RACER Website Redesign

for MIE240: Human Centred Systems Design

with Niloo Alireza and Kyle Juliao

from January 2020 to April 2020

We investigated the RACER inter-library loan website to understand the tasks users perform, then we redesigned, prototyped, and evaluated our design for improved usability.

Teamwork Strategy

In this course, we each took on different roles in each of the three phases of the project: I was the Spokesperson in Phase 1, Project Manager in Phase 2, and First Author in Phase 3. To help each others and the team succeed, we agreed on "ways of working" including: setting agendas with timeframes for meetings, setting internal deadlines, having frequent check-ins or updates, using Facebook Messenger, and maintaining open communication.

Design Process

Understand the tasks

The Ontario Council of University Libraries provides multiple services for all university libraries across the province in order to support and strengthen the academic research conducted in Ontario [1]. One such platform is the Rapid Access to Collections by Electronic Requesting service (RACER). This system is an interlibrary loan service where students, faculty, and researchers have access to extensive library catalogues where they can request research material from other institutions on a national and global scale.

To understand the tasks RACER is used for, we familiarized ourselves with it then conducted informal interviews to observe a librarian and a graduate student. We identified the core functions of RACER to be searching for an item, refining a search, and requesting an item. Further subtasks are shown in the Hierarchical Task Analysis below.

Create prototypes

We chose to focus on the search function to identify its pitfalls then improve its usability. We identified inconsistencies with the organization, visual momentum, and feature communication to users that made it frustrating to use. With the core tasks in mind, we redesigned search using three main screens: standard search, advanced search, and citation search. A morph chart was used to generate alternative designs which were evaluated using heuristics. Main screens from the resulting low-fidelity prototype are shown below. From heuristic evaluation, the prototype should support visual momentum through the search pages, maintain a consistent design, enhance the proximity compatibility between fields, and allow users to follow a simple and structured task sequence.

Evaluate the prototype

Usability testing was conducted on three users to identify areas of improvement to the prototypes. They were each asked to complete three tasks in order while thinking out loud, then complete a NASA-TLX form and summative survey. We noticed that the workload score and completion time corresponded to the designed complexity of each search method. The prototype could be improved by repositioning the "+" and "-" buttons in the Advanced Search screens to enhance visual momentum, and including navigation to all search methods on every screen for consistency.

References

[1] S. Portal, “Scholars Portal,” Scholars Portal. [Online]. Available: https://scholarsportal.info/. [Accessed: 04-Feb-2020].