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Of course, there might be more roles involved for large-scale companies (e.g. like a special translater role for enterprises operating in different countries with multi-lingual sites). However, I consider those as more specific roles of the basic ones and thus not explicitly mention them here.
User
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Characteristics
So far, you should have recognized that I only talked about a user's tasks - the "what" he's doing with the system. But there is definitely more to say about the user of a software system. For example "who" exactly or "when" and "how often" is he performing a specific tasks. These questions don't target the user's tasks but his skills and characteristics.
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- Usage frequency:
The usage frequency gives an insight about indicates how often a user uses a software system. We simply distinguish between frequently (e.g. daily or two days a week) and sporadically (that is maybe periods of some weeks between system access). - Usage intensity:
The usage intensity indicates how intensively a user is using the software. A user uses a software intensively if he uses the majority of features available to perform his tasks. In contrast to those users a user works with a software only facile if he only uses the basic capabilities of a software. - Application domain knowledge:
The application domain knowlege describes the users experience with the software. A layman might have never been working with a CMS or even doesn't know that such systems exist whereas an expert user knows the application area of a CMS well since he has been in touch with those systems for a long time.
Those basic characteristics of a user have a direct impact on the importance certain usability aspects. As you'll see in more detail in the next post there are seven important usability principles, namely suitability for learning, self descriptiveness, error tolerance, conformity with user expectations, suitability for the task, controllability and suitable for individualisation. As the table below depicts, the application domain knowledge for instance has a strong impact on the suitability for learning. For a layman user it is important that he get's enough help information at hands to be able to quickly work with the system. On the other hand for a user that frequently works with a system it is more important to allow him to customize the user interface, e.g. to setup keyboard shortcuts for certain commands. For the Magnolia AdminCentral application it counts both, the target audience of the Magnolia CMS ranges from sporadic users to frequent users and from laymen to experts. However, for some features it is more important to keep them primarily simple, for other features it is more important to design them as powerful as possible. Therefor, in future posts I will point to the users characteristics given above whenever I explain a new feature or an enhancement for an existing one.
Now that you know there are different
- the four roles: editor, manager, administrator, developer
- basic characteristics: the user-roles matrix
- factors: usage intensity, usage frequency, application domain knowledge
- "(side) note"/excursion: the 7 principles of interaction design => pointer to next article
- relationship to basic principles of interaction design
- note that usage frequency of course depends on update frequency of web content (up-to-dateness of web site)
- application domain knowledge: actually separate two different things: knowledge about Magnolia (CMSs) and company/commercial websites
- factors: usage intensity, usage frequency, application domain knowledge
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