Guideline For Usability of Tanzania Universities Websites

Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites: Mhina Mpeho Ombeni [TP017080] 2011
GUIDELINE FOR USABILITY OF TANZANIA UNIVERSITIES WEBSITES
BY
NAME: MHINA MPEHO OMBENI [TP017080]

INTAKE: TPMF1010ITM
SUPERVISOR: NARESH KUMAR
A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULLFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS OF

STAFFORDSHIRE UNIVERSITY FOR THE DEGREE OF MSC. IN INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
MANAGEMENT
2011
Dissertation: MSc. of Information Technology Management
Page 1
Acknowledgement
This dissertation is written as part of the fulfillment of Masters of Science in Information
Technology Management. This dissertation would not have been possible without the guidance,
support and encouragement from several personnel.
First, I would like to be gratefully to the almighty GOD for been with me from the beginning
until end of the dissertation by giving me strength, health and capability to manage and finish
this research on time.
I would also like to send my sincere thanks and greatly appreciation to my supervisor Mr. Naresh
Kumar for his guidance, support and advice which led me to complete successfully of this
dissertation. The feedback which I received from my supervisor produces my best work.
I would like to send my acknowledgement to my family Mr & Mrs Ombeni Mhina, My Brother
Nicco Ombeni, My Sisters Rest Ombeni and Esther Ombeni, for their encouragement, support
and motivate me for the whole my study period while am in Malaysia. Also I would like to
thanks my fiance Victoria J. Rowan for been with me side by side and encourage me all the
time for this dissertation.
My gratitude also goes to my advisor Mr. Sivananthan as well.
Also I would like to thanks Mr. Zailan Arabee for his valuable advice which kept me on the right
track. Last but not least, I would like to thank my friends for their advice and thanks to research
assistance for their data collection process.
Thank you to everyone and be blessed.
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Dedication
I
am
dedicating
this
research
to
my
Family
Mr.
and
Mrs.
Ombeni
Mhina.
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Abstract
Now days Tanzania as one of the developing countries is struggling to ensure penetration of
internet is successfully. The importance of Tanzania students to use Universities websites
increase everyday and some of the Universities have seen website as very important tool. Even
though some of Tanzania universities have already own their websites but their websites still
look unprofessional which make Tanzania students not satisfied with their Universities websites.
This problem is common for many Tanzania universities because there is no any guideline or
approach which can lead them to design a good, attractive and professional University website.
The main aim of this research is describe the issues of web usability from different Universities
websites including Tanzania universities, to describe the success reasons of the different
Universities websites, To analyze website usability Guideline and framework for other
Universities and to produce the Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites to help
overcome the issues which hinder Tanzania students not to access their Universities websites
frequently, not to be happy and satisfied with their University website. This paper explain the
current issues of Tanzania and different Universities websites, overcoming issues of Universities
websites usability, and successful implementation of Universities websites in other countries.
The Guideline and recommendations produced to emphasize and improve the competences and
skills in designing/developing Tanzania universities websites.
Keywords:
Tanzania universities
Tanzania universities websites
Website Usability
Students
Web-designers
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Table of Contents
Acknowledgement ......................................................................................................................... 1
Dedication ...................................................................................................................................... 3
Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... 4
List of Figures and Tables ............................................................................................................ 9
1.
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY........................................................ 11

1.1
Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 11
1.1.1
Usability .............................................................................................................................. 11
1.1.2
Website usability ................................................................................................................. 11
1.1.3
Important of Usability ......................................................................................................... 11
1.1.4
The Usability Goals ............................................................................................................ 11
1.1.5
Internet penetration in Tanzania ......................................................................................... 12
1.1.6
Tanzania universities websites ............................................................................................ 12
1.2
Background of the research ........................................................................................................ 13
1.3
Research Problem ....................................................................................................................... 16
1.4
Project Aims and Objectives ....................................................................................................... 17
1.5
Justification of the research ........................................................................................................ 17
1.6
Methodology............................................................................................................................... 19
1.7
Outline of the Dissertation.......................................................................................................... 20
1.8
Definition of the terms used ....................................................................................................... 21
1.9
Scope of the Research................................................................................................................. 22
1.10
Research Deliverable .................................................................................................................. 22
1.11
Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 22
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW .......................................................................... 24

2.1
Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 24
2.2
Web Interface Design.................................................................................................................. 25
2.3
Current issues of web usability ................................................................................................... 25
2.4
Evaluation of the web design framework ................................................................................... 28
2.5
The Guideline for web usability .................................................................................................. 31
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3.
2.6
Overcome the issues of Universities websites usability ............................................................. 35
2.7
Current issues of the Tanzania universities websites ................................................................. 37
2.8
Successful implementation of Universities websites in other countries .................................... 38
2.9
Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 39
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY ..................................................................................... 42

3.1
Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 42
3.2
Justification for the Paradigm and Methodology ....................................................................... 43
3.2.1
3.3
Research Approach ..................................................................................................................... 45
3.4
Design of Study exploration ........................................................................................................ 45
3.4.1
Research Design.................................................................................................................. 45
3.5
Research Procedures .................................................................................................................. 46
3.6
Data Collection ............................................................................................................................ 47
3.6.1
Questionnaire ...................................................................................................................... 47
3.6.2
Interview ............................................................................................................................. 48
3.7
4.
Introduction to Paradigms used........................................................................................... 43
Data Analysis Method ................................................................................................................. 48
3.7.1
Quantitative Analysis .......................................................................................................... 48
3.7.2
Qualitative Analysis ............................................................................................................ 48
3.8
Ethical considerations ................................................................................................................. 49
3.9
Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 49
CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS ...................................................................................... 52

4.1
Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 52
4.2
Profile of respondents ................................................................................................................ 52
4.3
Questionnaires Findings.............................................................................................................. 53
4.3.1
Category A: ......................................................................................................................... 53
4.3.1
Personal Information of the respondents............................................................................. 53
4.3.2
Category B: ......................................................................................................................... 58
4.3.2
Evaluation of user interface design and content of the Tanzania universities websites...... 58
4.3.3
Category C: ......................................................................................................................... 69
4.3.3 Evaluation of navigation and links of the Tanzania universities websites ................................. 69
4.3.4
Category D: ......................................................................................................................... 76
4.3.5
Evaluation of performance and effectiveness of the Tanzania universities websites ......... 76
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4.3.6
4.4
Interview Findings ....................................................................................................................... 94
4.4.1
Interview 1: ......................................................................................................................... 94
4.4.2
Interview 2: ......................................................................................................................... 96
4.4.3
Lessons Learned from interview 1 and 2 ............................................................................ 98
4.5
5.
6.
Category E: General Suggestion ......................................................................................... 89
Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 99
CHAPTER 5: ARTEFACT .............................................................................................. 101

5.1
Introduction .............................................................................................................................. 101
5.2
How the Analysis was used to create the Artefact ................................................................... 101
5.3
How the Literature Review was used to support the Artefact ................................................. 102
5.4
Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites ......................................................... 104
5.4.1
Preparation and Planning .................................................................................................. 105
5.4.2
University website Structure and Content......................................................................... 106
5.4.3
Support navigation ............................................................................................................ 109
5.4.4
University webpage Design .............................................................................................. 111
5.4.5
Evaluation of University website ...................................................................................... 113
5.4.6
University website Management and Maintenance .......................................................... 115
5.5
Conclusion ................................................................................................................................. 115
5.6
Testing of the Artefact .............................................................................................................. 116
5.6.1
Category A: Evaluation of user interface design and content ........................................... 116
5.6.2
Category B: evaluation of navigation and links ................................................................ 121
5.6.3
Category C: evaluation of performance and effectiveness................................................ 123
5.6.4
Category D: General Suggestion about the proposed guideline ....................................... 130
5.6.1
Conclusion ........................................................................................................................ 131
CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION ...................................... 133

6.1
Introduction .............................................................................................................................. 133
6.2
Conclusions relating to the research Questions/Research Problem ........................................ 133
6.3
Recommendations and Suggestions ......................................................................................... 134
6.4
Limitations................................................................................................................................. 134
6.5
Self-Review................................................................................................................................ 135
6.6
Further research ....................................................................................................................... 135
6.7
Conclusion ................................................................................................................................. 136
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7.
APPENDIX A: Log Sheets ................................................................................................ 138
8.
APPENDIX B: Gantt chart .............................................................................................. 146
9.
APPENDIX C: Proposal ................................................................................................... 150
10. APPENDIX D: PDRM Literature Review ................................................................... 165

11. APPENDIX E: Questionnaires questions & Evidence of Questionnaires responds ... 194
11.1
Questionnaires questions ......................................................................................................... 194
11.2
Evidence of Questionnaires responds ...................................................................................... 201
12. APPENDIX F: Interview questions ................................................................................. 207

13. APPENDIX G: Testing questions & Evidence of the result .......................................... 211
14. APPENDIX H: Fast -Track Ethical Approval Form ..................................................... 218
15. REFERENCES .................................................................................................................. 222
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List of Figures and Tables

Tables and Figures Name
Figure 1.2.1 ----Sokoine University Agriculture
Figure 1.2.2 ----Institute of Finance and Management
Figure 1.2.3 ---- Teofilo Kisanji University
Figure 2.3.1 ---- Current issues of web usability
Figure 2.4.1 ---- Lucid Framework
Figure 2.4.2 ---- Stages of Lucid framework
Figure 3.1.1 ---- The research process Onion
Figure 3.4.1 ---- Research design
Figure 3.5 ---- Research Procedure
Table 4.3.1.1 and Figure 4.3.1.1 ---- Gender
Table 4.3.1.2 and Figure 4.3.1.2 ---- Age
Table 4.3.1.3 and Figure 4.3.1.3 ---- Student from Different Tanzania
Table 4.3.1.4 and Figure 4.3.1.4 ---- Education level
Figure 4.3.2.1 and Table 4.3.2.1 ---- Impression of the overall look of Tanzania universities
Figure 4.3.2.2 and Table 4.3.2.2 ---- Reading text in website
Figure 4.3.2.3 and Table 4.3.2.3 ---- Difficulties faced during reading the text in Tanzania universities websites
Figure 4.3.2.4 and Table 4.3.2.4 ---- Easy to remember how to use university website
Figure 4.3.2.5 and Table 4.3.2.5 ---- Easy to learn how to use university website
Figure 4.3.2.6 and Table 4.3.2.6 ---- The Consistent design of all website pages
Figure 4.3.2.7and Table 4.3.2.7---- Consistent feel and look of the website
Figure 4.3.2.9 and Table 4.3.2.9 ---- Comfortable and familiarity with the language used in the website
Figure 4.3.3.1 and Table 4.3.3.1---- Understanding of the website Hyperlink description
Figure 4.3.3.2 and Table 4.3.3.2 ---- Effectiveness working of the website hyperlinks
Figure 4.3.3.3 and Table 4.3.3.3 ---- Moving around in University website by using the links or back button
Figure 4.3.3.4 and Table 4.3.3.4 ---- Understanding of metaphors used to website
Figure 4.3.3.5 and Table 4.3.3.5 ---- Easily knowing where you are in University website.
Figure 4.2.4.1 and Table 4.3.4.1 ---- Usage of universities websites
Figure 4.3.4.2 and Table 4.3.4.2 ---- Comfortable of using universities websites
Figure 4.3.4.3 and Table 4.3.4.3 ---- Find the information easy to locate on the website
Table 4.3.4.4 and Figure 4.3.4.4 ---- Information Update
Figure 4.3.4.5 and Table 4.3.4.5 ---- Completion of tasks
Figure 4.3.4.6 and Table 4.3.4.6 ---- Useful and understanding of error messages
Figure 4.3.4.7and Table 4.3.4.7---- Webpage Loading
Figure 4.3.4.8 and Table 4.3.4.8 ---- Responding action
Figure 4.3.4.9 and Table 4.3.4.9 ---- Easy and quickly of recovering mistakes
Figure 4.3.4.10 and Table 4.3.4.10 ---- Satisfaction of using university website
Figure 4.3.4.11and Table 4.3.4.11 ---- Rating University website
Figure 5.4.0 ---- Guideline for Usability of Tanzania universities websites
Figure 5.4.2.1 ---- Site Diagram
Figure 5.4.2.2 ---- Text structure
Figure 5.4.2.3 ---- University website structure
Figure 5.4.4.3.1 and Figure 5.4.4.3.2 ---- Text Colour
Table 5.6.1.1 and Figure 5.6.1.1 ---- Professional look of the university website (color Scheme, graphics, etc.)
Table 5.6.1.2 and Figure 5.6.1.2 ---- Readable text for students in the university website
Table 5.6.1.3and Figure 5.6.1.3 ---- Easily remember and learn how to use
Table 5.6.1.4 and Figure 5.6.1.4 ---- Consistent design, feel and look of all university website pages
Figure 5.6.2.1 and Table 5.6.2.1---- Hyperlink description
Figure 5.6.3.1 and Table 5.6.3.1 ---- Access the University website
Figure 5.6.3.2 and Table 5.6.3.2 ---- Find information easy in the University website
Figure 5.6.3.3 and Table 5.6.3.3 ---- Complete successfully the tasks in the University website
Figure 5.6.3.4 and Table 5.6.3.4 ---- Useful error message which will be easy for students to understand
Figure 5.6.3.5 and Table 5.6.3.5 ---- loading Time of the University website page
Figure 5.6.3.6 and Table 5.6.3.6 ---- Easy to recover mistakes easily and quickly in University website
Figure 5.6.3.7 and Table 5.6.3.7 ---- Very satisfied when using the University website
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CHAPTER 1:
INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY
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1. CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY

1.1 Introduction
1.1.1 Usability
Usability is the quality of attribute that measure how usable a system needs to be (Nielsen, n.d).
Usability does well in delivering a usable system.
1.1.2 Website usability
Web site usability makes the consideration on how quickly and easily website users are able to
make use the website and not just on making sure everything on the website works. The need of
website usability as expressed by Nielsen (2000) shows that, website users like website to work
the same way as all other websites they already know.
1.1.3 Important of Usability
Usability ensures that, users can use system properly. It also ensures that users are able gain
access to the information or features that they are looking for easily. While usability is most
commonly associated with more advanced systems or websites, it should be considered when
creating less complex systems or websites. Therefore without applying usability can result
failure of the system or website.
1.1.4 The Usability Goals
Usability goals generally ensuring that, the interactive systems or websites are easy to learn,
enjoyable and effective to use from the users perspective. It increases the good interactions
between users and system. The usability goals which ensure system to meet the user
requirements are Learnability (Easy to learn), Efficiency (Efficient to use), Error recovery and
prevention, Memorability (Easy to remember) and Subjective satisfaction (Preece et al, 2002).
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1.1.5 Internet penetration in Tanzania

According to internetworldstats (2011), the internet usage in Africa is growing very fast
compared with 6 years ago. Even though internet is growing very fast, Africa still has low
penetration of internet compare with other developed countries. The research which conducted
recently shows that, internet penetration in Africa is 11% and 89% is for the rest of the world
internetworldstats (2011).
Tanzania is one of the countries which is located in Africa, The usage of internet in Tanzania
each day is becoming popular compared to the last 7 years. Even though the usage is still very
low compared to other countries in Africa such as Egypt, The penetration of internet still takes
slower speed due to its high cost thus only few people can afford and manage it.
Within 6 years Government of united republic of Tanzania developed in different sector as per
the government plan, one of the sectors which developed is Tanzania communication regulatory
authority (TCRA).
TCRA is one among of sectors which implements the Government plan and one of the project
which implemented by TCRA is implementation of IT infrastructure in all government
Universities. Also TCRA implements the fiber optic cable as the network medium to increase the
speed of internet and usage of internet as well. The plan of TCRA boosts number of people to be
familiar and uses of internet to increase.
1.1.6 Tanzania universities websites
ICT such as web-based system (websites) plays a major role in the education sector and is
recommended by many educator experts as the essential tool to be used in education to ensure
the information is reached to students and staffs in easy and faster. Through the Innovation of
Universities websites usage, it can greatly improve the education sector by allowing the
Universities to promote themselves and improve the education services.
The plan of TCRA in Tanzania encouraged the government Universities and private Universities
to start design and implement different system such as websites to be used by staffs and students
as well. The various attempt of the Universities to develop the websites has been made but with a
little success due to the poor design of their websites especially in usability. There are still some
obstacles which may cause the poor and bad design in usability of the Tanzania universities
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websites due to many reasons such as shortage number of web designer who has low experience
and knowledge about the designing of the University website. In order to handle the issues which
make the Tanzania universities websites to have bad design in usability, the Guideline for
usability of Tanzania universities websites proposed to handle the issue.
This chapter contains the background research, research problem, aim and objectives,
methodology and outline of the dissertation.
1.2 Background of the research

Tanzania is one of the developing countries in Africa, located in East Africa. Tanzania is
currently adopting internet technology in terms of websites for Universities, colleges, schools
and other business sectors. The TCRA in Tanzania planning to increase the penetration of ITtechnologies especially in internet because is the key indicator of successful of a country for
competing with the competitive world (TCRA, 2010).
According to Tanzania President Kikwete (2006), IT-technologies can be used to empower the
students to access higher quality learning via internet. The forum which initiated by Bill Gates in
South Africa which involved leaders of Africa including President of Tanzania in 2006 was a
way of promoting and push the IT-Technologies to be used in different sector such as education
sector in Africa including Tanzania.
Many Tanzania universities have started to implement the websites (IT- Technology) for the
education purpose. The websites implementation in Universities has made some students among
the larger number of students to be familiar and happy with the usage of the websites of the
Universities because they can get assistance and information at any time they wish without
consulting University staffs manually.
Some students are happy while they using their Universities websites, but others are still
complaining about the design of the system such as difficult to perform task easily. It takes them
long time to find what they want (information) and therefore they find it useless to use the
system and return to the manual system. This issues most of the time is faced by the beginners
(Tanzanian students) of the systems.
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The problems which making the Tanzania universities websites difficult to be accessed is bad
interface design of the systems which violet the design principles such as too much text, no links
to return when users lost, the metaphors used confusing the users, poor color matching which
make the interface design to be more complex to users (students and staffs).
Below is among of the example of the website which have bad design such as too much text
used, inappropriate color used which may cause problem to color blind people.
Figure 1.2.1 Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA, 2011)
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Institute of Finance and Management (IFM) in Tanzania is another institute that has a bad
website design, this design is bad due to the poor color combination, bad arrangement of text and
some hyperlink are not active and there is no any information which shows the links are not
active.
Figure 1.2.2 Institute of Finance and Management ( IFM, 2011)
Therefore, on this research the guideline for the usability will be produced in order to keep and
maintain good design interface for websites of the Tanzania universities in order to allow the
students to be happy, learn, and enjoy when they use their Universities websites.
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1.3 Research Problem

