CMSC 434
Homework #2
Spring 2005
Due Wednesday February 9th.
Hmmmmmm, what would I like to read today...
For this project you will attempt to find the latest book by
J. K. Rowling, find the lowest price at the site, and begin
the ordering process (get to the page at which you would start
to place the actual order but do not actually go through the
process of ordering it).
You will go to each of the following web sites:
A1 Books http://www.a1books.com
Amazon http://www.amazon.com
Barnes & Noble http://www.bn.com
For each site, find out the most recent work they have by J. K. Rowling
and give the title, publication date, format and lowest price. If you
have a question of what I mean by this while doing the project, make a
choice of what you think I mean, document that in your homework write-up
and continue your work. For each site, do this three times. Do all of
the following for each trial:
- Time yourself in seconds
- Count the number of pages you visit
- Count the number of switches betweeen mouse and keyboard
- Count the number of mouse clicks
|
| Time (secs)
| # Pages
| # device switches
| # mouse clicks
|
| First Trial | | | |
|
| Second Trial | | | |
|
| Third Trial | | | |
|
In addition to turning in three tables as the one above (one for each site),
write a one page analysis (single space, 11 pt font) of the three interfaces
for finding and buying the book. What can you say about the efficiency of
each system based on your tiny experiment? What worked, what didn't work?
Where were you confused, frustrated, surprised? What did you enjoy?
And, most importantly, what recommendations do you have to improve all
three systems. On another page, discuss the techniques you used to collect
the requested statistics while doing this homework, if there were any
unforseen problems in concentrating on the task, and in general any problems
that arose while you were working on the assignment.
Make sure you staple all of these sheets of paper together to turn in.