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Process > Iterative Design and Test > Introduction
The third step in our overall project strategy was to iteratively refine our designs in order to optimize their usability, desirability, and safety. In order to do this we conducted multiple rounds of user testing, design, and prototype builds. We employed Think Aloud user studies and built a prototype environment resembling that of a working car stereo. The testing was intended to critique our design concepts, created in response to identified user intents, and to direct an iterative test and redesign cycle for the summer.
Our first usability goal was to minimize critical incidents with respect to important tasks. One metric for testing this was to compare the number of high critical incidents across user test phases. Another metric was to compare the percentage of high critical incidents to overall critical incidents across user test phases. Our second usability goal was to maximize the intuitiveness of our designs, which was judged by how obvious the existence, and functionality, of a concept was to the majority of users. Our final usability goal was to maximize the learnability of our interface. This was judged based on how quickly users were able to understand the concepts as well as the memorability of their functionality throughout the span of the test.