The Universities of Tanzania have seen major improvement of internet penetration. Before, these
Universities were using manual system for their daily routine work to reach students. The
information such as final result was sent through postal to the required student and sometime
students was supposed to come direct to University and see the final results or other information
of University. Everything was conducted manually. But after the internet penetration which still
in place in Tanzania, many Universities have found technology very important to be considered
on this competitive worlds, current most of the Universities have implemented different system
including web-based system in order to reach the current and prospective students and staffs as
well.
The conducted research show that, many of the Tanzania universities websites have bad design
which cause users to still prefer the manual system. Due to the low percentage of internet
penetration in Tanzania, many people are not familiar of the websites especially the people from
rural area that came to join in Universities, therefore it take them time to understand the system
in order to perform their tasks in the system. The problems which faced by these end-user
(student) of the system is bad design of the Universities websites which violate the design
principles.
Therefore there is a need to explore this area further and to describe the importance of the good
usability of the websites and how if adopted- can be usefully to the Tanzania universities
websites.
This research will focus on the factors which make the Tanzania universities websites to have
bad design in order to come up with the usability guideline of which the Tanzania universities
can utilize for their websites developments.
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1.4 Project Aims and Objectives

The aim of this research is to produce a suitable guideline for usability of the Universities
websites in Tanzania.
Objectives
To describe the issues of web usability from different Universities websites.
To describe the success reasons of the different Universities websites.
To analyze website usability Guideline and framework for Universities websites.
Formulate the Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites.
Test the Guideline usability to ensure it is practical in the Tanzania universities websites
1.5 Justification of the research

The completion of the first phase of the National Information communication and Technology
Broadband backbone and the Fiber Optic sub marine cable which done in Tanzania have reduce
the lack of ICT infrastructure from the adoption of web technology in education, government and
tourism. Dr. Zaipuna Yonah who is the Director of the Information and Communication
Technology in the Ministry of Communications, Science and Technology in Tanzania, explained
that, Due to the a reliable connectivity, everyone should think on how the can tap the ICT
potentials on their areas of interest, be in it education, tourism or in governance (Mutaburukwa,
2010). Swarts (2010) also supported that, There is inadequate application of ICT in Higher
Education Institutional for enhancing their operational efficiency and advancement.
The government has seen the importance of ICT in the education sector, therefore the
Universities need to use effectively the opportunity which has given by the government by
coming with the good system especial in the usability and functionality and make sure the
developed systems are usefully to users.
According to Mkwawa University College (2011) the statistics show that, 32.5% of the visitors
(students) of the University website voted the site design is poor, 23.4% voted the design is very
good while the 22.5% voted the design is good. Therefore the majority of who voted they were
complains of the poor design of the University website. This is one example of the University
which complained by the students based on the poor design of the website.
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Different example of bad design of websites from Tanzania universities has shown in the
background of the research and one example of the University website which has a bad design is
shown below.
The burner of TEKU University website below does not recognize is the University website, the
image which used on this website does not reflect the University; people can think this is the
hotel website or garden website even though there is University name, poor matching color
design. All these poor design need to be solved in order to make the Tanzania universities in a
good standard.
Figure1.2.3 Teofilo Kisanji University (TEKU, 2011)

ICT such web-based system in education sector is very important to given the priority because
students can easily get all information concerned with the studies without even meeting manually
with the management of the University.
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Therefore it is important to develop good systems which have a good user interface design
(usability) that can improve the Universities work and help the students and staffs as well to
interact with the systems easily wherever they are.
1.6 Methodology
The research will begin through investigation about the current issues of web usability in order to
know the common issues which face different websites including universities websites. Also one
of the framework which used by web designers to develop websites will be evaluated.
Due to the main aim of the research for producing usability guideline for Tanzania universities
websites, different guideline for web usability will be reviewed as well and how to overcome the
issues of universities websites usability in order to help for formulating the proposed Guideline.
Also things which make poor usability of the websites of the Tanzania universities will be
reviewed as well as other universities from different countries which successfully of their
universities websites. After that, questionnaires will be designed and distributed to different
students from different Universities in Tanzania to get their view point based on their
Universities websites design. The questionnaire will be distributed through using Google Docs
and the response expected to be in high percentage. Also interview will be conducted by
involving designers of the University website from two Tanzania universities. The feedback of
interviews and questionnaires will be reviewed and analyzed.
All questionnaires and interview questions will be reviewed and approved by supervisor before
sent to the respondents. The various implementation of frameworks will be reviewed from the
past literature review to determine the usefulness of the adoption of the frameworks during of the
implementation or redesign of web-based system in the Tanzania universities.
After the collection of results from the questionnaires, interviews and the past literature reviews,
then analysis will take place and the guideline of usability for Tanzania universities websites will
be formulated. Testing will be done in order to insure the usefully of the usability guideline for
Tanzania universities websites. After the guideline been tested and approved, the research will be
finalized by final recommendation for future studies.
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1.7 Outline of the Dissertation

Chapter 1:
This chapter including the research background, research problems, project aims and objectives,
justification of the research, methodology will be used on this research. Also the scope of the
research explained on this chapter as well as outline of the dissertation.
Chapter 2:
Chapter 2 is the review of the previous research which conducted by the different authors on the
same studies in order to find out the current issues of website usability and the improvements
which can enable the Universities websites in Tanzania to have good interface design.
Chapter 3:
This chapter explain the research methodology will be used, and the justification of its use in this
research. The data collection techniques and data analysis approach which will be implemented
in this research will be shown in this chapter.
Chapter 4:
The summary of the literature review and result from the interviews and questionnaires
conducted will be presented in this chapter.
Chapter 5:
The Artefact of the research will be presented based on the collected data from literature review,
questionnaires and interview. The test of Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities
websites will also be performed to approve the Artefact produced; the testing method will be
recommended.
Chapter 6:
The conclusion of this research, recommendation and future research will be explained on this
chapter as well as limitation of the research.
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1.8 Definition of the terms used
Web-based system: - The application (website) which delivered to users via internet.
Web Interface design: - is the design of website which allows users easily to interact with
the website.
Lucid Framework: - Means Logical User Centered Interaction Design framework that gives
a Context in which to conduct usability activities.
TCRA: - Tanzania Commission Regulatory Authority.
IFM: - Institute of Finance and Management.
ICT: - Information and Communication Technology.
TEKU: - Teofilo Kisanji University.
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1.9 Scope of the Research

The research based on the usability of the Tanzania universities websites from the main five
Tanzania universities. The research narrowed down to find the ways to improve the Tanzania
universities student interaction with their websites through having good usability of the websites.
1.10 Research Deliverable

The deliverable of this research is Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites.
1.11 Conclusion
This chapter explains the background of the research. The research problem was clearly
explained which helped to formulate the research aims and objectives. Also the chapter provides
the outline of the dissertation, scope of the research, the terms used in the research and the final
Artefact to be produced. This research is narrowed down and focuses on five main Universities
in Tanzania which is Mzumbe University, Sokoine University of Agriculture, Institute of
Finance and Management (IFM), Mkwawa University College, and Open University of
Tanzania.
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CHAPTER 2:
LITERATURE REVIEW
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CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Introduction
Usability is generally regarded as ensuring that interactive systems are easy to learn, effective to
use, and enjoyable from the users perspective (Maissel et al, 1991). Usability ensures that users
can use system properly. It also ensures that users are able gain access to the information or
features that they are looking for easily. There are different systems such as Web Applications,
Stand-alone System, Mobile Applications, and Kiosk around the world which developed through
considering the usability. Usability enables people to carry out different activities at schools,
Universities, work and in everyday life through using the systems.
The common system which used by people all over the world now days is web-based system.
According to internet world statistics, in March 2011 survey show that, the number of users
accesses the websites was 2,095,006,005. Many people are familiar to use websites than other
systems such as standalone systems. Web technology is everywhere in business, government,
health, banking and education as well. Different Universities have seen the importance of
website to different angles such as advertisement, supporting students by offering different
services online (books, journals), allow students to get Universities information wherever they
are at 24hrs. High number of Universities all over the world including some of the Universities
in Tanzania have implemented website to their Universities.
Due to the high rapidly of Technology, Now days good interface design (usability) for users is
very important to be considered when developing any system especially website because
interacted by many and different people all over the world. It is nice to have a good designing of
the system such as website in order to stay competitive in this competition world. The reason to
have a good design (usability) of the website in Tanzania universities is to motivate the users
(students and staffs) when they interact with their Universities websites, to help them when the
use the system, and to keep them happy and enjoy while the use their systems. If the interface
design (usability) was not considered during development of the website, this may cause users to
lose the interest to their websites; this issue is currents face many Tanzania universities websites
where users lose their interest due to the bad design of the Tanzania universities websites. The
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user interface design (usability) need to be considered in order to increase the accurate of
Tanzania universities websites design.
2.2 Web Interface Design
The main purpose of the user interface design is to allow interaction between human and system.
The better website user interface design the easier it is to train people to use it, the less help will
be needed by people to use it, more users will like to use the system, and will increase the users
satisfaction to the system (Ambler, 2010). The web interface design (usability) should be
designed to match the experience, skills and expectation of the targeted users. This supported by
Raskin (2000) that, in order to make the great user interface for the websites, the interface must
avoid ambiguity by making the clear language, implementing the familiar things such as
metaphors to users, and the interface should respond faster when user requested.
2.3 Current issues of web usability
According to Nielsen (2006) in early 1990s web was exciting to people and thought that it was
something amazing to them. But now days web is the tools which adapted by many users all over
the world. The users will be able to use the website if the only it is easy for them to use it. The
number of people decreasing for getting difficult to use the website because of the usability to be
considered and given the priority for the website design.
According to Virgina Tech University (2008), most issues of the interface design is usability,
visualization and functionality. There are a lot wrong Web sites today, these problems may be
caused by non-improvement of the usability, in order to solve these problems there is a need to
fix the problems that hurt users the most by considering and fix the web usability.
The numbers of the of problems which affect usability of the website stated by Marshal (2001)
are
-Confusion of website users, because the website does not explain what is it about
-Long loading due to the high number of images, graphics flash and etc.
-Difficult navigation because of many navigation link on the front page
-Poor readability of the design because of bad design and arrangement of the text, poor text
color, and small font as well
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-Irrelevancy and inaccessibility because the users were not involved during the website
development
-Ugliness because of the poor matching colors and graphics design
According to BBC News the discussion between BBC and Nielsen (2008), Nielsen stated that,
the usability problems make difficult for users when using the website, when users want to finish
their task and find usability website problems can stop using the application as soon as possible.
The research which done by Nielsen (2006) was to explore the usability problems of the
websites, pie chart below show the types of problems which causes users the most difficulties.
Each slice from the pie chart indicates the percentage of the problems users face.
Figure 2.3.1 Prioritizing Web Usability (Nielsen, 2006)

From the pie chart above, the highest percent of the task failure is caused by the usability
problems with Search and findability and followed by page design, information, task support,
fancy design and other. The usability problems which explained by Nielsen may cause the users
of the websites not to be interested when they visit the websites or users may leave the system
immediately even without finding what they wanted to find. The advantage of this research is
that, help the research to explore the different usability problems which may result the bad
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design of the website. The gap which found in this research, Nielsen didnt explain unparticipation of users in the website design is one of the problems which can cause the usability
problems, also didnt explain how these problems need to be solved and fixed in order to come
up with the good website design which have low and minor usability problems.
Alexander (2011) conducted the usability study of the Universities websites by examined 15
University websites from 13 Australian sites, one site in the United States and one in the United
Kingdom and found out almost all of them failed to meet the good design of the websites that
negatively impacted on usability, Alexander found that many users (students) were complaining
and commented of their Universities websites in order to get help. Examples of the complained
comments were I wouldn't have a clue where to go they should have a link.""They're not
there on that page with all the other information." "They should have that here they have
everything here about the course except the fees". These problems appeared because of the poor
information architecture of the websites. Another complain was "What's the exact difference
between programs and courses?, this problem fall under the content because of the most websites
was at least use terminology or jargons on some words of the contents that was making users to
be confused and not understand.
Other usability problems which explained by Alexander (2011) was bad designed navigation and
structure with the lack of detail and clarity provided in some content which lead many users to
search information on University websites. The research conducted by Alberta University (2003)
supported that, usability is very important to be considered in the websites in order users to find
specific information easy and ensure that those who visit the website are able to access and find
any information they want quickly as possible and efficiently but the research didnt explain how
users can be satisfied when they visit the Universities website.
According to Ellis (n.d), the web sites of the top 50 USA Universities graded very low in terms
of usability and accessibility, one of the websites Universities which ranked with low usability
are Brandeis University, University of Southern California, University of California Davis,
Pepperdine University, Yeshiva University, Emory University, Cornell University and so on.
A Similar study was conducted by the Pierce (2005) at the Harvard University about the Harvard
website usability. The researcher used exploratory testing to gather a foundation of information
regarding the design of the site such as accessibility of information, Performance, consistency,
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functionality and etc. The study showed that the website suffers from different problems
including graphics needed to be a bit more interesting, sometime the website did not provide the
required searchable information to users but the other result of testing was good. Based on the
result of the testing, author proposed recommendations in order to improve the University
website.
The research conducted by Bolhari (2010) tried to explore the factors affecting students
satisfaction of University websites, the Universities websites satisfaction model proposed in
order to satisfy the users and increase the number of users, this research found that, the number
of users increase when they perceive that the system is usable. Also the innovation and usability
in the websites found to have a great positive influence on users' satisfaction and trust. The gap
on this research did not investigate the effect of innovation on perceived usefulness, trust and
satisfaction in University websites and how the innovation in University websites can be
achieved to satisfy users of the system.
According to Mustafa (n.d.), navigation, link and performance of the Jordans University website
seemed to have little problems. Therefore author suggested in order the Universities websites to
achieve its purposes should go through several design guidelines in order to assure users are
satisfied with the services offered by this websites. There is a gap found by researcher of this
research from the research conducted by Mustafa, the research didnt explain about the content
to fit within the window where there is no need to scroll right and left, the use of color, image or
text to convey the information.
2.4 Evaluation of the web design framework
According to cognetics operations (1998), Logical User Centered Interaction Design (Lucid)
framework is the logical user centered interaction design which designed to manage the process
of designing the interface of the software and websites to encourage system usability through
offering to users the efficiency, effectiveness, error tolerance, engagement, and ease of learning.
According to Kreitzberg (2008), a small number of products are really usable: easy to learn and
use, efficient, and error tolerant. Lucid frame is more flexible and adaptable and can fix the
usability problems faced by many systems such as easy to learn and use, efficient and so on.
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The lucid frame work
Figure 2.4.1 The Lucid Design Framework (Cognitive Corporation, 1998)

