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usability evaluation comparison table

Subject	perform on	have steps	has definition
evaluation by observation of users		Select users corresponding to each of the most important actors, and who are both beginners and experts in the domain as well as people who are experts and non-experts in terms of their experience with computers Select the most important use cases for each of the actors you selected in the last step, and determine specific tasks for the users to follow Write instructions for each scenario in small cards so you can hand them to the users one at a time Arrange individual evaluation sessions of about 20 to 30 minutes Explain the purpose of the evaluation to the user Videotape each session Talk with the users as they perform each task and ask them what they are thinking, what they think the system's feedback means, and ask them why they perform various actions When the users finish all the tasks, de-brief them Take note of any difficulties experienced by the users, no matter how small Formulate recommended changes to the system that would avoid repetition of the difficulties
heuristic evaluation	a finished system or a prototype	pick some user cases to evaluate, focussing initially on the most important ones for each window, page or dialog that appears during the execution of the use case, study it in detail to look for possible usability defects: violations of the principles and guidelines (the heuristics) discussed in the previous section write down a description of each defect and any ideas for how the defect might be fixed	The process of systematically looking for usability defects in a user interface, based on a set of usability guidelines or principles

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