Usability Testing of an E- Learning System: A Comparative study of two Evaluation Techniques

Abstract

E- Learning is the most feasible way to hold distance learning by providing learning materials over the internet; thus trend is becoming popular in developed and developing countries. This learning style becomes difficult to use by learners, usually by vague interface design. Due to which learner/user becomes reluctant towards E- Learning system. Usability testing of E- Learning systems targets its interface design, usability and human computer interaction. This study is an attempt to uncover the problems that occur in the use of such systems at user end. A survey from learners of an E- Learning system is carried out and result are compared by another usability evaluation technique named Heuristic Evaluation commonly employed by experts. Both end users and usability expert participated in this research by which two different evaluation methods are used to evaluate the usability of Virtual University Learning Management System. At the end some suggestions are given in order to improve the usability of target system after validating the results.