This framework is very important for the system development including the websites because it
focuses much to users of the system. The main reason for different company, organization and
Universities to use lucid framework for their websites development is to enhance the usability of
the websites, to reflect the users needs and desire, and to organize the way users think and
expect. Lucid is not only focus on what the system should do but also how functions will be
designed from a user perspective
Having the poor communication, and wrong selection of team during the system development
are among the manageable problems that degrade the system. The LUCID Framework helps
avoid these pitfalls.
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Lucid framework organized into six stages
Figure 2.4.2 Description of the LUCID Framework (cognetics operations, 1998)
According to cognetics operations (1998), lucid framework incorporated six stages for the
software and websites development. The stages start with envision, analyze, design, refine
implement and support. From the six stages, the shared vision of the system among all
stakeholders need to be created, study the users in order to design the system (website) from their
perspective, the concept of the design need to be created to implement the prototype of the
system, the usability testing need to be conducted on the prototype for design problems, changes
are invited where required in order to meet the users needs and system must provide support to
users of the system.
More explanation of the six stages of lucid framework defined from the cognetics operations
(1998). According to Kreitzberg (2008), the reason for dividing the process into six stages is to
make sure the system which will be developed meet the user needs, expectations and is more
usable to users. One of the Universities become successful for the University website usability
through using the LUCID Framework is Maryland University (Kreitzberg, 2011).
The benefit of lucid framework fill the needs such as producing the system with lower cost, less
time, high quality, and overcome the usability issues of the system (websites), also End-users can
appreciate, provide the usefully feedback to the developers because users are incorporated on this
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framework and establish a good collaboration between users and developers. The gap found from
this framework does not address the suitable technique and tools for implementation which can
be used on this framework.
2.5 The Guideline for web usability
The users of the websites can be categorized in different types from expert to novice users based
on their knowledge and skills of the of the web application. All the categories of the website
users must be categorized while designing the website, due to that case novice users will be able
to learn and easy use the system while experts will not become bored with lots of hints on the
websites (Nielsen's, 2000). Therefore consideration from novice users to expert users will enable
good usability of the websites.
To full fill the requirements of all users of the Universities websites is very challenging task need
to be performed even though there is other Universities websites which has success to full fill the
requirements of users. It can be easy task if the designers will follow the certain well-established
guideline for the development of the website interface design and the problems will be solved.
Thats why many of the experts of the web interface produced the guideline for user interface.
Perlman (1992) shows different lists of the guidelines on human computer interaction. One of the
guidelines is Disability access to GNOME, 2002-03-25 GNOME Accessibility Project and
include design guidelines, Apple Human interface guideline, guideline for developing a
multilingual interface English, Gary Perlman 2008-05-16, and from W3C (1999) which is Web
Content Accessibility Guidelines. All design guideline which explained above it show that, all
are very specific which depends on the type of the application, users and company or
organization. Example the guideline which suggested by GNOME (2002) was to design the
interface for the disable users, W3C (1999) design the guideline for web content while Perlman
(2008) design the guideline for the multi language interfaces. Even though all guideline must be
specific but must target to the categories of users of the system and people with low vision, color
blindness, people who hard of hearing and so on.
According to Nielsen (2007), guidelines may be accept changes due to the frequently
environment changes and the main reason for these changes are technology improvements and
behavioral adoption and these changes are only the 20% of the overall guidelines. The low
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percentage of changes may take place because all the guidelines are developed regarding with
the principals of user interface.
The research conducted by Nielsen (2002) explained that, the most important page in the
websites is home page, because it is the page which viewed more than other pages. In order to
increase the usability of home page and overall website, Nielsen proposed guideline for
homepage usability. The guideline is that, the website should explain the clear purpose of the
website, help users to find what they need by including a search input box and emphasize the
Site's top high-Priority Tasks, Use Visual Design to increase Interaction Design through using
meaningful graphics.
Usability and design significantly associated with designing an effective University website.
According to Palmer (2002), businesses whose homepages address usability and incorporate
other essential design criteria report higher traffic, more repeat visitors, and greater customer
satisfaction. Palmer (2002) presents basic design guideline that must always be considered to
achieve the usability of any websites including the Universities websites. The guideline is as
shown below.
1) Navigation
Design should help users in finding information efficiently and quickly.
2) Response time
Design should have fast loading pages and readily available search results for users.
3) Content
Design should constantly update company/organization information; organize content within a
single click where possible, most relevant material should be at the top of a page.
4) Interactivity and responsiveness
Design should give users the freedom to customize their interactions and provide appropriate
feedback from what they customize.
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The guideline which proposed by palmer is too general because did not address other issues such
as Visual design (color, text and etc), even if the designers will follow this guideline there some
other important issue will not able to be fixed to achieve the Universities website usability.
A study by Jasek (2004) proposed the guideline for the library websites in the Universities in
order to maximize the usability, this guideline can help Universities evaluate the design of their
own library Website and improve it. Below is the guideline which proposed by Jasek (2004).
1) Consistency: Provide a Help link on every page, Use consistent design elements
2) Orientation and Navigation: Link to your library Web site directly from your institutes
home page, Use one navigation bar
3) Hypertext and Linking: Treat links according to conventions
4) Page Layout: Use page real estate wisely
5) Aesthetics and Graphics: Use few colors and minimal graphics
6) Flexibility and Efficiency of Use: Organize information in multiple ways, Minimize the
number of clicks users must make, Explain details to help users select and access resources
7) Matching the System and User Activities: Organize your site based on users tasks and
their frequency, Make your website search clear, Do not use librarian terminology, Ensure
good performance.
8) Accessibility: Make your site accessible
Dall et al (2005) conducted a research about the usability Guideline, The research identified key
issues concerning usability of cultural websites and addressed the key points should be taken by
the institutions for their effort to design and implement the websites, also from the research
addressed usability guidelines should be adopted by local cultural institutions across all stages of
the lifecycle of the website application. The guideline which produced by Dall et al (2005)
shown below
a. Conception and planning
1. Identify the audience and their needs: which means that, the users of the system should
be known and understand their needs, knowledge, skills and interest because different
users have different skills, knowledge and interest.
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2. Include usability in your project: which means that, all stakeholder should be notified
that usability is the core quality of technology project, and usability should be considered
as one of the project policy to be achieved.
3. Control usability of contracted work: If the projects will be outsourced from the
external parties, such as software developers, or creative media companies, usability
should be an important factor by making usability as a formal criterion for the selection of
contractor. Also if there are any issues concerning with usability should be raised and
solved.
4. Educate staff and get advice: To keep staff knowledgeable on usability issues, you can
consult the institutes which have expert knowledge about the cultural technologies to
disseminate know- how to staff.
b. Specification and Design
5. Define useful functionalities
6. Use appropriate metaphors
7. Provide for accessibility
8. Satisfy criteria for Information Architecture and design
9. Evaluate usability before implementation
c. Implementation
10. Ensure content usability
11. Provide for orientation, help and feedback
12. Test usability before launch
13. Require usability for project signoff
d. Operation and use
14. Keep usability policies up to date
15. Plan for regular evaluation
16. Employ usability in future updates
The benefit of this guideline is procedural guideline which focuses on steps to be taken in each
project lifecycle phase to ensure the usability of the websites achieved. The gap of this guideline
did not address experts on how they should work themselves such as responsibilities, flow of
communication to achieve the usability through following the guideline.
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2.6 Overcome the issues of Universities websites usability

All issue which may lead University websites to be poor in the usability need to be fixed to meet
different users standard and satisfaction. There are different issues which discussed in the part
of current issues of the usability; each Universities websites may have one or more than one of
those issues. The issue must be solved regarding of different current issues face those websites.
In order to overcome the issues of Universities websites usability the things below must be taken
and considered.
Usability Goals
There are many famous websites which are ugly but highly functional and few of them are beautifully but
hard to use. The usable Universities websites are the one where the users are able to clearly
recognize the information they need or/and perform any tasks they came to the website easily
and quickly. To assist the users in this, there is several usability goals need to be considered.
Those usability goals to be considered are broken down into the following (Preece, J et al.,
2002).
Learnability
There are some people who have small idea about the websites how to use it. According to
Preece et al (2002), learnability is very important to be considered during the development of any
system including website because the first experience of people in the system is that of easy
learning to use it. Dix et al (1993) supported by explained that, Learnability can make the new
users to begin effective interaction with the system and achieve a good performance. If
learnability will be considered in the Universities websites will minimize the surprises to the
users when they visit their Universities websites and users will be able to access the information
quickly.
Efficiency
The Universities websites need to respond faster and just in time once users (students) send
request in application page and users may become very happy and comfortable when they use it,
this defines how quick the user can perform well in using the their Universities website after
once the users learn the design of the system (NASA, 2011). For Example, An interface can be
considered as part of efficiency if there are user friendly button, menu, links and shortcuts. When
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the Universities websites are well-designed, with clearly expressed actions, less time and effort
are will be needed to users to make navigation and action choices.
In order to achieve efficiency in the Universities websites, the proper arrangement of the buttons
and hyperlinks such as Home, contact us, about us and so on need to be done, all application
pages of the University website should have the same common menu bar.
Memorability
According to Preece et al (2002), the concept of memorability, within the usability context, is
that a user can leave a system for a period of time and, when returns to it, can be able to
remember how to do things and navigate in the system. Carughi et al (n.d) supported by
explained that, the ease of remembering the system functionality, so that the casual user can
return to the system after a period of non-use, without needing to learn again how to use it.
According to Zainbooks (2011), by structuring information and icons placed in relevant
categories can help the users remember where to look to find particular information at a given
stage of a task. Memorability is very important usability goal to be considered in order to fix the
usability problems of the Universities websites. The Universities websites must have the little
content especially in the home page, and the content must reflect the University and the shortcut
words, metaphors which can be used in the website must reflect the real world. Also the good
arrangement of the contents of the website must be considered as well.
Subjective satisfaction
The Universities websites must satisfy users in order for the users of the websites to be happy.
The users can be satisfied through having the good design of the Universities websites, allow
users to navigate easily, search detail of the website content, known and common language of the
content, and so on.
According to Carugh et al (n.d), satisfaction can be defined as the
acceptability and comfort of use of the system where the users find the system enjoyable to use.
Usability in the Universities websites is important because it can make the users (students) to
access easily the information regarding to their Universities, get sufficient information about
their Universities. The Universities websites with poor usability can reduce the efficiency of the
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personnel to a level of performance. Lack of usability can cost time and effort, and can result in
greatly failure of a website.
2.7 Current issues of the Tanzania universities websites

In Tanzania the education including the application of information and communication
Technology (ICT) must continue to be ranked high to ensure sustainable development of
country. Msolla (n.d) explained that, Currently, the level of ICT application in the education
sector in the country is still inadequate with the whole tertiary and higher education sub sector
facing a number of bottlenecks due to limitation of ICT infrastructure and specific competent
workforce. Due to the limitation of the ICT infrastructure and specific component in Tanzania,
education sectors such as Universities many people are not in the category of expert users to use
the websites, most of them are in the category of novice users. These people they suffer much
when they become to use their Universities websites.
Many Tanzania universities have already implemented websites even though there is other of
them still not yet. Most of the Tanzania universities do not satisfy their website users (students)
due to poor design of their websites. Many users found is difficult for them to use their websites
and achieved the required task at the appropriate time because many of the websites designed
without involves the novice users (students). Currently, the number of students to be familiar
with their University website is still low because they see the websites are not usable for them, so
they prefer manual system rather than websites to solve their issues.
(students) of the website University voted the site design is poor, 23.4% voted the design is very
good while the 22.5% voted the design is good. Therefore the majority of those who voted
complained of the poor design of the University website. This is one example of the University
which was complained by the students based on the poor design of the website.
The most problem which make Tanzania universities websites to be difficult for users to interact
with their Universities website is interface of the websites which are Text, un-matched colors,
bad arrangements and allocation of the hyperlinks and labels, the main page contain a lot of
information where by users confusing, there is no proper direction to allow users to navigate the
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site, other websites use inappropriate metaphors which do not match with the real world which
confusing users and found the websites is difficult for them. Any website interface should be
simple and not complex which can make users to perform easily.
Another problem is that, most Tanzania universities websites developers focus on the sites
features or its technical implementation while never paying attention to the end users, and the
way these people think and act is usually totally different from the way end user does. Therefore,
this defies the law of User Centered design which insists to know your users.
Therefore from the discussion above, the summary of the issues explained above caused by
-
Shortage of knowledgeable designers and developers
In appropriate way of designing the websites
High number of end-users who have low skills with Universities website interaction
Lack of users consideration during the website design
After the implementation of the system many Universities do not conduct usability testing
by involving users.
2.8 Successful implementation of Universities websites in other countries

There are many Universities around the world trying to adopt the website implementation but
most of them have already implemented the websites Universities. Some of them were successful
with the implementation of the websites while others fail.
According to the research conducted by Mustafa (n.d), Jordans University is among the
successful implementation of the University website. The research showed that, 51% out of the
total number of responses were satisfied with the usability level provided by the Jordans
websites, 26% judged the Jordans website is fair with respect to usability and the rest were not
satisfied with it. Therefore, the research showed that majority was satisfied. Many respondents
were satisfied with the Jordans University website because of good content organization and
readability of the website, the good arrangement and color used of the link, good navigation,
reflection of the education information to users, performance and effectiveness of the website,
and the interface design of the website is attractive.
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Harvard University is among the successful Universities to implement the University website.
According to survey conducted by Pierce (2005) through using exploratory test, the website is
well organized and it is not overloaded, easy for users to navigate, also based on the (color
scheme, and graphics) all pages had basically the same look and top image and color schemes
are consistent. Also the website provides detailed benefit information of the University, easy to
locate information and the website does not have any terms for users to refer. Furthermore, most
of the pages of Harvard University website offer users with a meaningful title that describes the
topic.
According to University of London (2010), the London University has been successfully in the
implementation of the usability of website by following the standard recommended by The
World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and the best recommendation from the wider web
community. The standard which implemented and been successful of the University website is
customization of the text of its website, good navigation, limited the use of graphics and search
function which allow users to search the entire site or only the course pages.
2.9 Conclusion
Guideline is very important for the system design interface. For the web designers to develop the
web interface design is more challenging for them even though there are a lot of different tools
for web design. Most of the designers just use tools without following principles or guidelines
for the web-design which may lead them not to satisfy the website users. According to Keyes
(2007), the developers must follow principals and guideline which was formulated from
experience of other expertise to develop the good web interface design which satisfy users.
Therefore, by following the guideline of system design (websites), involve end-users during
development and testing of the system we can improve our systems.
In Tanzania many students have low knowledge and skills about computer which result them not
to be satisfied with their University websites. These users need very user friendly interface
design and it is extremely to pay attention in usability of the interface design of the Tanzania
universities websites.
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The utilization of the lucid framework has ability to help designers work effectively and
efficiently by having a good collaboration and communication among all the stakeholders. And
following the Lucid procedures, defining the tasks and process that support usability throughout
the system (website) development lifecycle, achieve complete requirements from the users
perspective. Therefore lucid framework will be suitable to be implemented and used by the
Universities of Tanzania for the Universities website development in order to achieve the
usability of their websites. But also, it is difficult to achieve usability through using Lucid
Framework without having a proper usability guideline for Tanzania universities websites. By
using the Lucid Framework and following proper guideline the usability of the website will
increase and the user participation and satisfaction of the Tanzania universities websites will
increase as well.
The Literature review has been conducted by highlighting the Current issues of web usability
from different Universities all over the world and how to overcome the issues of websites
usability which faced by many Universities, The different guideline used to achieve the websites
usability, Current issues faced by Tanzania universities websites. The researcher then gives
examples of the different Universities that have successful implemented usability in their
websites. The chapter concludes that, lucid framework is recommended to be used in order to
come up with the usability guideline for Tanzania universities websites to be by the Tanzania
universities.
The next stage of this research will discuss the research methodology.
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CHAPTER 3:
METHODOLOGY
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3. CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY
3.1 Introduction
Research methodology is a set of clearly procedures that are used to perform research. In order to
success on this research the methodology need to be formulated and followed. This chapter
formulates the research methodology which used to accomplish a research. This chapter explains
the aim of the research method used (paradigm, approaches and etc) and the techniques of the
data collection for the research. According to Saunders (2003), the research onion initiate
research philosophy question, consider the subject of the research approach that flows from
research philosophy, and last examine the data collection methods for the research. Therefore by
taking research process onion into the consideration helped to show stage by stage the
procedure or process to be followed on this research.
Figure 3.1.1: The research Process onion

Source: Saunders et al (2003)
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3.2 Justification for the Paradigm and Methodology

According to Martyn (2008), research defined as any gathering of data, information and facts
for the advancement of knowledge. Therefore research seems as a systematic carefully
assessment to find out new information that expand knowledge.
In the carrying out of this research an overall fact initiated to demonstrate the theoretical
philosophy which relate with the literature review and data analysis of this research. The view of
this research is accountable with the relationships of the paradigm used on this research.
3.2.1 Introduction to Paradigms used
The research philosophy depends on the way researchers think about the development of
knowledge. According to Saunders (2003), there are three views about the research process the
way knowledge is developed and judged as been acceptable, these views are Positivism,
Interpretivism and Realism.
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The comparison of research paradigm
Source: Penny state University (2011); Joerg et al (2005)

Due to the nature of the research based on the literature reviews, data collection and the proper
analysis of the acquired data, the paradigm used in this research is positivism and interpretivism
because research methods consists interview and questionnaire as well as quantitative and
qualitative analysis.
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3.3 Research Approach

The selected of Research approach from this research is quantitative approach and Qualitative
approach. The reason to select quantitative approach is because use high structured methods
such as questionnaire and it follow more scientific paradigm which find to collect unbiased data.
Therefore quantitative approach used to analyze data collected from the questionnaire which sent
to students of the main 5 Tanzania universities and other Tanzania universities. The reason to
select Qualitative approach was to collect quality data through interview. The aim of
conducting quantitative and Qualitative approach was to know the issues of websites usability
which faced by the student of Tanzania universities websites so as Guideline can be formulated.
On this research, online distribution of questionnaires used to gather data from the targeted
respondents. The reason for using online questionnaire was to reach a large number of students
easily and faster because the researcher current was not in Tanzania. Also interview method was
used as well.
3.4 Design of Study exploration
3.4.1 Research Design
Research design is the design on how, where and when to collect information. According to
Mahmud (2009), research design is the plan for selecting the sources and types of information
used to answer the research questions. Below is the research design used on this project.
Figure 3.4.1: Research Design

Page 45
3.5 Research Procedures

The research procedure shows the flow of the research and how the research was carried out. The
research was conducted systematically by following the procedure shown from the diagram
below. This procedure tries to show identification of the research problem, procedure for data
collection until formulating of Artefact, testing of Artefact, conclusion and recommendation of
project. Below is the chart which shows the research procedures flow from this project.
Figure 3.5: Research Procedure

