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Unit 10: Evaluation of User Studies

Current information about ADL, including descriptions of the current JIGI interface with screenshots Notes
and a brief overview of the functionality, is available at http://www. alexandria.ucsb.edu.
Using ADL, one can
1. Find information about a geographic area—the “what’s there” question that starts with a
query area drawn on a map browser.
2. Find where a place or feature is located—the “where is it” question that starts with a
place or feature name.
These basic query types can be combined into “what’s there” questions that start with place names,
as in the “What do you know about the Santa Barbara area?” example. The query to ADL can also
contain other parameters such as a date range, a type of information (e.g., maps or a particular
feature type such as rivers), a format (e.g., TIFF), freetext, assigned terms, originators, or identifiers
(e.g., control numbers).
A selection can be made among the multiple collections available for searching. The items returned
that match the query parameters can be evaluated by their footprints, thumbnail and browse images,
and metadata attributes. Thumbnail images are small image representations, Browse images are
larger, and provide more detail. Selected items can be put aside in user-named folders. On-line data
can be downloaded directly to local storage. Interfaces have been tested that provide access to
application packages with which items from ADL’s collections can be processed.

Interaction of Evaluation with Design and Implementation

There are obvious problems with evaluating an innovative and evolving system, and with eliciting
from users what they might do with such a system if it existed. With new software systems there is a
degree of education involved, because users must understand the new capabilities to evaluate them.
The process may be thought of as a cycle in which the implementers build certain functionality, users
are introduced to the potential of the new features, the users request additional functionality (some of
which may be part of the system but not recognized), and the implementers modify the design. This
has been the pattern with ADL.

It describes the formative evaluation process that has captured the development
cycle and guided the evolution of the geo library system and the understanding
of potential use.

Self Assessment

Multiple Choice Questions:
3. The first ADL prototype was called:
(a) Rapid prototype (b) Research libraries
(c) Both (a) and (b) (d) None of these.
4. ADL is funded by
(a) NSF (b) NASA
(c) GRIN (d) None of these.

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