tri-university group primo usability study
DESCRIPTION
TRANSCRIPT
TUG Primo Central Usability Study
Randy Oldham
Web Development Librarian
University of Guelph
Who we are…
Tri-University Group (TUG) Consortium of three university libraries in
Ontario, Canada: University of Waterloo Wilfrid Laurier University University of Guelph
ExLibris Products we share:
• Voyager• Primo• Primo Central
• bX Recommender• SFX• Verde
About our institutions
U Waterloo U of Guelph Laurier
# of Undergrad Students
28,200 18,296 14,536
University employee FTE
1901 2340 -------
Library employee FTE
118.5 95.4 61
ACQ Budget 6.9 Million 6.8 Million 3.1 Million
Primo Implementation Team
Primo Implementation Team: 7 members total from all three
institutions: 1 systems guy 2 programmers 2 cataloguers 2 web developers
The cataloguers and the web developers were responsible for the trial and final implementation of PC
Initial Trial Launch
Based on several other Primo implementations U of Utah
U of Auckland
U of Iowa
Initial Decisions
Primo Implementation team initially decided on three tabs
Web and Information Architecture cross functional team at Guelph Recommended having no tabs Single search box for Guelph 3 tabs for Waterloo and Laurier Compare user feedback with our consortial
partners
The Design – Waterloo / Laurier
Waterloo and Laurier 3 tabs: Blended, Primo only, Primo Central
only Tabs have quick limits that can be applied
The Design – U of G
U of Guelph Single search box No tabs, no quick limits
The Trial Launch
Waterloo & Laurier launched as separate trial, parallel to existing non-Primo Central primo view
Guelph replaced access to it’s Primo-only view, essentially forcing patrons into the PC view.
Feedback links on the Guelph PC view shunted patrons to a quick three-question survey…Random PRIZE: one of five $10 gift cards for campus food services/textbooks/gifts
The Survey Responses
88 responses
Generally +ve staff vs users
Number 1 +ve: Easy to use
Number 1 –ve: How do I find a known item?
Immediate tweak
Changed facet order
Before: After:
Usability Studies – UW
@ U of Waterloo Purpose: to discover how uWaterloo
students, faculty and staff use PC, what they like, and what they dislike.
Came up with specific scenarios: “Please search for the journal article title
Strategic decision-making. Could you tell me if you find the search results easy to understand? Why, or why not?”
“I’d like to draw your attention to the facet ‘Expand beyond library collections’. Before I ask you to click on it, could you tell me what it means to you?”
Usability Studies - UW
UW Participants: Undergraduates: 38 Graduates: 32 Faculty: 2 Staff: 4 Alumni: 1
UW Incentive Prize: iPad 2 Lots of feedback to help with labels and to
get direction. Lots of non-PC related comments.
Usability Studies - UG @ U of Guelph (True usability) Participants completed 4 real-life tasks.
Before the tasks were assigned, users were asked pre-test questions and after the test a number of follow-up questions were asked. Use PC to find information on
something that interests you, or that you expect to be researching in the near future.
Take some time to look at the results of your search. What have you found?
Usability Testing - UG
UG Participants: 3 Undergraduates 4 Graduates
Incentive: $10 Dollar gift card for campus food/gifts/textbooks
Learned a lot about GENERAL principles of discovery vs. search and user expectations…less about the actual PC labels etc.
Usability Testing - UG Also did group interview with Library staff
from Learning &Curriculum Support team and Research Help Team How do you use facets/with students? When do you use Adv search/with
students? How effective is PC to find what
you/students need? What has PC been good/lousy for What do you wish PC could/not do? Has the availability of PC changed your
search habits?
The Final Launch Decisions:
Primo Implementation Team (PIT) Review all input:
Staff survey results Patron feedback Usability feedback Staff group interview feedback WIA feedback
Mock-up new labels and do some final testing…
Guerilla Testing
Guerilla Testing
Guerilla Usability Testing
Other Decisions:
Removed “CITED ARTICLES” facet Removed “EXPAND BEYOND
LIBRARY COLLECTIONS” facet Changed search scope names to
match tab names
Modified availability labels (for consistency
Launch Date:
FULL launch date with all new changes is MAY 1 2012
Wish us luck!
IMAGE: hellojenuine
Randy [email protected]
References:
List of Primo Sites
Guelph Primo Central View Waterloo Primo Central View Laurier Primo Central View