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3.6 Data Collection

Research involve the data collection and data analysis through reading the books, journals,
articles or through observation, conducting interview and questionnaire, doing experiments or
through doing other methods for data gathering. Dawson (2007) in her study mentions the
research methods which can be used to collect data, those methods are Interviews, Questionnaire,
Focus group and participant observation.
In this research, the methods used in primary research for data gathering are questionnaire and
interview method. The data collection involved students and experts (designers) from the 5 main
Universities in Tanzania and other Tanzania universities. Below is the method which used for
data collection
3.6.1 Questionnaire
Questionnaire is the prepared set of questions in paper or online designed to generate data
necessary for accomplishing the objectives of the research project. According to Dawson (2007),
there are three basic questionnaire which are closed-ended, open-ended and combination of both.
Researcher decided to use questionnaire method for the students from the 5 main Universities of
Tanzania because is quick way to collect information, and the information can be collected from
a large portion of a group and analyzed easily. Furthermore, the cause of choosing questionnaire
method among students was to identify the views of Tanzania universities websites in a large
group because is not easy to obtain from large group by conducting observation or interview
method.
From the questionnaires result, the respondents were 68 students from the 5 main Universities in
Tanzania and other University as well. The questionnaires involved four categories of questions:General information (gender, age, etc), navigation issues (Difficulties of students when they use
website application), Website interface design and content appearance (text size, usage of
technical terms, arrangement of text and pictures, colour used and etc), performance and
effectiveness of the website. Refer questionnaire questions from Appendix E and Questionnaires
results with analysis in Chapter 4.
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3.6.2 Interview
According to Walliman (2001), the use of interview is very flexible method where the
interviewer communicates with the interviewee face to face or by telephone. Since interview is a
proper technique to ensure validity and reliability of data, however is inefficient way of
collecting data from the large group of people but it is efficient and effective method for
collecting data from small number of people.
The interview which used on this research was through using mobile phone to 2 experts
(designers) of University website from two Tanzania universities.
The purpose to choose interview method for data gathering was to obtain the extra information,
opinion and viewpoints from experts (designers) regarding the usability of Tanzania universities
websites. Refer the Interview Questions in Appendix F, and Interview result with analysis in
Chapter 4.
3.7 Data Analysis Method
The next step after data collection was Analysis of Data. The purpose of analyzing data was to
help researcher to interpreting it and put into action. In this research quantitative analysis was
used to collect data from interviewers and qualitative analysis was used to collect data from
questionnaires. Once the Analysis of data was done, software package used to present findings of
the research in forms of graphs, tables and pie chart.
3.7.1 Quantitative Analysis
The researcher use Google Docs for the Analysis of the data presentation. The main reason for
the researcher to choose this tool because was already available to researcher, easy to use, and
also was requires an accurate counting of responses and reproducing them in form of graphical
forms such as pie chart.
3.7.2 Qualitative Analysis
The qualitative analysis was done through conducting interview with the two web developer
from among two of the main five Universities in Tanzania. The Interview arranged with the
interviewer before the interview to start. The data gathered from interview summarized and used
as qualitative data, also compared with the questionnaire result as well and help to come up with
the valid guideline.
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3.8
Ethical considerations
The ethical issues are very important to be considered when doing any research. The research
participants (Tanzania universities students) informed for the ethical issues which involved
during the research. The Ethical issues involved on this research are voluntary participation,
informed consent and confidentiality. The participants of this research were not forced to
participate on this research and the participants informed that they have all rights to withdraw
from the research at any time they wish not to answer any or one among of the questions asked.
All the collected information during the research kept confidential and the data used in required
research only.
3.9
Conclusion
This chapter presented the methodology and techniques used to gather data related with the
guideline for usability of the Tanzania universities websites. The paradigm, research approach,
research design, research procedure, data analysis, data collection methods and ethical
consideration explained on this chapter.
The sample group which was chosen from the whole population is students from Tanzania
universities. Questionnaire is method which selected for the current research; the questionnaire
distributed to students from the five main Universities in Tanzania which are Mzumbe
University, Sokoine University of Agriculture, Institute of Finance and Management (IFM),
Mkwawa University College and Open University of Tanzania. Each University have 10 or more
than 10 questionnaires to participants (students), therefore the total of questionnaires result were
68 from the students of the five main Tanzania universities. The researcher use Google Docs
(Online Survey) to distribute questionnaires. The researcher collected data online and analyze it
through using Google Docs as well. The main reason to use this approach instead of other
approach because is faster and accurate way to distribute and gather the questionnaires result.
Also two experts (designers) from two Tanzania universities interviewed through using mobile
phone. Before interviewing them, they notified about the Date and Time of the interview.
The main reason to use interview and questionnaire was to be able to compare the qualitative
analysis and quantitative analysis in order to come up with the usefully and acceptable guideline.
Finally the ethical considerations were discussed and used ethical principles were explained.
Page 49
Furthermore, at the end after data gathering and analysis conducted from literature review,
interview and questionnaire Guideline was formulated, then after the guideline been formulated
was tested to the web designers of Open University of Tanzania, Institute of Finance and
Management, and University of Dar es Salaam, all are Tanzania universities. Then Guideline
formulated and founded is useful and helpful for Tanzania web designers and said it will help to
solve the problems where students were faced during using their websites (Tanzania universities
websites).
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CHAPTER 4:
DATA ANALYSIS
Page 51
4. CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS

4.1 Introduction
The objective of this chapter is to discuss the results of data collection from the primary research
in the efforts to develop the guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites. Data was
collected from students of the main five Universities in Tanzania which were Mzumbe
University, Sokoine University of Agriculture, Institute of Finance and Management (IFM),
Mkwawa University College, Open University of Tanzania and other different Tanzania
universities. Also another data were collected from two web-developers from the two among the
main five Universities in Tanzania.
This chapter will describe and justify the result of data collection (questionnaire) from each
category of the questions such as personal information, user interface design and contents,
navigations and links, performance and effectiveness, and General Suggestion, Also data which
was gathered from the interview were be analyzed as well. Quantitative analysis of the gathered
data presented in different charts by percentage (%) for each of the responded answers, also the
qualitative analysis will be analyzed and presented in detail. For each question from different
category, the findings will be presented and given the summary.
4.2 Profile of respondents
In this research there are two respondents which are students and web designers from Tanzania
universities. The totality of 68 questionnaires and 2 interviews were sent to respondents. Out of
this, 68 questionnaires consists of 14 students from Mzumbe University, 10 students from
Sokoine University of Agriculture, 12 students from Institute of Finance and Management, 10
students from Mkwawa University College, 10 students from Open University of Tanzania, 10
students from other different Tanzania universities and two interviews consists two web
developers from the two among the main five Universities of Tanzania mentioned above.
The questionnaires were divided into 5 categories which Consist 30 questions and interview
Consist 10 questions.
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4.3 Questionnaires Findings

Each table below presented by its own Diagram
4.3.1 Category A:
4.3.1 Personal Information of the respondents
Table 4.3.1.1
Qn. 1: Gender
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Percentage of responds
Male
42
62%
Female
26
38%
Gender
38%
Male
Female
62%
Figure 4.3.1.1 from Table 4.3.1.1
Page 53
Table 4.3.1.2
Qn. 2: Age
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
14 - 19
0%
20 - 30
57
84%
31 - 40
12%
41 above
4%
Age
0%
84%
14-19
20-30
31-40
1.2
41-above
12%
Page 54
Table 4.3.1.3
Qn. 3: You are a Student from which University
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Mzumbe University
14
21%
Sokoine University of Agriculture
10
15%
Institute of finance and Management
12
18%
Mkwawa University College
10
15%
Open University of Tanzania
12
18%
Other
10
15%
Student from Different Tanzania universities
21%
Mzumbe university
Mzumbe university
15%
Sokoine university of Agriculture
Sokoine university of Agriculture

Institute of Finance and
Management
18%
Institute of Finance and

Management
15%

18%
Other
Other
15%
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
Page 55
Table 4.3.1.4
Qn. 4: Which Level are you at
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Diploma
0%
Degree
49
72%
Master
18
26%
PHD
1%
Education Level
1%
0%
26%
Diploma
Degree
Master
PHD
72%
Page 56
Summary of Figure 4.3.1.1, Figure 4.3.1.2, Figure 4.3.1.3 and Figure 4.3.1.4
A total of 68 users representing 5 main Universities and other different Universities in Tanzania
have participated in the questionnaires. 100% of the total number responded to the online
questionnaire. According to the data collection as of gender, 62% of the respondents were males
and 38% were females. Ages of most participants ranged between 20 and 30 years which was
84% out of other age range. 72% of the respondents were undergraduate students, 27% were
graduate students. Also all the students from the main 5 Universities in Tanzania the responses
were equivalent same as was expected by the researcher. The respondents from Mzumbe
University were 21% out of 100%, Sokoine University of Agriculture were 15% out of 100%,
Institute of Finance and Management (IFM) were 18% out of 100%, Mkwawa University
College were 15% out of 100%, Open University of Tanzania were 18% out of 100%, and from
other different Tanzania universities were 15% out of 100%. Therefore the positive contribution
of respondents from different gender, age range, level of education and Universities of Tanzania
were complains for their Universities website in different reason from the questions they
answered. Therefore these respondents help researcher to analyze usability issues they face from
their Universities websites in order to come up with the solution to overcome the problems they
face.
Page 57
4.3.2 Category B:
4.3.2 Evaluation of user interface design and content of the Tanzania universities websites
Table 4.3.2.1
Qn. 1: Describe your impression of the overall look of your University site (color Scheme, graphics, etc.)
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Professional Looking Good Graphics and
33
49%
35
51%
color used
Not professional Looking Poor Graphics
and color used
Impression of the overall look of Tanzania universities
49%
51%
Professional looking - Good graphics

and color used
Not professional looking poor
graphics and color used

Summary of Figure 4.3.2.1
Figure 4.3.2.1 shows that 51% of the respondent currently responded that, the Tanzania
universities websites are not professional looking and 49% answered are professional looking.
The reason which makes the Tanzania universities websites not to be professional looking may
be caused by having the poor graphics and inappropriate matching color used in the websites
which not suitable for the blindness users as well. This may cause the visitors of the websites not
to be interested and grade the website as unprofessional. Therefore, heavy graphics and
inappropriate color must be avoided as well as having the good organized information in the
websites.
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Table 4.3.2.2
Qn. 2: How is it easy for you to read text in your website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Very Easy
13
19%
Easy
19
28%
Average
26
38%
Difficult
13%
Very Difficult
1%
19%
Very Easy
28%
Easy
Very Easy
Average
38%
Easy
Average
Difficult
Difficult
13%
Very Difficult
Very Difficult
1%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%

Figure 4.3.2.2 shows that, the high percentage which is 38% of the respondent responded that,
the reading text of their Universities websites is average. Therefore students who are among of
the Universities websites still suffer to read text from their Universities websites.
Lessons learned from figure 4.3.2.2, Most of the time users do not be able to read websites text,
they just scan for the key word they looking for. Text is very important to be considered during
the websites development in order to keep users of the websites to recognize, understand and
read the websites text easily.
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Table 4.3.2.3
Qn. 3: What difficulty do you face when reading text in your website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Poor Text organized
31
26%
Poor color used
31
46%
Text is small
18
26%
Difficulties faced during reading the text in Tanzania universities websites
Poor Text organized
46%
46%
Poor Color used
Poor Color used

Text is Small
Poor Text organized
Text is Small
26%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Page 60

The chart above illustrate the results of the responses from students of different Tanzania
universities, 46% of the respondents answered that, due to the poor color of the text used, they
face difficult to read text in their Universities websites. 26% of the respondent responded there
was poor text organized from their Universities websites, another 26% responded the text of their
websites were small while the rest of the percentage they dont face any difficulties from
reading text in their Universities websites. The
The lessons learned from figure 4.3.2.2, the text size must be specific which can be able to be
read by any people who can visit the websites, the text size and type must be standard for the
websites. The text color must reflect with the background of the website, the color which can be
used for the website do not need to be faint, the color which can be used for the text must allow
the text to be visible and readable for any users of the websites including the color blind people.
Also the text must be well organized and the technical terms must be avoided so as to allow users
to be able to read text easily.
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Table 4.3.2.4
Qn. 4: Does your University website easily remember how to use it
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
12
18%
Agree
42
62%
Disagree
13
19%
Strongly Disagree
1%
Easy to remember how to use university website

1%
18%
19%
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
62%

Figure 4.3.2.3 shows that, 62% of the respondents agree that their University websites are easy to
remember how to use, 19% of the respondents disagree their Universities websites are easy to
remember how to use, 18% of the respondents strongly agree their Universities websites are easy
to remember how to use whilst only 1% strongly disagree their Universities websites are easy to
remember how to use.
The lessons learned from figure 4.3.2.4, it seems most of the Tanzania universities websites are
easy to remember how to use it.
Page 62
Table 4.3.2.5
Qn. 5: Is your University website easily to learn how to use it
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
12%
Agree
36
53%
Disagree
24
35%
Strongly Disagree
0%
Easy to learn how to use university website

0%
12%
Strongly Agree
35%
Agree
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
53%
Figure 4.3.2.5: from Table 4.3.2.5

According to Nielsen (2000), web usability should keep focusing in increasing ease of learning
for the novice users as Learnability is one the main Goal. Due to the result which was provided
by the respondents shows that, 53% of the respondents answered their Universities websites is
easy to learn how to use, 35% disagree that their University websites is not easy to learn how to
use and 12% strongly agree it easy to use. Even though majority of the respondents agree their
Universities websites are easy to use but the ratio of those who do not agree is not much
different. So the 35% of the respondents may be the novice users who need to be considered in
order for them also to be able to learn their Universities websites easily as other users.
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The lesson learned from figure 4.3.2.4 is that, The layout of the website design need to has an
intuitive design and easy understandable by users so users can be able to do whatever task they
intend to perform in quick and effectively when they visit the website for their first time, For
example, a site is learnable if a user that wants to register in the course easily sees the
registration button or link and is able to fill out necessary field easily. Also the design should
follow the standard of the website especially home page followed with other pages.
Table 4.3.2.6
Qn. 6: Is there Consistent design of all website pages?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Yes
27
40%
No
41
60%
The Consistent design of all website pages
40%
Yes
No
60%
Page 64

Figure 4.3.2.6 shows that, 60% of the respondents responded there is no consistent design of all
website pages to their University websites, whilst 40% responded that, the Tanzania universities
websites has the consistent design for all websites pages.
The lessons learned from this figure is that, the problem may be caused by having different color
in different pages, not all web pages have title of the website, other pages do not have title page
or/and do not have menu bar, different organized structure of information from different web
pages, the websites images do not convey a consistent mood, Colors images do not match, The
sizes of the images consistent with the overall structure of the website are not the same, the text
fonts are not the same for all pages, the colors used not consistently across pages, icons do not
match in size in all pages.
Table 4.3.2.7
Qn. 7: My University website has a consistent feel and look
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
12%
Agree
24
35%
Disagree
33
49%
Strongly Disagree
4%
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Consistent feel and look of the

website
4%
12%
Strongly Agree
Agree
49%
35%
Disagree
Strongly Disagree

From figure 4.3.2.7 shows that, 49% of the respondent disagreed that, their Universities websites
do not have consistent feel and look, 35% agree their Universities websites do not have
consistent feel and look, 12% strongly agree their Universities websites do not have consistent
feel and look whilst 4% strongly disagree their Universities websites do not have consistent feel
and look.
Consistency feel and look is very important in website design because it makes users do less
thinking but Inconsistency feel and look design only slows down their surfing speed and make
them lose interest in web site easily. A bad looking and feeling sign of poorly website designed
will focus people's attention and triggering the thinking that if this is what the looks like, then the
services are probably of a poor quality too.
The lesson learned from this figure is that, the reasons which may cause Tanzania universities
websites not to have the consistent feel and look of the website are too much and unnecessary
information in a single page, too much animations, technical terms used, too many colors with a
lots of white space, inappropriate use of photography, bad shapes and layout of the website and
etc.
Page 66
Table 4.3.2.8
Qn. 8: The language used in my University website is
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
English
68
100%
Swahili
0%
Language used in the website

0%
English
100%
Swahili

The result form Figure 4.3.2.8 shows that, 100% of the Tanzania universities use English as the
language in their websites. There is no any other language rather than English.
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Table 4.3.2.9
Qn. 9: I am comfortable and familiar with the language used in my University website
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
39
57%
Agree
24
35%
Disagree
7%
Strongly Disagree
0%
Comfortable and familiarity with the language

used in the website
0%
7%
Strongly Agree
Agree
35%
58%
Disagree
Strongly Disagree

The result from figure 4.3.9 shows that, 58% of the respondents strongly agree are comfortable
and familiar to use the English language in their website, 35% of the respondents agreed are
comfortable and familiar to use the English language in their website whilst only 7% were not
familiar and comfortable to use English as a language in their websites Universities. Therefore
the majority of the respondents do not have any problems with the English language used in their
Universities websites, so the preferable language for the Tanzania universities websites is
English.
Page 68
4.3.3 Category C:
4.3.3 Evaluation of navigation and links of the Tanzania universities websites
Table 4.3.3.1
Qn. 1: Does the Hyperlink description of your site easy to understand?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Yes
47
69%
No
21
31%
Understanding of the website Hyperlink

description
31%
Yes
No
69%

Result from figure 4.3.3.1 is that, 69% of the students do not find any difficulties of
understanding of their website hyperlink description whilst 31% of the students do not
understand their website hyperlink description.
Lessons learned from figure 4.3.3.1, Even though the high number of students responds they
understand their websites hyperlink description but there is a need to maintain other websites
Page 69
regarding on hyperlink in order to full fill the needs of other respondents. The description of the
hyperlink and button
must be shortly and clear which can provide meaning and easy to be
understood by users, the linked item must makes sense relative to the links context. Also the
hyperlink must be differentiated by other text such as when cursor reach to the hyperlink must be
change the shape and the hyperlink must change the color and be underline as well denote that
the text is clickable. The description of the hyperlink need to be easy so can be easy to recognize
by users rather than recall e.g. having the link Examination Schedule rather than click here for
exams.
Keep non visited links and visited links different colours
Table 4.3.3.2
Qn. 2: Do all hyperlinks on your site work effectively?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Yes
26
38%
No
42
62%
Effectiveness working of the website hyperlinks
38%
Yes
No
62%
Page 70

The 62% of the respondents from figure 4.3.3.2 responded most of the hyperlinks of their
Universities websites were not working, it shows as active hyperlink but when you click there is
no any action to be taken. 38% of the respondents responded the hyperlinks of their Universities
websites working effectively.
The lessons learned from this result is that, users can become unhappy when they find out what
they expected to get they cannot be found. Is not appropriate way to put link in the website while
is not working, If the link is not working better to be removed and leave the entire working link,
or in active link must be invisible by users until its working. By having inactive hyperlink in the
website can give the bad impression to the users of the websites. Therefore all links in the
websites must be working effective by directing users to his or her expected task.
Table 4.3.3.3
Qn. 3: It is easy to move around in my University website by using the links or back button.
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
10
15%
Agree
22
32%
Fair
24
35%
Disagree
12
18%
Strongly Disagree
0%
Page 71
15%
Strongly Agree
32%
Agree
Strongly Agree
Agree
Fair
35%
Fair
Disagree
Disagree
18%
Strongly Disagree
Strongly Disagree
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
35%
40%
Figure 4.3.3.3: from table 4.3.3.3

