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Newsletter | Archive | July 2002


Wimbledon - Usability in Action: Search

Keyword entry is not very forgiving. Many of the tennis players' names are uncommon and difficult to spell. Mechanisms in use now that are becoming popular are features on Google such as 'Did you mean Hingis?' when the user has perhaps misspelled the name and typed "Hengis", so the user can choose to accept the correct spelling and do a new search with it if s/he wishes to.

However, at least the keywords entered are currently reiterated at the top of the search page, which allows users to check whether or not they have made a spelling mistake.

The total number of matches found is also displayed as well the matches currently being shown. This provides users with a good sense of the size of their result set. Most users do not go past the first or second result pages, so the provision of a weighted list is very useful as it ensures the more relevant matches appear at the top of the search result list.

If a large amount of results are obtained there should be an option to refine the search and if very few or no results are returned there should be an option to broaden the search. It is good practice to provide facilities to broaden or refine a search rather than 'dead-ending' users with no results or overwhelming them with too many.

Search results
Search results page showing results weighted by closeness of match to the query

Wimbledon - Usability in Action 

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