Usability vs. Functionality testing
Last week, we conducted a usability test on a web application. We found ourselves in a fix since the application hadn’t undergone sufficient functional testing.
So in the process of uncovering usability issues, we ended up uncovering functional issues as well. This was a nightmare since the whole flow of usability was interrupted hence need to redo the test once the functional test was finished.
In the core, functional testing focuses on how the product behaves based on the functional requirements. This is done through ‘feature-by-feature validation of behaviour’, hence quality assurance.
Functional requirements process is quiet simple. First, it requires an understanding of the system requirements, identifying the test data, computation of expected outcomes, execution and comparison.
Some tools for functional testing are: Selenium, UFT, SoapUI, IBM Rational Functional Tester and Watir among others.
Functionality testing is a predecessor to usability testing in order to have valid feedback from the testers who are using the application. If it’s not done prior, it ends up affecting the flow of the users in their quest to complete a task (as it did). They end up struggling with bugs that could have been identified and fixed during functional testing.
So what’s usability testing. This is testing of how easily a user completes the required task on the application. It focuses on user acceptance, structure, how clear the content is, layout of the page and navigational flow.
Usability testing encompasses 5 components:
- Efficiency — how fast return users are able to accomplish tasks
- Learnability — how easy is it to use the app and accomplish tasks in their first interaction.
- Satisfaction — how much the user likes using the application.
- Memorability — how much the return users can remember to use the application after being away for a while.
- Error — the number of errors users make, the severity of these errors and ease of recovery from these errors.
Usability testing is designed with tasks that users need to perform in order to explore and use the entire platform. On completion of each task, the testers answers a bunch of questions, they can later include their concerns, comments and feedback.
This can be conducted on a physical space or a platform. If it’s done on a physical space, the moderators can go ahead and conduct an open forum. Some platform that conduct these test are: testbirds, usertesting, and our very own crispytest among others.
The more the testers fit the target market, the more helpful the feedback is in uncovering usability stumbling blocks. For crispytest, we require our clients to provide their customer profile so that we can use testers that fit this profile. This way, we are able to provide an optimal analysis of the feedback, impact and recommendations.
In conclusion, in as much as functional and usability testing are related, they can’t be conducted at the same time and functional has to come before the usability to avoid a ‘bugs’ nightmare and wastage of resources.