15% of the respondents strongly agree it is easy to move around in the website by using
links or back button
32% of the respondents agree it is easy to move around in the website by using links or back
button
35% of the respondents responded it is fair to move around in the website by using links or
back button
18% of the respondents disagree it is not easy to move around in the website by using links
or back button
No one responded to the strongly disagree.
Lessons Learned
The exits standard of the link, button, and labels must be used such as
Home page, Main, Main page, Home
Find, Search, Browse, Site map, etc.
Contact Us, Contact webmaster, Feedback
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Help, Frequently Asked Questions, FAQ
News, Whats New
About, About Us, Who We Are
Buttons with information names, simple icons (such as arrows) and use a few consistently icons
throughout the site can be very helpful. Ensure that menus are consistent, and that all have a
Home link back to the website home page.
Table 4.3.3.4
Qn. 4: Do you ease understand the metaphors used to your University website
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Yes
40
59%
No
28
41%
Understanding of metaphors
used to website
41%
Yes
59%
No
Page 73

High number of the respondents which are 59% responded that, they understand metaphors used
to the website whilst 41% they dont understand the metaphors used in the website. The lessons
learned from figure 4.3.3.4 are that, most of the websites applied metaphor (use icon similar in
some way to the real physical entity around us). Therefore this is not a big problem to many of
the Tanzania universities websites but also other Universities which have metaphors not similar
in some way to the real physical entity around us, they must be changed and match with the real
world entity. Even if users use an interface for the first time, certain elements can still be
familiar.
Table 4.3.3.5
Qn. 5: I can easily know where I am at my University website.
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
14
21%
Agree
17
25%
Fair
25
37
Disagree
10
15%
Strongly Disagree
3%
Page 74
21%
Strongly Agree
25%
Agree
Strongly Agree
Agree
Fair
37%
Fair
Disagree
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
15%
Strongly Disagree
3%
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
35%
40%

37% of the respondents responded is fair, they know where they are in their University website,
25% of the respondents agree it is easy to know where you are in the University website, 21% of
the respondents strongly agreed it is easy to know where you are when using the University
website, 15% of the respondents responded it is not easy to know where you are when using the
University website, and 3% of the whole respondents strongly disagree it is not easy to know
where you are when using the University website.
The lessons learned from figure 4.3.3.5 is that, users of the website must be shown where they
are and where they can go through having the meaningful title for each page and provide the
overview of the site, also by providing the navigation link for each page which can allow them to
navigate from one page to another and the number of clicks should be minimized to allow users
to reach final content (useful information).
Page 75
4.3.4 Category D:
4.3.5 Evaluation of performance and effectiveness of the Tanzania universities websites
Table 4.3.4.1
Qn. 1: How often do you access the website of your University?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Everyday
14
21%
Weekly
35
51%
Monthly
19
28%
Usage of universities websites

21%
28%
Everyday
Weekly
Monthly
51%

According to Figure 4.3.4.1, 51% of the respondents access their University website weekly,
28% of the responds access their University website monthly whilst 28% access every day.
The lessons learned figure4.3.4.1 is that, many respondents are not happy and satisfied with their
University website due to several reasons such as poor interface design, un-availability of other
functionality in the website, no frequent update of information. Therefore all the problems which
make students not to visit their University website frequently need to be solved.
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Table 4.3.4.2
Qn. 2: How comfortable are you in using your University website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Very comfortable
14
21%
Moderate comfortable
45
66%
Uncomfortable
13%
Comfortable of using universities websites

13%
21%
Very comfortable
Moderate comfortable
Uncomfortable
66%

Figure 4.3.4.2 shows thats, 66% of the respondents responded are moderate comfortable in
using their University website. 21% are very comfortable in using their University website whilst
13% of the respondents are uncomfortable in using their University website.
Lessons learned from figure 4.3.4.2, due to poor design of the Tanzania universities websites
which lead to poor usability of the website, many students are not comfortable which means are
not happy while using their University website, one of the goal of any website is to keep users
happy and enjoy while using the website. Renovation for most of the Tanzania universities
websites needs to be done in order to rebuild trust of comfort ability to its students (users) when
using the website.
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Table 4.3.4.3
Qn. 3: Did you find the information easy to locate on the website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Very Easy
10
15%
Easy
13
19%
Average
29
43%
Difficult
16
24%
Very Difficult
0%
15%
Very Easy
19%
Easy
Very Easy
Easy
Average
43%
Average
Difficult
Difficult
19%
Very Difficult
Very Difficult
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%

Figure 4.3.4.3 shows thats, 43% of the respondents answered it is not difficult or easy, so it is
average to find the information in their University website, 19% of the respondents responded
information is easy to locate, another 19% responded it is difficult to locate information, 15%
responded it s very easy to locate information in the website, no one responded if it is very
difficult to locate information in their Universities websites.
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The lessons learned from figure 4.3.4.3, the issues which may encounter users (students) to face
problems in locating information are bad Web site navigation, difficult readability of typeface,
inappropriate font style and size of text, and ineffective color combination of fonts and
backgrounds. All these factors need to be given priority and solution during designing of the
University website.
Another lessons learned from figure 4.3.4.3. Many Tanzania universities websites do not have
search feature, the search feature also may encounter user difficult to find information, users may
type something in a search field but search may not return the expected information. Therefore,
include search function by keeping search features simple and visible, keeping search on home
pages to a type-in field and not a link, keep the search input field wide enough to contain a
typical query and keep search results useful will help visitors find relevant contents.
Table 4.3.4.4
Qn. 4: Is your University website information updated frequently?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
7%
Agree
18
18%
Disagree
39
39%
Strongly Disagree
6%
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Information Update
6%
7%
Strongly Agree
18%
Agree
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
39%

According to Figure 4.3.4.4, 39% of the respondents Disagree information from their University
website not updated frequently, 18% of the respondents agree information from their University
website updated frequently, 7% of the respondents strongly agree the information from their
University website updated frequently and only 6% of the respondents strongly disagree the
information from their University website not updated frequently.
The Lesson learned from figure 4.3.4.4, Most of the Tanzania universities do not update
information to their websites frequently, this can be one of the reason for many of Tanzanian
students to access their website weekly and Monthly, most of the time users access website
because the information is currently. The Human mind is very interesting with the something
new. The Tanzania universities must update information in their websites as and when the
content is available, organize content within a single click where possible, and order the most
relevant material at the top of a page, also the information which will be updated need to reflect
with the University.
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Table 4.3.4.5
Qn. 5: Are you able to complete successfully the tasks in your University website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Yes (50 100 %)
21
31%
Sometime (10 49 %)
46
68%
No (0 - 9 %)
1%
Completion of tasks
1%
31%
68%
Yes (50 100 %)

Sometime (10 49 %)
No (0 - 9 %)

According to figure 4.3.4.5, 68% of the respondents responded sometimes they are able to
complete successful the tasks in their University website but sometimes not. 31% of the
respondents responded yes always are able to complete successfully the tasks in their University
website, and only 1% of the whole respondents responded that they are not able to menage to
complete successfully the tasks in their University website.
The lessons learned from figure 4.3.4.5, the factors which may keep users not to complete
successfully the tasks in their University website is presents of a couple that took several clicks
in different areas to find the requested information, un-working of some hyperlinks, bad
searching function and so on. Most of users are novice users so they dont have much skill to use
their University website. Design of the website should be easy and simple to learn from novice
users so as can be able to finish their tasks on time.
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Table 4.3.4.6
Qn. 6: Are the error message usefully and easy to understand in your University website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Yes
38
56%
No
30
44%
Useful and understanding of error messages
44%
Yes
56%
No

From Figure 4.3.4.6, 56% of the respondents found error messages are usefully for them and also
are easy to understand, only 44% of the respondents responded the error messages of their
Universities websites are not usefully and difficult to understand.
The lessons learned, Error messages are playing significant role in any application, especially in
web applications where the range of the users is very wide. In order to achieve usability web
design, help function is necessary for the users. High number of respondents responded the error
message is usefully, therefore error messages should be designed very carefully to be easy
recognized by students, the jargons terms and technical terms must be avoided, error message
should be available at any time when users get error in order to resolve the issues faster as
possible.
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Table 4.3.4.7
Qn. 7: How fast is loading Time of the University website page?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Faster
10%
Moderate
45
66%
Slow
16
24%
Webpage Loading
10%
24%
Faster
Moderate
Slow
66%

The result from Figure 4.3.4.7 show thats, 66% of the respondents responded their University
website page loading Time is average, 24% responded their University website page loading
Time is slow and only 10% of the respondents responded their University website page loading
Time is Faster.
The Lessons learned from figure 4.3.4.7, many of the Tanzania universities websites take time to
load. Page load time may depends on several usability factors such as the number and size of the
images, heavy graphics, the use of EIGHT and WIDTH attributes with image and table tags,
other factors may be the number of servers that must be contacted to the required website, speed
of the users modem and so on. The usability factors which may reduce time for the webpage to
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load must be taken to consideration such as avoiding heavy graphics, image size must be specific
for all pages, the number of images must be reduced, avoiding using many tables during design
the website, also the selection of the appropriate programming language for designing the
website must be considered.
Table 4.3.4.8
Qn. 8: My University website respond to my actions as expected
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
9%
Agree
37
54%
Disagree
24
35%
Strongly Disagree
1%
Responding of Action
1%
9%
Strongly Agree
35%
Agree
Disagree
54%
Strongly Disagree

According to the result of figure 4.3.4.8, 54% of the respondents agreed their University website
respond actions as what they expected, 35% of the respondents disagreed that their University
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website respond actions as what they expected and only 1% of the respondents strongly
disagreed their University website respond actions as what they expected.
The lessons learned from figure 4.3.4.8 is that, Majority of the students who are 69% responded
positive but few of them responded negative. The reason which can make the Universities
websites not to respond users actions as expected is having the inactive hyperlink, poor search
function, heavy load of the website which may result website to disconnect frequently, having
number of clicks in a hyperlinks or buttons, having technical terms and ambiguous terms in the
link, button which are not familiar to users, having the page which is not active. All these may
result students fail to achieve what they requested from their website.
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Table 4.3.4.9
Qn. 9: It is easy to recover mistakes easily and quickly on my University website
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
9%
Agree
32
47%
Disagree
30
44%
Strongly Disagree
Easy and quickly of recovering mistakes

0
9%
Strongly Agree
44%
Agree
Disagree
47%
Strongly Disagree

Figure 4.3.4.9 shows that, 47% of the respondents agreed that it is easy to recover mistakes
easily and quickly on their University website, 44% of the respondents disagree that it is not easy
to recover mistakes easily and quickly in their University website, 9% strongly agree it is easy to
recover mistakes easily and quickly in their University website and no one responded about the
strongly disagree.
Lessons learned from figure 4.3.4.9, the majority of the students agree when the error or
mistakes appeared during access their University website are easy to recover, and this is because
of having the usefully help function in the website. The help function need to be considered
during of the website development.
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Table 4.3.4.10
Qn. 10: How satisfied are you with your current skills for using your University website
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Very Satisfied
12
18%
Moderate Satisfied
47
69%
Unsatisfied
13%
Satisfaction of using university website

13%
18%
Very Satisfied
Moderate Satisfied
Unsatisfied
69%

The result from Figure 4.3.4.10 shows that, 69% of the respondents responded that they are
moderate satisfied with their current skills for using their University website, 18% responded
they are very satisfied with their current skills for using their University website and 13% of the
respondents responded they are unsatisfied with their current skills for using their University
website.
The lessons learned from figure 4.3.4.10, high numbers of students are moderate satisfied which
means did not well meet their needs when they use their Universities websites. The Tanzania
universities websites must be designed and make sure to meet the users satisfaction. It seems
most of the Tanzania universities do not conduct evaluation for their website before and after
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development. Even if other Universities do, but they dont take action to what they get result
from their students regarding of the website improvement.
Table 4.3.4.11
Qn. 11: On a scale of 1 to 5 (one being the lowest, and five the highest), how would you rate your University website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
4%
27
40%
21
31%
15
22%
3%
4%
40%
1
2
31%
3
4
22%
5
3%
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
35%
40%
45%

The high number of the overall number which was 40% of the respondents rated their University
website being the lowest from the scale 1 to 5; most of the respondents responded and rated their
University as the 2 scale which is the lower scale. Very few of the respondents rated their
University website ranked to the high scale.
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The lessons learned from figure 4.3.11, the Tanzania universities websites need to be improved
in order students to be satisfied with it. Many students are not happy and satisfied with their
University website thats why they ranked as lower level. Therefore improvements need to be
done in overall of the design and functionality of the website as well.
4.3.6 Category E: General Suggestion for improvement of University website
Table 4.3.5.1
Qn. 1: What do you think needs to be done in order to improve the usability of your University
website? (If any) Give your comments below
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Respondent who comments
40
60%
Respondent who didnt comments
28
40%
From Table 4.3.5.1, Comments from the respondents (students) of the main 5 and other
Universities in Tanzania
1. They need to improve the overall website to be attractive, is very poor
2. The University should improve by showing link of the best published dissertation(s), The
University has to update campus life video link.
3. I think there should be more improvement on my University website in terms of speed
and user friendly
4. The issues of Hyperlinks have to be taken care, more improvement should be considered on
the speed of Internet. Also the web has to be updated frequently depending on the current
issues on board!
5. The website of Sokoine University is sucks, they need to have good expert in order to
improve it, the color used very poor
6. They have to redesign the University website that's why people do not access it.
7. I would recommend that information on the University website be updated regularly.
8. I think there should be a trained before any one accessed the website and information
should be provided in a way that all we could understand
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9. Immediate changes must be done easily I.e. to upload the marks and the home page should
be changed to a new one since some things in the University change, also there should be a
list of all students and their classes
10. I think they should put everything in a softcopy...the materials should be there or at least
they should recommend a site to get them.
11. Frequently updates and colors should be changed at list to have a good look thats all.
12. They should improve the reliability of the website at times when the students really want to
access the website and they should try to post information valuable to the users faster
without any delays i.e. being punctual were necessary.
13. To encourage University staff to seek out additional education in new media, technology
and other courses that will make them to improve website usability.
14. Fair enough
15. Website improvement
16. Fair
17. Improvement of good and match color, good arrangement of text and well design of the
pages because design very poor.
18. One example of the page which needs to be improved for the website of ifm is about
improvement library page, the page is sucks for real. The link not active, not good color
design, the color not match each other, there is no proper arrangement of information, even
the picture used as symbol of the library need to redesigned to look nice. All mentioned
above must be taken action
19. In order to improve the usability of Tanzania universities website I think by making easier
to recover mistakes appeared on websites to allow quickly respond to any one using the
web, fast on loading time during the website visiting, website information is very important
to be updated frequently for anyone be comfortable and improve the performance of
University by knowing where am I around the University, understand the metaphors used
and do all the hyperlinks on our site effectively. Moreover Universities should provide
training to all students not to those in particular field I mean IT so than they can know
where they are inside and outside University.
20. Nothing to say than changes must be done for improvements
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21. Some hyper links are still under constructions i suggest they should complete so as to make
the website more usable
22. More features to be added and should be designed to be user friendly
23. University should hire professional to deal or create the website because it shows like it
was just done by the armature when you look at the graphics and the slides movements as
well. And they should make sure they update it before and after every event and put all
students requirements as the real University website is suppose to be. THANKS
24. It should have some useful links for us students to find information that can help us with
our studies and the part of announcements the old ones should be archived or something so
you dont end up reading the same thing thinking its new but its already out dated, and it
takes too much time to load.
25. Should be more dynamic, professional and simple. Page Borders are displaying
unprofessional images. Difficult to get what you want.
26. Option for Swahili users rather than English only to let many users to access the
Information.
27. Early uploading of news.
28. They have to redesign the website. The website is poor and bad design that's why student
are not interested with the system. they have to make sure they consider the blind people
during the design of the website
29. Information should be well organized
30. They should make sure at least after every three months they upgrade the system
31. "I think these few comments will help to improve usability of the website:
a. I strongly suggest that the University should make sure that they maintain up to date
information because currently there is a strong weakness in that area. People fail to get
up to date information when they need. For example information regarding changes in
fee structure, schools and results
b. I think the University should give more priority to the IT department by allocating
more resources so that great improvement should be made in maintaining a highly
professional website.
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c. We are leaving in a world of science and technology, people expect to get a lot of
services that currently are not provided, for example e-learning is one area that should
be looked with seriousness.
d. Performance of the website should be under constant improvement so as to serve user
more and more efficiently. Thanks."
32. Therefore in order to improve the usability of my University website to ensure the
performance capability of website by updated frequent.
33. Information should well organized
34. Nothing to comment, rather than changes must be done to keep the website University
attractive, and to have more function so student can visit frequently
35. Information should be well organized
36. They need to be more serious with it and give updates frequently
37. They have to add some functionality and to improve the performance of the website,
another thing which need to be taken action is to have a well organized text, known
metaphors, and use familiar hyperlink name, also color must be taken consideration that's
all.
38. Changes must be done
39. First of all I recommend the website to have a large capacity of the servers because most
of the time students are using to access the website then during the busy time sometimes it
become inefficient in terms of speed. Database engineers should work out on this problem
fist all things will be ok!, Secondly the University web should have online library to enable
us student to have online reading to save time and cost to visit always physical library this
will increase efficiency in our performance during our examinations. That is all about
Regards Students
40. I don't visit my University frequently because no update and even I cant find some other
things so I find is useless for me, I think they have to recheck again the website so that can
keep us to visit frequently.
41. Daily updates of different things should be done.
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Summary of respondents comments

