User Testing and Research
Tools and Services
Federal Crowdsource Mobile Testing Program —Compatibility testing service that agencies can use to test the mobile-friendliness of their websites.
News and Events on User Testing and Research
135 posts
User Experience
Building a Bureau-Wide Usability Collaboration Group: Lessons Learned from the U.S. Geological Survey
Learn about the U.S. Geological Survey’s Usability Collaboration Area in this short interview with the group’s organizer.
Redesigning an Intranet Site: Final Stages, Launch, and Lessons Learned
Helpful lessons from the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) on the redesign of an intranet.
Making Customer Satisfaction Data Actionable at the Peace Corps
Learn how measuring customer experience helped inform and guide website development at Peace Corps
3 Ways to Manage Research Projects Remotely
Being a remote team doesn’t mean you should forgo any of your research rituals. It means finding different ways to do them.
Finding Usability Testers: Tips from an Army Recruiter
An Army recruiter shares how her training in the Army has helped in her approach to usability testing, and gives a peek inside how usability testing works for USAJOBS.gov at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM).
A Conversation With ITIF About the State of Federal Government Websites
Since it’s been nearly six months since their report was released, we wanted to check in with ITIF and see what they’ve learned, what they’ve heard from agencies and what their future plans are to build on this research.
Code.gov User Interviews — What We Learned
This post was originally published by Code.gov on Medium. It’s been a year since the federal government published the Federal Source Code Policy, which created the foundation for Code.gov. In honor of the policy’s anniversary, we checked in with our users to learn more about them, their needs, and the challenges they face. Our users
Walter Reed’s 3-D Printing Innovations Help Warfighters Get Back to Life
This is part of an ongoing series highlighting the innovations and research happening at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. Wounded warriors who dream of returning to playing hockey, climbing mountains or simply brushing their teeth with ease can look to 3-D printing innovations at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center to
Shedding Light on Underserved Users through Research
How user interviews helped spotlight the needs of a previously forgotten group. We may not like to admit it, but, most web services or sites have users that (for whatever reason) just aren’t well understood—and in turn, not well served. Conducting user interviews and making sure you get good participation from those groups can help
The Cutting EDGE: New Virtual Training Prepares First Responders for Active Shooter Incidents
Amidst the chaos of an active shooter event, preparedness is key to a seamless, swift and effective response—and a new video game funded by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate and the U.S. Army Research Laboratory just might do the trick.
Have You Critiqued Your Critique Process?
DEMO Whenever I hear someone complain about the process of a design critique, I’m always a bit surprised. Blame it on the fact
Vets.gov: A Modern Software Development Environment in Government
When people think of government software, they often think of COBOL and PowerBuilder 5, with manual software deploys every three to six months on a fixed number of machines in a government-run data center. This perception is sometimes justified, but sometimes entirely wrong. Regardless, the perception makes many developers reluctant to work for the government
OIP Seeks Your Participation in the Development of the National FOIA Portal
The Office of Information Policy (OIP) is pleased to announce its collaboration with GSA’s 18F team on the development of a National FOIA Portal. This is the next step in a long line of OIP initiatives working towards a National FOIA Portal going back to 2010 with the launch of FOIA.gov. Most recently, the FOIA
Engineering the Chaski Relay: A Touchscreen Game at the National Museum of the American Indian
On visiting The Great Inka Road: Engineering an Empire exhibition at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian, it is impossible not be taken by the sheer scale of the Inka Road. Qhapaq Ñan, or the Road of the Inka, is a 25,000-mile long road system that fed the rapid expansion of the Inka
A Complete Redesign with You in Mind
We’re excited to launch a complete redesign of USDA.gov featuring stronger visual storytelling components, a more modern user-experience with easy to find services and resources, and to top it off, a completely mobile-friendly design. Through careful planning, thoughtful design, and a primary focus on user experience and usability, we’ve taken the best of government and industry
New ITIF Report Inspires a Closer Look at Website Performance and Security—Here Is Where to Begin
The Information Technology & Innovation Foundation (ITIF) recently published a report, Benchmarking U.S. Government Websites, that looks at the performance, security, and accessibility of the top 297 government websites. ITIF is a think tank in Washington, D.C. whose mission is to formulate, evaluate, and promote policy solutions that accelerate innovation in technology and public policy.
Presenting Online Data to Wide-Ranging User Communities
Presenting data online that will serve a wide range of users can be challenging. It requires an understanding of the target users’ needs, interests, and familiarity with the use of data handling tools. This challenge can be especially daunting for government websites that present data for use by the general public. The audience for such
DigitalGov Readers and Subscribers: We Want to Talk to You (Again)
We at DigitalGov want to hear more about you – your job, your role, the challenges you face — all of it — as you work to deliver more secure, effective, and reliable
DigitalGov University in Review: 2016 Training Trends
DigitalGov University (DGU), the events platform for DigitalGov, provides programming to build and accelerate digital capacity by providing webinars and in-person events highlighting innovations, case studies, tools, and resources. Thanks to your participation, DGU hosted over 90 events with 6,648 attendees from over 100 agencies across federal, tribal, state, and local governments.
Lessons Learned: Evaluating Video Content
If you were to perform research on the value proposition of training videos, you would notice that opinions are split on their efficacy. Despite all the tools that are out there that can help you evaluate video quality, views, and drop-off, there are some things that should be considered in the analysis of your organization’s
