Ways to Prioritize Tasks - I

Now that you have reviewed an example of developing a task, the next issue is ascertaining what tasks you need to include. Due to time constraints verv rarely do you actually test the full range of tasks that comprise an entire interface, documentation, or both together. (It is impractical to conduct test sessions that last for days at a time, unless you are willing to commit an inordinate amount of resources.) Instead, you typically face a situation of testing a representative sample of the product's functions.

When choosing this sample of tasks, it is important that you exercise as many of the most important aspects of the product as possible and address all test objectives. Filter or reduce your task list to something manageable, while ensuring that you capture as many of the usability deficiencies as possible. 

The following list outlines some common methods you can use that prioritize or pare down the task list without needless sacrifice.

- Prioritize by frequency. Select those tasks that represent the most frequently performed tasks of your end  user population. The most frequent tasks are the ones that the typical end user performs daily, possibly up to 75 to 80 percent of the time, when using the product. For example, if you were testing a word processing package, you would want to make sure that the end user could easily perform the following tasks before you concern yourself with the more esoteric tasks such as "how to hide a comment that does not print out."

1. Open a file.

2. Save a file.

3. Edit a file

4. Print a file.