According to Table 4.3.5.1, 60% of the respondents are the one who responded the questions of
general suggestions whilst 40% didnt respond.
The Lessons learned from the respondents comments:
Most of the Tanzania universities websites do not satisfy its students (users), many students have
complained about the color issues and graphics of the text, images, buttons, links background
pages which do not consider the color blind people, poor organized of the information, late
update the overall information such as announcements, events and other changes, hyperlink
(inactive hyperlink, undifferentiated hyperlink, unfamiliar hyperlink name and so on), no user
friendly of the interface, develop website with unprofessional web-designers, uploading material
such as class notes, assignments not on time.
It seems some of the Tanzania universities websites has problems with the page borders issues
which result to display unprofessional outlook images and disorganized information. Most of the
searching function does not respond what the users (students) expected to get. The loading time
for the Tanzania universities websites is slow and some of the websites lack of help function
which makes users fails to get help when they need help on time.
Also some of the Tanzania universities do not have online library which is a key and heart to the
students in order for them to read and downloading materials online. All these issues which were
learned from the respondents comments may result problem of usability. Therefore these issues
need to be improved and solved so that usability can be achieved to the Tanzania universities
websites and to satisfy users of the Tanzania universities websites.
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4.4
Interview Findings
4.4.1 Interview 1:
First interview was done by researcher to the Web Developer of Open University of Tanzania
through the use of mobile phone. Name of the interviewee is Emmanuel Thomas and his email
address is Emmanuel.thomas@out.ac.tz or malangoe@yahoo.com. Below was the interview
conversation conducted on Wednesday, November 9, 2011 at 4.00 PM Kuala Lumpur Time.
1. How long have you been involved in University website design?
Answer
I am a web developer of the Open University of Tanzania. I have been involved in University
website design for 2 years.
2. Do you think the University website is usefully? If yes why and if no why
Answer
Yes, because student can be able to access the information regarding to the University in 24hrs
wherever they are.
3. Did you consider usability during designing the University website? Why
Answer
Yes I considered usability because make users of the website to be very happy and satisfied with
the Open University.
4. Identify any usability issues from the University website. What changes would you make to
enhance the user experience and satisfaction?
Answer
Usability issues from Open University of Tanzania are organization of information, matching
colors for the overall of the web design. The changes which need to be done in order to enhance
the user experience and satisfaction is to make sure the information is well organized, having
good and matched colors which can make user to be attractive with the website, graphics also
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need to be taken consideration, navigation links need to be known to allow users to move from
one page to another easily. Design interfaces that promote recognition rather than recall
5. Which design approach did you use to design the website?
Answer
Currently there was no any approach or guideline I use to design Open University website, I used
to design the website by having comments and feedback from users such as students and staffs.
6. Many people have been complains about the University website regarding to the interface,
did you get any complaints from students regarding of the websites, if yes which action did
you take?
Answer
Yes I got some complains from staffs and students regarding of the design, I didnt take any
action but I want to prepare some questionnaire to distribute to users and collect the result from
them and working on it.
7. What are some usability principles that tried to follow when designing web pages?
Answer
The usability principles which I have been used to design the website is visibility of the system
status such as a color code and text, I never stick much on the design principles.
8. Did you perform evaluation for your University website before? If yes which method did you
use? If no what are the barriers?
Answer
I didnt perform evaluation, but as I told you I want soon to distribute questionnaire to users in
order to improve website.
9. What are the best practice you recommend in order to improve the website usability
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Answer
The practices which I recommend is Information design and link navigation
10. Please suggest overall improvements in terms of usability if you have.
Answer
The overall improvements in terms of usability to review Color, Graphics, layouts of the design
and etc
4.4.2 Interview 2:
Second interview was done by researcher to the System Analyst (Web-Designer) of Institute of
Finance and Management (IFM) through email. Name of the interviewee is Jessica Chiwenda
and her email address is chiwenda@ifm.ac.tz. Below was the interview conversation which
responded on Monday, November 14, 2011.
1. How long have you been involved in University website design?
Answer
I am System Analyst (Web-Designer) of Institute of Finance and Management; I have been
involved in University website design for 5 years now.
2. Do you think the University website is usefully? If yes why and if no why
Answer
Yes because it provides some information to all IFM Stake holders (contents), for those who
want to join the Institute and those who have interest in academic area.
3. Did you consider usability during designing the University website? Why
Answer
Yes, to make web sites easy to use for an end-user, without the requirement that any specialized
training be undertaken such as Contents availability for those who needs such information, to
make the site easy to navigate and see the contents, to keep the contents clear and simple and to
provide a site map which will show everything and where to get them easily.
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4. Identify any usability issues from the University website. What changes would you make to
enhance the user experience and satisfaction?
Answer
Usability issues from the Institute of Finance and Management website is contents, the changes I
would make to enhance the user experience and satisfaction to making sure that all the contents
needed by the stakeholders are available layouts: improving layout to make sure that all
information is seen at first site colors: no change since blue is out corporate color Keep
everything as consistent as possible.
5. Which design approach did you use to design the website?
Answer
We normally look at our contents that we want to deliver to our stakeholders and try to see how
we are going to deliver that information. Second, we check to see how others organize their sites
(academic Institutions) that are where we get different views on arrangement. Third, views are
collected from others, staffs and other people as we carry on developing the site.
6. Many people have been complains about the University website regarding to the interface,
did you get any complaints from students regarding of the websites, if yes which action did
you take?
Answer
Everyone has his/her views on appearance of anything house, cars etc. Someone will like this
next wont. Sure there are some complaints that I get from stakeholders especially students but
remember the website Idea don't only come from me it comes from a group of people who
approve it to be used and provide their comment during development. But it is always to make
everyone satisfied because everyone has his/her own taste.
7. What are some design principles that tried to follow when designing web pages?
Answer
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Collecting ideas from people, designing while collecting comments from others, online or manually for
those who reach us direct
8. Did you perform evaluation for your University website before? If yes which method did you use? If
no what are the barriers?
Answer
Yes, we normally put the site online and give people a link to view and provide their comments by email
to the webmaster or Facebook or any other means they can use.
9. What are the best practices you recommend in order to improve the website usability
Answer
The best practices I recommend in order to improve the website usability are designing while considering
usability
10. Please suggest overall improvements in terms of usability if you have.
Answer
Consideration should be done on the contents to be published, navigation, layouts etc.

4.4.3 Lessons Learned from interview 1 and 2
The lessons learned from interview 1 and 2 shows that, Usability is very important to be
considered when designing the website of the University in order to satisfy users (students and
staffs) of the website. Even though the Tanzania University seem usability is very important to
the Universities websites but there is some issues which make usability not to be considered fully
in the Tanzania universities. Those issues are poor organized of information, inconsistence of
page layout, colors, Navigations.
Interviewee 1 responding by saying that he didnt perform website evaluation after website
development and he didnt use any Approach or Guideline to come up with the website also the
interviewee 2 seemed not to use any Guideline to come up with the website, due to this thats
why Universities websites have luck of usability and look unprofessional which result users to be
unhappy, uncomfortable and unsatisfied with the system.
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The recommendation which was done by the interviewees was that, they recommended
considering usability while design the website such as Information design, navigation, layouts
and so on.
Therefore Guideline for usability of the Tanzania universities websites is very important to be
produced in order to help the Tanzania universities websites to have usability and keep users
visiting frequently rather than weekly or monthly.
4.5 Conclusion
According to the Data collected, presented and analyzed as illustrated above, it can be noticed that most
of the Tanzania universities websites at present have the problems of websites usability. These
Universities have been trying to practicing the good designing of the websites but still not achieved the
website usability. Nevertheless it was noted that although most of Tanzania universities have been
develop their websites, they have not applied usability principles. It was also observed through these
findings that many of the students are not happy, comfortable, satisfied and do not interact with their
Universities websites due to the poor graphics and inappropriate matching color used in the websites
which not suitable for the color blind users.
Also the designs do not follow the standard of the consistency pages, poor organization of
information. The sizes of the images consistent with the overall structure of the website and each
other not same, the text fonts not same for all pages, icons not match in size in all pages, unavailability of other functionality in the website, no frequent update of information, loading Time
of the website page is slow, inappropriate respond according to users expectations, difficult of
searching Information and so on. All these issues result the poor usability of the Tanzania
universities websites. Also through analysis was observed that, there is no any proper Guideline
which is used by the Tanzania universities to develop their websites. The analysis concludes that
the use of Usability Guideline to design Tanzania universities websites will be adequate by
design websites which has usability and satisfaction to users (students).
Every Tanzania University by using Guideline for usability which will be developed on chapter 5
to design and develop their websites will bring positive impact of the websites to be accessed and
satisfied by many students. Guideline which will be produced in chapter 5 will help to produce
the most appropriate Tanzania universities websites for all students.
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CHAPTER 5:
ARTEFACT
Page 100
5. CHAPTER 5: ARTEFACT
5.1 Introduction
Chapter 5 presents the produced Artefact which formulated from secondary and primary
research. A Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites is the deliverable of this
research. Proposed Guideline will definitely have positive effect for Universities websites of
Tanzania and help achieve the strategic aims of the Tanzania universities for long-term
perspective. Through the use of this Guideline, Tanzania universities will be guided on the
proper steps to take while design or redesign their websites.
5.2 How the Analysis was used to create the Artefact
According to Data Analysis, Tanzania universities students and web designers are most
important in optimizing Tanzania universities websites. In particular the students of Tanzania
universities responded negative regarding to their websites and suggested improvements of the
websites.
During analysis conducted from the students of the main 5 Tanzania universities, many issues
were identified from Tanzania universities websites such as poor organized information, late
update the overall information such as announcements, events and other changes, hyperlink
(inactive hyperlink, undifferentiated hyperlink, unfamiliar hyperlink name), no students friendly
of the interface, develop website with unprofessional web-designers, problems with the page
borders issues which result to display unprofessional outlook images and disorganized
information, slow loading page time, color issues such as text, buttons, links, background pages
which do not consider color blind people. Thus from all these issues help to create the guideline,
the guideline which will be produced will base on the issues identified above. Therefore,
guideline will incorporate planning of the website, website content and structure, navigation
website Support and Metaphors, webpage Design, evaluation of website, and website
management and Maintenance.
Additionally, the data analysis from the web designers shows that, the evaluation of the website
is also important in optimizing the usability of the website and therefore having higher success
rates. As the result, the Guideline also incorporates the evaluation process for the website.
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5.3 How the Literature Review was used to support the Artefact
The literature review from chapter 2 conducted by highlighting the Current issues of web
usability from different Universities all over the world and how to overcome the issues of
websites usability which faced by many Universities, also some current issues faced by Tanzania
universities websites were identified to be the main reasons. Therefore, all these issues help
researcher to design and come up with questionnaires and interview questions to students and
web designers of Tanzania universities which gave support and contribution to produce
Guideline.
Aspects such as overcoming the issues of Universities websites usability, different guidelines
which used to achieve the websites usability and successful implementation of Universities
websites in other countries which show the reason of successfully as discussed in literature
review are created in support to ensure the Tanzania universities optimizes usability in their
websites and hence increases the level and standard of their websites in international
Universities.
Also several criteria which mentioned and discussed on the literature review support to formulate
the Guideline. Those criteria are:
Learnability: The easiest way for students to learn how to use Tanzania universities
websites
Efficiency of use: The easiest way for students to complete their performing tasks within
Tanzania universities websites
Memorability: The easiest way for students to use and remember the functions and other
elements of the website when they use Tanzania universities websites for another time
after a long time not being use.
User satisfaction: How enjoyable the system to use.
Within the perspective of websites content and visual-interactive form are parts of a total
experience, where students have diverse, complex and evolving needs and interests. Also there
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are other additional criteria which contribute greatly to students satisfaction, which are
Accessibility: Easiest way for different students to use the Tanzania universities websites
(students with special needs, etc.) in different environments. Usefulness: The ability of Tanzania
universities websites to provide good service to its students through appropriate web
functionalities structure.
According to the web design Framework proposed by cognetics operations (1998) which titled
The LUCID Design Framework" which means Logical User Centered Interaction Design
Framework as evident in the literature review, the need of planning such right selection of the
web-designer during of the website design or redesign has been incorporated. Also scope of the
design such as look and feel, screen layouts, navigation, and users assistance elements of lucid
framework incorporated in the proposed Guideline. Furthermore, the insist of the design based
on user activity, context of the overall tasks and work flow as suggested by Lucid Framework
support to produce the Guideline in the part of Site structure and content, and Support
navigation.
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5.4 Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites

Designing Tanzania universities websites through using Guideline for usability of Tanzania
universities websites will ensure students satisfaction and optimization of the websites usability.
The steps to be taking in section of the Guideline for the designing of Tanzania universities
websites are mentioned below which will ensure the usability of the final product (website)
which will lead to quality of an application that determines its ease of use.
5.4.0 Diagram: Figure 5.4.0: Guideline for Usability of Tanzania universities websites
Preparation and
Preparation and Planning
Planning
University website
University website
Structure and Content
Structure and Content
Support navigation
Support navigation
-Help Students to find their
-Help Students to find their
way
way
-Tell students what to expect
University
University webpage
webpage Design
Design
-Design
-Design an
an effective
effective home
home page
page
-Design
-Design for
for efficiency
efficiency
-Keep
-Keep text
text simple
simple to
to use
use and
and easy
easy
read
read for
for students
students
Evaluation of University website

-Choose your Evaluators
-Review Website
-Tell
-Tell students
students what
what to
to expect
expect
University website Management and

Maintenance
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5.4.1 Preparation and Planning

a. The University website designer should be known on this stage; the selected University webdesigner should have skills and experience on how to design and develop the Universities
website and also should have the ability to work as a team.
b. The purpose of the designed University website should be well known in order to help
designer to know which requirements need to be included in the websites. All project
stakeholders, including senior management of the University should support policy of
usability as a core quality of projects (website development).
c. University web-designers roles and responsibilities should be well identified to accomplish
the usability of the University website and overall quality of the website. The resources,
timetable and budget for website design must be well estimated and planned.
d. The important users of the website such as students, staffs and non-students who want to join
to University should be well identified with their purpose for accessing the University
website. Also it should be accepted that, different students have different skills, needs and
interests. Therefore their opinion must be taken consideration
e. On this stage, the technologies such as programming language will be used to design and
develop University website must be well known.
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5.4.2 University website Structure and Content

a. First brainstorm content that needs to be created for the University website and then working
closely with students, staffs and other stakeholder such as management to know which
contents are appropriate to them and then review all contents after get feedback from
students, staffs and management, then trimming whatever thing does not match the goals of
the University websites.
b. Time must be taken note, meaning that, think about the future and how the University
website content might need to grow in order to leave room for growth. After that, group
contents of the University website into categories. During the categorization of the contents,
consideration of getting students feedback through a card sort is very important.
c. After the Categories of the contents been established, the outline of the web content must be
established and reviewed with stakeholder for accuracy. The structured and grouped contents
will help students to be able to search Information easily and acquire fast overview of
information available in particular areas.
d. Take the final content and create site diagram which will represent content and site structure.
Excel or Visio can be used to create site diagram. Figure 5.4.2.1 is the site diagram example.
Site Diagram
Home Page
Sub-page
Sub-page
Sub-page
Figure 5.4.2.1
e. Use University website headings and web page headings for all pages and consistent
structure to increase usability.
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f. The structured and organized text must be readable and kept in meaningful headings,
highlighted keywords, and text kept in short. Below is example of the information content
which is well organized, readable, meaningful headings and highlighted keywords with short
text which can help students to recognize easily and to know where they want to go
Figure 5.4.2.2
g. The terminology of the information content must be familiar to the students. Students of the
University website should be interviewed to establish the students terminology. Not expect
students to read huge amount of information so make content of the information brief to
students of the University website in order to attract and motivate them to read.
h. All elements include content, navigation; images, icons, buttons, functional elements (like
search) and footer must be well organized for all pages of the University website to allow
students memorize the function.
i. The University web-content such as graphics, text and style of the content should express the
message and not just to decorate homepage. The colors which need to be used in the
University websites must be warm colors, the photos which can be used to convey message
must be the photos which relate with the University e.g. the photos of happy student on a
bench, or student who are in the library or lecture room, student conversing with the
professor.
j. The used text in the University website must reflect and give the message regarding to the
University and its players such as students, lecturers.
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k. University website content should be organized within a single click where possible, and
order the most relevant material at the top of a page.
l. Make sure that, all pages structure look alike. Keep the size, shape and position of the web
structure elements constant. Inconsistency can leads to confusion and frustration. Also try to
minimize the amount of space in order for students to view content without scrolling the
page. Figure 5.4.2.3 is example of the University website structure which looks alike in all
pages and web contents.
University website Structure
Website title
Page 1
Menu Bar
Information
contents
Title page
Website title
Page 2
Menu Bar
Information
Contents
Title page
Figure 5.4.2.3
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5.4.3 Support navigation

5.4.3.1 Help students to find their way
a. Show students where they are through having the University website title and page title for
each page and active link in order to know where they can go.
b. Maintain consistent navigation and use color to distinguish between visited and unvisited
links to help students to identify un-visited links and any visited link, because students can
get lost when University website make use of the alike link color for visited and un-visited.
Do not change the default link colors of the unvisited links which should be shade of blue
and visited links should be some shade of purple.
c. The number of clicks needs to reach the required content must be minimized. Make sure
students can get to useful information in no more than four clicks. Also provide links of
menus on each page to keep students easily to navigate while searching information. All
links should have visible color which reflects with background of the web page, must be
active and same text size. All links which are not active should be hidden not to be accessed
by students. Also do not use word link such as click here for Prospectus, click here for
Undergraduate use direct name such as Prospectus, Undergraduate.
5.4.3.2 Tell Students what to expect

a. The hyper links must be arranged based on the students experience such as instead of having
home hyperlink from right side for each application page must be kept left hand side for
each University webpage due the students experience. Also every webpage should be linked
to the home page.
b. Use terms which are meaningful and understandable to Students. Example, Use term such as
online catalog instead of OPAC.
d. Make sure each link should address Students to the required contents of information.
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e. Avoid scrolling pages if necessary because students do not like scrolling pages. If the pages
need scrolling make sure navigation buttons are included at bottom and up for all scrolling
pages to minimize the need for students to scroll the page.
f. Make sure University logo is clickable and takes the students to home page of the University
website and keep logo in the upper left corner of the screen. Also make sure you differentiate
contents list for a page, use a heading of the Page contents.
g. Provide search features simple and visible because many students prefer to use search
function than exploring the University website, therefore students can fast find exact item of
information through using search function. On home page, search function should be a typein field and not a link, also should provide understood results regarding on what students
requested. Keep search input field wide enough to contain a typical query.
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5.4.4 University webpage Design

