PULSE Portable Usability Lab for System Evaluation

Usability greatly affects the acceptability, affordability, and overall success of technology. However, the resources that are typically required to ensure usability are substantial, and failing to do so will degrade a system`s ability to support the user`s mission, decrease the perceived value of the technology, and reduce the number of future transition opportunities. Aptima`s Portable Usability Lab for System Evaluation (PULSE) is a tool comprised of software and hardware that supports the analyst in gathering, organizing, and sharing usability evaluation requirements, automatically generating systematic test plans based on those requirements, implementing and adapting those test plans, and analyzing and interpreting the results. PULSE consists of four modules, each of which guides the analyst through the usability assessment process: Test Requirement Specification, Test Plan Generation, Data Collection, and Analysis. In addition to these modules, PULSE leverages a Community of Practice to supplement the analyst as the assessment is planned, executed, and analyzed. The collaborative nature of this functionality supports users with all levels of expertise by providing access to numerous resources that, typically, have been previously unavailable. PULSE is versatile, and provides an efficient and reliable means of evaluating and ensuring usability by bringing these capabilities to bear across numerous domains.