<p>Yeah the different commercial packages do have some pretty different ideas! I think OpenLP should pride itself on having an interface that is powerful and pretty efficient and yet not too complex for the beginner user In my personal opinion, some elements of the UI hit the spot really nicely, while some could be tuned a little more.</p>
<p>My main point in the post above is to do with UI usability testing. I know everyone, user and dev alike, has their own opinion of what the UI should and shouldn't be!</p>
<p>But what I'm wondering is, once an idea has been tabled (or implemented), would there be value in doing proper usability testing on how well the UI change works?</p>
<p>I'm talking about setting a user a task they need to achieve, and then observing (directly / via video recording / via user 'think-aloud' / via post-test interview) how they go about it, what difficulties they have, how long it takes them, etc. This can be done on a prototype or a working system, on both old and new versions of the UI. The aim is to gather quantiative data on whether a UI change is better or worse, for both novice and experienced users, and use that data to make more informed UI design decisions.</p>
<p>Has this sort of usability testing been done for OpenLP? With any success?</p>
<p>UI design then becomes an iterative process of redesigning the UI on the basis of usability testing, and then submitting it for more testing, and so on.</p>
<p>PS I'm glad to discover a dev culture that is open to ideas, and honest in it's assessment of them!</p>