5.4.4.1 Design an effective home page
a. The University website identity should be established and give a clear overview of the
content.
b. Avoid unnecessary information in the University website in order to fit all information on
one page, because many students not like to scroll the home page (avoid scroll of pages)
c. Use less than 9 menus. The reason of providing less than 9 menus into University website is
to fulfill the George Millers (1956) theory which will help students to memorize the
University website functions. According to his theory 7 2 chunks of information can be
held in short term memory at anytime.
5.4.4.2 Design for efficiency

a. If there are some files to be downloaded in the University website, the download time should
be minimized by uploading small capacity of files as many students in Tanzania have low
connections speed of internet.
b. The graphics size should be minimized through minimizing number of colors to increase
speed loading of the University website.
c. Use only less than four matched colors in the design of University website to attract attention
and express meaning.
d. Use same size images, use small images in University website.
e. Use appropriate icons where supposed to be used and make sure it match with real world.
Example: in library page, book can be used as metaphor (icon). In searching function,
magnifying glass can be used as metaphor.
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f. Dont put too much content on webpage because making University website to suffer from
poor performance and to be look excessively large.
g. If errors do occur, try to provide students friendly messages with no jargon and suggest a
solution.
5.4.4.3 Keep text simple to use and easy read for Students
Avoid or minimize the use of flashing, scrolling text or animation, as many students find it
distracting.
Do not make the text too small; make University website text slightly bigger than smaller.
Use text of san-serif font with font size 12 with appropriate color consistently and
professional appearance across all pages of the University website, this will help students
to read University website text easily.
Use text colors which reflect the with the background color of the University website.
Example in Figure 5.4.4.3.1 background is white and text color is black, so can be easily for
the students to read. While in Figure 5.4.4.3.2 background is white red and text color is red,
so is difficult for the color blind students to read.
Figure 5.4.4.3.1
Figure 5.4.4.3.2
Avoid use moving text or elements because distract the readers (students) attention from the
text.
Avoid Long blocks of unbroken paragraphs because it is easy for the reader (students) to lose
their place. Use short paragraph with broken paragraphs that express one idea.
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5.4.5 Evaluation of University website

Heuristic evaluation is the usability inspection whether each element of a user interface follows a
usability heuristics. The Heuristic evaluation is done in order to come up with the opinion about
what is good and what is bad in the interface (Nielsen, 1990).
Heuristic evaluation relies on the experience and creativity of the evaluators thus making it easy
to perform, by experience of evaluators may knowing the difficult problems students will face (
Rosson, 2002).
In evaluating the University website, evaluator can use questionnaire or interview questions and
distribute to the students) of the University website. All questions must be formulated based on
heuristic evaluation. The heuristic evaluation shown below
5.4.5.1 Choose your Evaluators
Choose your Evaluators for University website, the more evaluators selected, the more usability
problems will be found out. Choose evaluator with experience of University website because
they will help to find high percentage of usability problems with your interface and those without
experience of University website will help to find low percentage of usability problems.
5.4.5.2 Review University website
Choose approach that will take to perform evaluation either interview or questionnaire. Once you
have chosen approach, and select your evaluators you need to brief these people in short on
heuristics you want for them to assess the University website.
a. Visibility of System Status
Ask students about the appropriate feedback for the action they take within reasonable time
example, once students clicks the Register button on registration form, within a little seconds
will require feedback that tells registration has been successfully. This feedback might appear in
the separate page which contains back to site or Home link.
Also ask students about colours which used to the University website if are appropriate to them
or not. Also ask about matching overall colours in the University website if can students are able
to see the icons, labels, hypertext, and University website information easily.
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b. Match between the System and the Real World

Ask students about using words if there is any terminology and concepts that are not familiar
with them. Ask students if they understand metaphors used in the University website and let
them give opinion which metaphors they prefer.
c. User Control and Freedom
Ask students if they have control and freedom with the University website. Example, An element
which makes students control and free in University website is Home button which must
appear in every page, they know once the lost they can find home.
d. Consistency and Standards
Ask students if University website follows standards such as having Home menu on left side of
the University website and contact us on right side, each page of the University website has title
of the University website and title of the page and so on. Ask if the structure of the University
website is well organized and designed.
e. Error Prevention
Ask students if error messages produced accurately at the appropriate time and ask if it shows
what to do to correct the occurred error. Also ask if there is any error does not understand. This
part is where more testing need to be done in order to avoid errors.
f. Recognition Rather than Recall
Ask students if is easy to them to recognize how to navigate the University website. Ask them if
the instructions for using of the University website are visible and easily retrievable whenever
they need them. This will increase the chance for students to recognize where they are; therefore
they will not have to retrace their path from the home page.
g. Flexibility and Ease of Use
Ask students if University website interfaces allow them to move from one page to another as
they require. Also ask them if they have freedom either to leave the system or to go to home
page at any point in the different pages. Ask if all menus are similar to each pages of the
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University website. Ask if all links are working effectively and can retrieve information with a
single click. Ask students if the loading speed of the site is fast or slow.
h. Aesthetic and Minimalist Design
Ask students if the University website design is simple and attractive, and if are happy while
using it. Ask if University website has much information, pictures and colours.
i. Help
Ask students if is easy for them to search information, focuses on their task, carry out their tasks
and achieve their goals.
Note: Also test the University website with different browsers, such as Internet Explorer, Safari
and Firefox
5.4.6 University website Management and Maintenance

a. Help new students to find University website by indexing names of the key people from the
University and important information such as courses offered.
b. Make sure any new pages which will be added into the University website meet the quality
and usability requirements.
c. Information should be updated frequently in the University website.
d. Make sure that, the University website structure is planned and reviewed as it grows, make
sure the students needs are reviewed through monitoring feedback from students by having
comments form in the University website which allow students to give their opinion
regarding of the website.
5.5 Conclusion
The proposed Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites developed based on the
Literature review, feedbacks from Tanzania students and web-designers of Tanzania universities.
The formulated Guideline above will help designers of the Tanzania universities websites to
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come up with the good Universities websites which will meet University website usability
requirements, students needs and students satisfaction. If the formulated Guideline will be used
by designers to design Tanzania universities websites will assist in solving different problems
faced by Tanzania University students. Therefore the students will be happy, very comfortable,
very satisfied when using their University websites and also will enable them to access their
Universities websites frequently.
5.6 Testing of the Artefact
To know whether the Guideline will be appropriate, used and provide the feasible solution to the
Students of the Tanzania universities websites, the Guideline sent for reviews to the website
designers of Open University of Tanzania, The Institute of Finance and Management (IFM) in
Tanzania and University of Dar es Salaam to verify the guideline and to make any changes
whenever required in order to assure the Guideline is usefully for Tanzania universities websites.
In detail of the testing questions are found in Appendix G. Below is the Analysis of testing result
5.6.1 Category A: Evaluation of user interface design and content

Table 5.6.1.1
1. Qn. Does the Guideline help to come up with the Professional look of the University
website (color Scheme, graphics, etc.)
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
33%
Agree
67%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
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Professional look of the university

website (color Scheme, graphics, etc.)
0% 0%
Strongly Agree
33%
Agree
Disagree
67%
Strongly Disagree

The testing result about user interface design and content found that, the 67% of the
respondents agree and 33% of the respondents strongly agreed the produced Guideline will help
web-designers of Tanzania universities websites to come up with the Professional look of the
University website (color Scheme, graphics, etc.).
Table 5.6.1.2
2. Qn. Does the Guideline help to come up with the readable text for students in the University
website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
0%
Agree
100%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
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Readable text for students in the

university website
0%0%
Strongly Agree
Agree
100%
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
Summary from Figure 5.6.1.2

The Guideline is well organized, structured and the problems are well identified. The 100% of
respondents agree that, the produced Guideline will help web-designers of Tanzania universities
websites to come up with the readable text for students in the University website and because it
is the proper solution to the Universities websites.
Table 5.6.1.3
3. Qn. Does the Guideline help students easily remember and learn how to use University
website
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
33%
Agree
67%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
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Easily remember and learn how to use

0% 0%
33%
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
67%
Strongly Disagree
Summary of figure 5.6.1.3

The reviewers were asked whether the Guideline will help students easily remember and learn
how to use University website. 33% of the respondents strongly agreed and 67% of respondents
agreed that, the produced Guideline will help web-designers of the Tanzania universities
websites to design the websites that is easily memorable and learnable for students to use.
Table 5.6.1.4
4. Qn. Does the Guideline help to come up with the Consistent design, feel and look of all
University website pages?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
0%
Agree
100%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
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Consistent design, feel and look of all

university website pages
0% 0% 0%
Strongly Agree
Agree
100%
Disagree
Strongly Disagree

The 100% of respondents agreed that the produced guideline will assist web-designers in their
Tanzania universities websites to increase the level of designing the Consistent design, feel and
look of all University website pages of the Tanzania universities websites so that students of
Tanzania universities will be satisfied with their Universities websites.
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5.6.2 Category B: evaluation of navigation and links

Table 5.6.2.1
1. Qn. Does the Guideline help to come up with the good and understandable Hyperlink
description in the University website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
33%
Agree
67%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
Hyperlink description
0% 0%
33%
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
67%
Strongly Disagree

The 33% of respondents strongly agreed the proposed Guideline will help web-designers in their
Tanzania universities to come up with the good and understandable Hyperlink description in
their University website whilst 67% of the respondents just agree.
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Table 5.6.2.2
2. Qn. Does the Guideline will help to come up with the good University website which allows
easy students to move around in University website by using the links or back button?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
67%
Agree
33%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
0% 0%
33%
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
67%
Strongly Disagree

Figure 5.6.2.2 shows that, 67% of the respondents strongly agreed whilst 33% of the respondents
agreed that, guideline will help Tanzania universities website designers to come up with the good
University website which will allows students to easily move around in their University website
by using the provided links and buttons in the websites.
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5.6.3 Category C: evaluation of performance and effectiveness

Table 5.6.3.1
1. Qn. Does the Guideline will help to improve the students to access the University
website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
0%
Agree
100%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
0%
0%
0%
Strongly Agree
Agree
100%
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
Summary of figure 5.6.3.1 from table 5.6.3.1
The testing result from figure 5.6.3.1 found that, the 100% respondents agreed that by using the
produced Guideline to design the Tanzania universities websites will help to increase the
accessibility of students to access their University website frequently.
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Table 5.6.3.2
2. Qn. Does the Guideline will help students to find information easy in the University
website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
67%
Agree
33%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
0%
0%
33%
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
67%
Strongly Disagree
The result from figure 5.6.3.2, 67% of the respondents strongly agreed while 33% of the
respondents agreed that, the produced guideline will help Tanzania universities website designers
to come up with the well planned, structured, organized and search functionality of information
so that students can find information easily in their University website.
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Table 5.6.3.3
3. Qn. Does the Guideline will help students to complete successfully the tasks in the
University website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
0%
Agree
100%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
0%
0%
0%
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
100%

Result from figure 5.6.3.3 shows that, 100% respondents strongly agree the produced Guideline
will help Tanzania universities website designers to come up with the Universities websites
which enable students to complete successfully the tasks in their University website when they
use it.
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Table 5.6.3.4
4. Qn. Does the Guideline help to come up with useful error message which will be easy for
students to understand?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
33%
Agree
67%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
0%
0%
33%
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
67%
Strongly Disagree

Result from figure 5.6.3.4 shows that, 33% of the respondents strongly agree and the 67% of the
respondents agreed that, the produced Guideline will help Tanzania universities website
designers to come up with the University website which has usefully error message which will
be easy for students to understand when they face some errors problems when they use their
Universities websites.
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Table 5.6.3.5
5. Qn. Does the Guideline help to speed up the loading Time of the University website
page?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
0%
Agree
100%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
0%
0%
0%
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
100%

100% of respondents agreed that, due to the instruction given from the guideline about the
website performance will help to speed up the loading Time of the University website page.
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Table 5.6.3.6
6. Qn. Does the Guideline help students easy to recover mistakes easily and quickly in
University website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
33%
Agree
67%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
0%
0%
33%
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
67%
Strongly Disagree

The result from figure 5.6.3.6 shows that, 33% of the respondents strongly agreed while 67% of
respondents agreed that, the produced guideline will enable students easy to recover mistakes
easily and quickly in their University websites, so students will feel happy and enjoying while
they use their Universities websites.
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Table 5.6.3.7
7. Qn. Does the Guideline will make students to be very satisfied when using the University
website?
Respondent Category
Number of Responds
Strongly Agree
67%
Agree
33%
Disagree
0%
Strongly Disagree
0%
0%
0%
33%
Strongly Agree
Agree
Disagree
67%
Strongly Disagree

The result from figure 5.6.3.7 shows that, 67% of the respondents strongly agreed while 33% of
the respondents agreed that, the produced Guideline will help Tanzania universities website
designers to meet the usability requirements for Tanzania universities websites and will enable
students to be very satisfied when using their University website.
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5.6.4 Category D: General Suggestion about the proposed guideline

a. The suggestion from web-designers of Open University of Tanzania
First of all i found the guideline helpful and it help in the website parties although have
comment on the website performance suggest should have included some tools that can used to
loading of the website.
b. The suggestion from web-designers of The Institute of Finance and Management in

Tanzania
Consider that the stakeholders that use website are not only students there are other groups
using the website as well.
c. The suggestion from web-designers of University of Dar es Salaam

-You must consider how Disables can use Universities website, such as integration with Sound,
animation
etc
-How old people like professor who above 50yrs can Use University website.
Summary of the general suggestion

Therefore based on this comments, the suggestion tools that can be used to speed up the
designing of the Tanzania universities websites and speed up the loading of the website after
been launched should be put as recommendation for future enhancement. Also comments from
another respondent suggest the use website is not for student only but there other group using the
University website as well. Therefore, the formulated guideline produced for web-designers of
Tanzania universities websites which can help them to come up with the Universities websites
which meet the usability requirements and satisfy students and also may satisfy other groups as
suggested by one of the respondents. Another comment which provided by the web expert from
University of Dar es Salaam, the consideration of sound integration to the Tanzania universities
websites for disabled suggested to be further researched. Therefore the guideline will provide the
positive impact not only for students but also for other stakeholders who are using the Tanzania
universities websites.
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5.6.1 Conclusion
This chapter has proved that, the guideline produced fit the usability problems of Tanzania
universities websites. After the evaluation of Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities
websites conducted by web designers from Open University of Tanzania, Institute of Finance
and Management (IFM) in Tanzania and University of Dar es Salaam found the guideline will be
helpful for Tanzania universities websites. But also, there are some additional improvements
which have been suggested to be included in the guideline such as sound integration to the
Tanzania universities websites for disabled users and tools that can be used to speed up loading
of the University websites, so the improvements has been kept as further research. In fact, this
Guideline will show successfully achievement of websites usability for the Tanzania universities
and solve problems of Tanzania universities websites where students were faced before.
Therefore commitment for Tanzania universities to use the proposed guideline is very important
when they design or redesign their website.
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CHAPTER 6:
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
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6. CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION

6.1
Introduction
On this chapter, research conclusion is described from the summarization of data deriving from
the data analysis, literature review, Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites, and
testing of the Guideline. Also, this chapter describes the recommendations and suggestions on
the usability of Tanzania universities websites, Limitations, self review, further research and
overall conclusions of the dissertation.
6.2
Conclusions relating to the research Questions/Research Problem
The research begins with Tanzania universities websites problems faced by Tanzania universities
students. The Tanzania universities lacked a guideline needed to acquire University website
usability that will help in the improvement of the Tanzania universities websites.
The Guideline which proposed on this research tackles these problems by recommending several
stages to be performed to design the Tanzania universities websites which have usability
requirements. This includes Preparation and Planning, University websites structure and content,
Support navigation, evaluation of University website, and University website management and
maintenance.
According to the feedback received from Tanzania universities websites designers after the
Guideline was tested, it was determined that, the guideline will be effective if implemented in the
Universities. The effective use of the Guideline as a tool for designing the Tanzania universities
websites should be pursued by proper engagement of the management of the University and
designers of the University website.
Usability plays vital role in website design where focus understands the users requirements and
needs. The proper implementation of the Guideline could give the positive impact of the
Tanzania universities websites which will result students to be satisfied with their Universities
websites.
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6.3
Recommendations and Suggestions
Although the proposed Guideline is based on the need of the Tanzania universities students, it
can be adopted in other Tanzania schools such secondary school as well. The researcher
recommends thats, in order for Tanzania universities to improve their websites in terms of
usability so that they can be able to satisfy high number of students and make them accessing
their Universities websites frequently with enjoying, Universities must use Guideline for
usability of Tanzania universities websites during designing the Universities websites.
According to the research, it was discovered that there was improper way of designing the
Universities websites of Tanzania, most of the designers do not follow approach to design the
websites which resulted to low students satisfaction with their websites. Therefore researcher
recommends and suggests that, usability goals and design principles must be considered through
using Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites during design University website,
due to this Tanzania universities will improve the performance and professional outlook of their
websites.
6.4
Limitations
The research was limited to selective Tanzania universities, the respondents of the research were
students and website designers among of the Tanzania universities. However the selected
respondents were chosen from different knowledge and experience on using their University
website.
The researcher was observed that, the respondents (designers) of the Tanzania universities take
time to respond the interview conversation and testing the guideline due to their daily job
responsibilities. Also due to the low penetration of internet connection, respondents (students)
for the questionnaire delaying to respond on time the questionnaire because questionnaires were
supposed to be answered online. Only two designers from different Tanzania universities were
interviewed due to the lack of responds for other designers.
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6.5
Self-Review
The research topic was very interesting to the researcher since he has done one module which is
interaction design so has experienced similar issues addressed by the research. Even though the
topic was very interesting to the researcher but also was the biggest challenge as well, therefore
this project is the greatest achievement to the researcher.
It was challenging to find the relevant literature review Tanzania universities websites. Also the
place where data was collected is very far from where the researcher was doing project; this was
very challenging in terms of time management, the researcher ensured that, all questionnaires
which were already sent out reached to the required correspondents and were collected on time
for analysis, also researcher was making sure the interview was conducted on schedule.
All the challenges mentioned required self discipline, motivation and hard working on the
researcher in order to make sure the project is delivered on time with the high quality. All the
responds given from the respondents was very usefully on developing Guideline for usability of
Tanzania universities websites.
The researcher managed to finish the dissertation which has quality of work and on time due to
the kind guidance and support given by his supervisor Mr. Naresh Kumar Appadurai, also
another support given by family, fiance and friends of the researcher as well as support from
students of the main five Tanzania universities and website designers from Tanzania universities
made the project to be manageable..
6.6
Further research
For most of the Universities, websites is very crucial to be used by students to interact with their
Universities better and faster, thus it has a lot of part to be researched and improved further. The
future contribution of the current research is recommended that, Universities could focus on
functionality, security and content management of University website.
After testing of the Guideline been conducted, researcher recommends that, tools that can be
used to speed up the designing of the Tanzania universities websites and speed up the loading of
the website after been launched need to be researched for future enhancement. Also another
further research which recommended by researcher after testing been conducted is consideration
on how Disables can use Universities website, such as integration with Sound, animation.
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6.7
Conclusion
This chapter concludes the final guideline produced by researcher with the suitable
recommendations and suggestions, limitations of the research, self review and further research.
The researcher concludes by saying that, Tanzania universities websites aim to offer the services
and information to its students in efficient ways. To attain their purposes, Tanzania universities
websites design should go through Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites
to ensure that students are more satisfied with the information and services provided by their
websites.
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APPENDICES
Page 137
7. APPENDIX A: Log Sheets
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Page 139
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Page 144
Page 145
8. APPENDIX B: Gantt chart
Page 146
Page 147
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Page 149
9. APPENDIX C: Proposal
Table of Contents
A. Title ..................................................................................................................................... 151
B. Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 151
C. Dissertation Background .................................................................................................. 152
D. Dissertation Aims & Objectives ....................................................................................... 157
E. Intellectual challenge ......................................................................................................... 158
F. Research Programme ........................................................................................................ 158
2.1
Project Plan ............................................................................................................................... 159
a.
Writing Proposal 1 to 3 weeks ............................................................................................... 159
b.
Writing Literature review.......................................................................................................... 159
c.
Write the questionnaire and Interview ...................................................................................... 159
d.
Work on the dissertation chapters layout ................................................................................. 159
e.
Develop the guideline ............................................................................................................... 159
f.
Testing....................................................................................................................................... 160
g.
Project schedule ........................................................................................................................ 160
h.
Dissertation writing up & submission ....................................................................................... 162
G. Deliverables ........................................................................................................................ 162

