use case project

I used one of my favorite sites, Espn.com, as my use-case. It is full of information, but that can make it overwhelming, too. So, I decided it would be an excellent choice.

The first of five tasks I asked my friend to complete was to find the profile page for my favorite coach, the head man of the NBA’s Charlotte Bobcats, Larry Brown. My friend clicked the “NBA” button on the top nav bar, then clicked “teams” on the top nav bar, then scrolled down and clicked on the “Charlotte Bobcats.” these three steps went quickly and without much trouble. He did run into some trouble on the team site page, but finally clicked on “roster” on the top nav bar. Then, he went to the bottom and clicked “Larry Brown.” So, that went pretty well, overall.

The second thing I had him find was the page for my other favorite coach, Steve Spurrier. He’s the head football coach at the University of South Carolina. So, my friend clicked “college football” on the top nav, then “teams” on the top nav, then clicked “South Carolina” which was under SEC. Again, upon reaching the team page, things bogged down a bit. He then went to “roster” on the top nav bar, but that was incorrect. So, he had to go back to the team page. He searched and searched for quite awhile, before finally going to a recap of the last game, hoping there might be something about the coach in there, and that he could link to his name. This was, I thought, a pretty savvy move. Unfortunately, it didn’t work. So, finally, having exhausted all options, he just used the search function, typing in the coach’s name, and that worked.

The third thing I had him do was see if one of my favorite columnists (Jeff MacGregor) on espn.com had a new column up for the week. He clicked on “Commentary” on the top nav. On this page, there was a spot where you could search for a particular columnist, either by last name, or by sport. I mentioned that this guy was a general columnist, not covering any specific sport, so he used the last name option, which goes by letter. So, he did “M,” but, for some reason, Macgregor failed to pop up. So, he had to break down and utilize the search function, typing in the name, which was successful.

The fourth thing I asked him to do was find the latest video episode of “Mayne Street.” As he went to click on the “video” button, a selection of shows immediately came up as he hovered over the button, one of which was indeed “Mayne Street.” Obviously, this was one of the better functions of the site. It made this task very easy. He clicked on “Mayne Street” and the show’s page came up, complete with all the episodes and other stuff. Excellent.

Finally, I had him look up when my favorite sporting event, the Kentucky Derby, will be held this year. Obviously, everyone knows it’s famously always “The First Saturday in May,” so it would be easy to figure out. Alas, that is not the point. The point was to have him look it up through the site. He hovered over the “all sports” button on the top nav, which made a whole plethora of sports appear, and he clicked horse racing. Then, he clicked the “calendars” button on the top nav bar. However, there was no way to go to next May. The calendar only went through 2009. This was very disappointing and unthinkable. Talk about a major glitch. They really need to rectify that.

Obviously, the site was varied. The best thing they did was the ease with which one could find the video of “Mayne Street” episodes. The worst was the fact that their calendar for horse racing events only went through the current year. That was pathetic. The other three tasks were in the middle, ranging from fairly easy to accomplish, to arduous, difficult, onerous, and considerably more time-consuming