July 2001
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Participants were screened to include a mix of men and women, with a minimum of at least 3 years using a graphical user interface (GUI). Each participant indicated that he or she had at least six months experience (and often a great deal more) with the web, used document editing software at least weekly, email at least 3 times a week with a volume of mail exchanged exceeding 25 messages. (All participants, except P12, completed the full study. P12 had to cancel her scheduled time, and our timetable did not permit rescheduling.) Each participant received $75 in gift certificates for completing the study. (We had one additional test participant, who fits the profile, but works for Sun. She was the guinea pig to give us practice with the newly configured laboratory and with our tasks and scripts. Since several parts of her experience differed from the rest, we have not included her data. The protocol for the Pilot subject, the participant who completes a "dress rehearsal" of the study, matched the rest of the participants, and therefore we have included his data.)
The participants for this study (Pilot, and P1 through P12) are experienced professionals in B(usiness), S(cientific) fields, or C(reative) endeavors. For example, the Pilot participant works in a creative industry, but his job is in finance: therefore we categoried him as B. Similarly, P12 works in Aerospace, but her role is in drafting and design, using CAD software, therefore we categorized her as C. Each participant can be considered a technical professional, but not in computer programming or information technology. Some of these people use industry-specific applications or productivity software for hours each day. We wanted to look at how people with prior experience using computers would respond to a new operating system and desktop environment.
We intentionally screened out people whose jobs included more than 25% time programming, where we were quite inclusive in what kinds of programming we asked about. Potential participants whose jobs or avocational programming included extensive Java, C or C++, LISP, SQL, Fortran or similar expertise were disqualified from this study. Potential participants whose work or hobbies included less than 25% time using HTML or Javascript or Lingo might still be included.
We selected these three types of professionals with several hypotheses in mind. Would business professionals be receptive to the integration of desktop services? Would creative professionals respond to the opportunities for customization in GNOME? Would those with a scientific bent be more likely to experiment? Would one or another group be more thrown off step by the unfamiliar? While we were careful to balance the types of participants by professional role (B, S, C), we did not observe strong patterns distinguishing them. Likewise, we didn't see strong difference between the men and the women. The only pattern worth noting is that the people with greater programming backgrounds had better predictions about what would happen next or where to look for clues to solve the tasks we had given them. This tendency suggests that GNOME needs some additional work to make it more usable by people unlike the developer community.
| Participant | Profession | Industry | B/S/C | Completed study? | Years in position (or similar) | Mail Client | programming, HTML, Java, etc. | Self-rating
0 (novice) - 5 (expert) |
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Win | Mac | UNIX | ||||||
| Pilot | Financial Analyst | Industrial Design firm |
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Outlook
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n/a |
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| P1 | Customer Service Manager | ISP |
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Outlook | n/a |
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| P2 | Analytic Chemist | BioTech |
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Outlook | n/a |
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| P3 | Content Manager | Collateral Marketing |
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Outlook | <25% time HTML |
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| P4 | Graphic Design | Self-employed |
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Outlook, yahoo | <25% time on authoring tool |
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| P5 | Director of Marketing | Equipment Reseller |
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Netscape, Outlook | n/a |
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| P6 | Videographer | Self-employed |
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Netscape | n/a |
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| P7 | Project Manager | Translation company |
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Outlook | n/a |
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| P8 | Director of Diagnostics | BioTech |
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Hotmail | n/a |
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| P9 | Mechanical Engineer | BioTech |
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Netscape | college only |
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| P10 | Business Analyst | Web Infrastructure |
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| P11 | Senior Research Associate | BioTech |
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Lotus Notes, Eudora | <25% time HTML, Java, C++ |
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| P12 | Drafting, Design | Aerospace |
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Netscape | <10% Visual Basic |
5
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3
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1 (Solaris) 1 (CDE) |
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