Usability Heuristics as an assessment parameter: For performing Usability Testing

As the field of Usability Engineering gains more importance day by day, the phenomenon of testing the Usability of software and hardware products is becoming popular too. But, in presence of so many usability testing techniques, selecting an assessment parameter for performing usability testing is considered to be a great challenge for testers. The aim of this research is to suggest usability heuristics as an assessment parameter to Usability testing. To achieve the aim and objectives of this research, renowned Usability expert Jakob Nielsen´s 10 Usability Heuristics have been chosen for assessing usability of some public sectors universities websites. In the second step, by using these Heuristics as an assessment parameter, Usability Survey and Heuristic Evaluation techniques are applied on these websites. It has been found that Heuristics are key attributes of software products and considered good measuring parameters to assess usability. Meanwhile this research is also a contribution towards rating the Usability of some academic websites. And hence, in this research, Usability Heuristics have been chosen as an assessment parameter for performing Usability Testing.