Hi, Inspired by the simulated usability review at http://www.thiesen.org/d-i/index.html by marcus@thiesen.org, I thought I'd take the usability testing of d-i one step further by arranging a real usability test. Yes, that's with a live crash test dummy. :) I hoped to see a result similar to Marcus' simulation, but unfortunately I didn't. While I've only tested with one person so far, I now believe there is a rather big amount of usability flaws in d-i. Further testing is certainly warranted, but I couldn't set aside the results I've got so far. I'm concentrating on users who have never installed an operating system before. While this may at first seem like the wrong thing to do, I actually think it's a very sensible approach. If a user who has never installed any operating system can use d-i to successfully install Debian, then anyone can. Adding more control and features for experienced users should be easy, but if the installer is that simple then my guess is that even the "gurus" will appreciate getting the installation over with so they can concentrate on more important things such as installing and configuring software packages. The complete results of the usability test is at http://people.paniq.net/~fabbe/tmp/d-i-test/ (yes, "tmp" means temporary -- it'll be up for many weeks, even months, though). Feedback is welcome, and I'm subscribed to debian-boot so please discuss here. I'm trying to find time to arrange a few more tests within the next month or so, so that I can see what other flaws emerge. Cheers, -- Fabian Fagerholm <fabbe@paniq.net>
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