has many usability problems. Improving these issues will help improve the site's service to users.

No comments:

Post a Comment