Okay; I follow the link to the site. After looking over the first page, go to registration from the top menu bar. First screen doesn't look hopeful, scroll down, and there's a heading saying "Are you already registered as a member?" ("as a member" is redundant in that heading.) Click "membership list" link in that paragraph, and get a membership list. With an alphabetical index at the top even!
I'd rate this A, myself. I probably overrate people's ability to scroll beyond what instantly appears on their screen, though; maybe it's only a B+.
Okay, now I see the stuff behind the cut tag, but not comments yet.
I would have clicked on a "membership" link first if I'd seen one for this task; I remember consciously thinking "nothing here points directly to what I'm looking for; so, what page points in the right general direction?" and that was of course "registration". A top-level link directly to the list would, I hope, be "members" or "membership list"; but I don't think that's really a top-level item.
While I mostly don't like them, an active outline control can help some with the problem you describe; if you click "membership" you get an expanded and hence more detailed list. If, of course, it works at all with the browser I'm using.
In a large group there will always be people for whom a page design doesn't work, you're absolutely right. Doing actual user testing (as this is, at a low level) is a good way to find out how actual people actually interact with the page, considerably better than just a few people's mental models (yes, including mine).
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2009-02-19 02:51 am (UTC)Okay; I follow the link to the site. After looking over the first page, go to registration from the top menu bar. First screen doesn't look hopeful, scroll down, and there's a heading saying "Are you already registered as a member?" ("as a member" is redundant in that heading.) Click "membership list" link in that paragraph, and get a membership list. With an alphabetical index at the top even!
I'd rate this A, myself. I probably overrate people's ability to scroll beyond what instantly appears on their screen, though; maybe it's only a B+.
Okay, now I see the stuff behind the cut tag, but not comments yet.
I would have clicked on a "membership" link first if I'd seen one for this task; I remember consciously thinking "nothing here points directly to what I'm looking for; so, what page points in the right general direction?" and that was of course "registration". A top-level link directly to the list would, I hope, be "members" or "membership list"; but I don't think that's really a top-level item.
While I mostly don't like them, an active outline control can help some with the problem you describe; if you click "membership" you get an expanded and hence more detailed list. If, of course, it works at all with the browser I'm using.
In a large group there will always be people for whom a page design doesn't work, you're absolutely right. Doing actual user testing (as this is, at a low level) is a good way to find out how actual people actually interact with the page, considerably better than just a few people's mental models (yes, including mine).