H. Resources ............................................................................................................................ 162
I.
References........................................................................................................................... 163
Page 150
A. Title
Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites
B. Introduction
According to internetworldstats (2011), the internet usage in Africa is growing very fast
compared with 6 years ago. Even though internet is growing very fast but Africa has low
penetration of internet compare with other development countries. The research which conducted
recently shows that, internet penetration in Africa is 11% and 89% is for the rest of the world
internetworldstats (2011).
Tanzania is one of the countries which are located in Africa, The usage of internet in Tanzania
each days become popular compare with the last 7 years, even though the usage is still very low
compare with other countries in Africa such as Egypt. The reason which make the internet
penetration to become very slow in Tanzania because is expensive to manage internet in
Tanzania, therefore very few people are able to manage it.
Within 6 years Government of united republic of Tanzania developed in different sector as per
the government plan, one of the sectors which developed is Tanzania communication regulatory
authority (TCRA).
TCRA is one among of sectors which implements the Government plan and one of the project
which implemented by TCRA is implementation of IT infrastructure in all government
Universities. Also TCRA implements the fiber optic cable as the network medium to increase the
speed of internet and usage of internet as well. The plan of TCRA boosts number of people to be
familiar and uses of internet to increase.
ICT such as web-based system (websites) plays a major role in the education sector and is
recommended by many educator experts as the essential tool to be used in education to ensure
the information is reached to students and staffs in easy and faster. Innovate use of websites can
greatly improve the education sector by allowing the Universities to promote themselves and
improve the education services.
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The plan of TCRA encouraged the government Universities and private Universities to start
design and implement different system such as websites to be used by staffs and students as well.
The various attempt of the Universities to develop the websites has been made but with a little
success due to the poor design of their websites especially in usability. There are still some
obstacles which may cause the poor and bad design in usability of the Tanzania universities
websites due to many reasons such as shortage number of web designer who has low experience
and knowledge about the designing of the University website. In order to handle the issues which
make the Tanzania universities websites to have bad design in usability, the Guideline for
usability of Tanzania universities websites proposed to handle the issue.
This chapter contains the background research, research problem, aim and objectives,
methodology and outline of the dissertation.
C. Dissertation Background
Tanzania is one of the developing countries in Africa, located in East Africa. Tanzania is
currently adopting internet technology in terms of websites for Universities, colleges, schools
and other business sectors. The TCRA in Tanzania planning to increase the penetration of ITtechnologies especially in internet because is the key indicator of successful of a country for
competing with the competitive world (TCRA, 2010).
According to Tanzania President Kikwete (2006), IT-technologies can be used to empower the
students to access higher quality learning via internet. The forum which initiated by Bill Gates in
South Africa which involved leaders of Africa including President of Tanzania in 2006 was a
way of promoting and push the IT-Technologies to be used in different sector such as education
sector in Africa including Tanzania.
The completion of the first phase of the National Information communication and Technology
Broadband backbone and the Fiber Optic sub marine cable which done in Tanzania have reduce
the lack of ICT infrastructure from the adoption of web technology in education, government and
tourism. Dr. Zaipuna Yonah who is the Director of the Information and Communication
Technology in the Ministry of Communications, Science and Technology in Tanzania explained
that, Due to the a reliable connectivity, everyone should think on how the can tap the ICT
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potentials on their areas of interest, be in it education, tourism or in governance (Mutaburukwa,

2010). Swarts (2010) supported There is inadequate application of ICT in Higher Education
Institutional for enhancing their operational efficiency and advancement
Many Tanzania universities has been starting to implement the websites (IT- Technology) for the
education purpose. The websites implementation in Universities has made some students among
the larger number of students to be familiar and happy for the usage of the websites of the
Universities because they can get assistance and information at any time they wish without
consulting University staffs manually.
Even though some students are happy while they using their Universities websites, but other
students still complains about the design of the system such as difficult to perform task easily, it
take them long time to find what they want (information) and therefore they find is useless to use
the system and return to the manual system. This issues most of the time is faced by the
beginners (Tanzanian students) of the systems. The better website user interface design the easier
it is to train people to use it, the less help will be needed by people to use it, more users will like
to use the system, and will increase the users satisfaction to the system (Ambler, 2010).
According to Virgina Tech University (2008), most issues of the interface design is usability,
visualization and functionality. The problems which making the Tanzania universities websites
difficult to be accessed is bad interface design of the systems which violet the design principles
such as too much text, no links to return when users lost, the metaphors used confusing the users,
poor color matching which make the interface design to be more complex to users (students and
staffs).
(students) of the University website voted the site design is poor, 23.4% voted the design is very
good while the 22.5% voted the design is good. Therefore the majority of who voted they were
complains of the poor design of the University website. This is one example of the University
which complained by the students based on the poor design of the website.
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Below is among of the example of the website which have bad design such as too much text
used, inappropriate color used which may cause problem to blindness people and etc.
Source: SUA, 2011
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This is another bad design of the IFM University, this design is bad due to the poor color match,
bad arrangement of text, and other hyperlink is not active and there is no any information which
shows the link is not active.
Source: IFM, 2011

Another example of the TEKU University website which has a bad design which shown below
show that, The burner of the University website does not recognize is the University website, the
image which used on this website does not reflect the University; people can think this is the
hotel website or garden website even though there is University name, poor matching color
design. All these poor design need to be solved in order to make the Tanzania universities in a
good standard.
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Source: (TEKU, 2011)

ICT such web-based system in education sector is very important to given the priority because
students can be easily getting all information concerned with the studies without even meet
manually with the University.
According to BBC News the discussion between BBC and Nielsen (2008), Nielsen stated that,
the usability problems make difficult for users when using the website, when users want to finish
their task and find usability website problems can stop using the application as soon as possible
Usability is generally regarded as ensuring that interactive systems are easy to learn, effective to
use, and enjoyable from the users perspective (Maissel et al, 1991). It is important to develop
good systems which have a good user interface design (usability) that can improve the
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Universities work and help the students and staffs as well to interact with the systems easily
wherever they are.
According to Keyes (2007), the developers must follow the certain principals and guideline
which was formulated from experience of other expertise to develop the good web interface
design which satisfy users. Therefore on this research, the guideline for the usability will be
produced in order to keep and maintain the good design interface for the websites of the
Tanzania universities in order to allow the students to be happy, learn, and enjoy when they use
their Universities websites.
D. Dissertation Aims & Objectives

The aim of this research is to produce a suitable guideline for usability of the Universities
websites in Tanzania.
Objectives
To describe the issues of web usability from different Universities websites.
To describe the success reasons of the different Universities websites.
To analyze website usability Guidelines and framework for Universities websites in order to
determine Universities websites requirements for the adaption of proposed usability
guideline.
Formulate the Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites to overcome the
overcome the issues which hinder Tanzania students not to access their Universities websites
frequently, not to be happy with their websites and un-satisfaction.
Test the Guideline usability with web designer of Tanzania universities to ensure it is
practical in the Tanzania universities websites
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E. Intellectual challenge
Carrying out different literature review and identify good research concern about the web
usability of different Universities
Arranging interview with the web designers of the Tanzania universities websites.
Developing of questionnaire and Interview questions which will suit to deliver the
acceptable and appropriate suitable Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities
websites.
Distribution of data and get the result at the appropriate time is challengeable as well
Analyzing, evaluate and propose the suitable Guideline for usability of Tanzania
universities websites
Time management is another challenging part while doing project, each and every project
to be successfully need to meet deadline, due to author still attempting other modules
which have exams and assignment as well, time management will be most challengeable
part in order to meet deadline of the project.
Supervisors most of the times are very busy with their own other responsibilities, therefore
is challenging part for researcher of this project to meet with supervisor frequently to
discuss and get opinion from him.
F. Research Programme
The research programme will be over 4 month. The program will start with the critical analysis
of the literature reviewing. The research will begin through investigation about things which
make poor usability of the websites of the Tanzania universities and how to overcome those
issues. The information will be obtained from various sources including books, journals articles,
e-journals, white papers, credible websites and research papers will be evaluated of the focus
being on analysis of the Current issues of web usability from different Universities around the
world to determine the problems they face, Guideline for web usability to determine the good
way of developing University website which will achieve usability and overcoming issues of the
Universities websites usability in order to determine the solution of Universities websites
usability.
Page 158
2.1
Project Plan
a. Writing Proposal 1 to 3 weeks

b. Writing Literature review
To undertake literature review through reading academic materials such as books, journal etc by
considering the various existing research related to usability of Universities websites. The critical
evaluation among the past and current different work about current issues of the websites
usability, overcome the issue of the Universities websites usability from different country,
successfully implementation of Universities websites in other countries and so on will be
reviewed. Also framework for website design will be reviewed from the past literature review to
determine the usefulness of the adoption of the framework during of the implementation or
redesign of web-based system in the Tanzania universities
c. Write the questionnaire and Interview
The Questionnaire and interview questions will be designed and reviewed by researcher and then
will be approved by supervisor before sent to the respondents. Then questionnaire will be
distributed to the different students from different Universities in Tanzania to get their view point
based on their Universities websites design through online. The questionnaire will be distributed
through Google Docs and the response expected to be in high percentage. Also interview will be
conducted by involving designers of the University website from two Tanzania universities. The
feedback of interview and questionnaire will be reviewed and analyzed.
Outcome will be collected and analyzed. All result of questionnaire and interview will be
reviewed and analyzed to ensure the smooth and having data that will be used to come up with
suitable guideline of usability for Tanzania universities websites.
d. Work on the dissertation chapters layout
Review chapters dissertation layout with supervisor
e. Develop the guideline
Based on the collected information from literature review, interview and questionnaire, the
guideline of usability for Tanzania universities websites will be developed on this stage.
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f. Testing
Test of Guideline will be done in order to insure the usefully of the usability guideline for
Tanzania universities websites.Testing of the Guideline will be done by among of the web
designers of the Tanzania universities through sending the produced Guideline to them with
some questions regarding of the guideline and waiting respond from them. After testing result
been collected, the result will be analyzed to further refine the solution.
g. Project schedule
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Page 161
h. Dissertation writing up & submission
Writing up other sections (Abstract and conclusions)
Formatting and final tidy up
Print dissertation
Bind dissertation
Submit dissertation
Preparation for dissertation presentation
G. Deliverables
The deliverable of this research is Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites
which will help web-designers of Tanzania universities to design quality Universities websites
which have usability requirements to improve the Tanzania universities students to interact with
their websites easily, happy and with higher satisfaction.
H. Resources
Access to secondary resources such as academic books, journals, articles, white papers, ejournals, research papers from the professional associations including those found on UCTI
Library i.e. IEEE, DSpace MIT Theses, ProQuest Computing and Bussiness, Staffordshire
University Library.
For Primary research, researcher will require access to web designers of the Tanzania
universities websites who were direct involved in designing and develop their Universities
websites and students from different Universities of Tanzania will be involved for the purpose of
data collection.
Also different softwares such as Microsoft excel will be needed to analyze the data, Microsoft
word for writing the project and Microsoft office project for project schedule.
The make use of Laptop and internet will help to manage the whole project.
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I. References
Ambler, W. S., 2010. User Interface Design Tips, Techniques, and Principles. Available at:
http://www.ambysoft.com/essays/userInfaterfaceDesign.html [accessed 20th September 2011]
BBC
&
Nielsen.,
2008.
Web
users
'getting
more
ruthless.
Available
at:
http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/mpapps/pagetools/print/news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7417496.stm
[accessed 20th September 2011]

IFM., 2011.ifm library webpage: available at: http://www.ifm.ac.tz/library/index.html [accessed
14 September 2011]
Internetworldstats.,
2011.
Internet
usage
statistics
for
Africa.
Available
at:
http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats1.htm [accessed 14 September 2011]
Kikwete, M. J., 2006. The Microsoft Government leaders forum Africa, Cape town, republic
of
south
Africa.
Available
at:
http://www.tanedu.org/PresidentKikweteStatement_MicrosoftGLFAfrica.pdf [accessed 14 September
2011]
Maissel,
et
al.,
1991.
What
Is
Usability.
Available
at:
http://www.nigelbevan.com/papers/whatis92.pdf [accessed 20th September 2011]
Mkwawa University College., 2011. The Design of MUCE website is. Available at
http://muce.udsm.ac.tz/index.php/component/poll/14-the-design-of-muce-website
[accessed
30
September 2011]
Mutaburukwa., 2010. Tanzania: First Phase of ICT Broadband Backbone is Activated
Nationwide. Available at: http://allafrica.com/stories/201005270311.html [accessed 15 September
2011]
Swart, P and Wachira, M. E., 2010. Tanzania: ICT in education Situational analysis. Available
at: http://gesci.org/assets/files/Knowledge%20Centre/Situational%20Analysis_Tanzania.pdf [accessed
30 September 2011]
Page 163
SUA,. 2011. Main webpage:
available at: http://www.suanet.ac.tz/ [accessed 14 September
2011]
TCRA,
2010.,
Internet
and
data
usage
in
Tanzania.
Available
at:
http://www.tcra.go.tz/publications/InternetDataSurveyScd.pdf [accessed 14 September 2011]
Teku, 2011., Home Page. Available at: http://www.teku.ac.tz/ [accessed 17 September 2011]
Virgina Tech University., 2008. The elements of interface design. Available at:
http://www.edtech.vt.edu/edtech/id/interface/index.html [accessed 20th September 2011]
Page 164
10.APPENDIX D: PDRM Literature Review

Table of Contents
10. Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 167
a)
First Wave ..................................................................................................................................... 167
b)
Second Wave................................................................................................................................. 168
c)
Third Wave .................................................................................................................................... 168
B. The area which used with agile methods ......................................................................... 169

a)
Software development ................................................................................................................. 169
b)
Business......................................................................................................................................... 170
c)
Medical.......................................................................................................................................... 171
C. The successfully of agile methods ..................................................................................... 171

a)
Team Cooperation ........................................................................................................................ 171
b)
Training and learning .................................................................................................................... 172
c)
Involvement of Users in Iteration during System Development .................................................. 172
d)
Changes of Requirements ............................................................................................................. 172
e)
Agile methods address Testers ..................................................................................................... 173
f)
Light Documentation .................................................................................................................... 173
D. Application for pervasive computing ............................................................................... 174

a)
Healthcare ..................................................................................................................................... 174
b)
Homecare ...................................................................................................................................... 175
c)
College........................................................................................................................................... 176
d)
Transportation .............................................................................................................................. 176
E. Challenges faced by Pervasive computing....................................................................... 178

a)
Scalability ...................................................................................................................................... 178
b)
Invisibility ...................................................................................................................................... 178
c)
Integration .................................................................................................................................... 179
d)
Hardware and Software ................................................................................................................ 179
e)
Security ......................................................................................................................................... 179
F. The importance of agile methods to pervasive computing ............................................ 179

a)
Adoption changes and Risk Minimization ..................................................................................... 180
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b)
Cost Reduction .............................................................................................................................. 181
c)
Team cooperation ......................................................................................................................... 181
d)
Customer collaborations ............................................................................................................... 181
e)
Quality improvement .................................................................................................................... 182
f)
Empower developers .................................................................................................................... 182
G. Related work ...................................................................................................................... 183

H. The existing methods used for pervasive computing ...................................................... 183
a)
Waterfall Methodology ................................................................................................................. 183
b)
Rapid Application Development (RAD) ......................................................................................... 184
I.
J.
Applicability of agile methods to pervasive computing ................................................. 185

a)
Case study of BMC Software (Martens, 2006) .............................................................................. 185
b)
Case study of EffectiveSoft (effectivesoft, 2011) ......................................................................... 186
c)
Case study of Motorola Wireless systems Group (Kee, 2009) ...................................................... 187
Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 188
K. References........................................................................................................................... 189
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A. Introduction
The goal of researcher working in pervasive computing is to develop the guideline for pervasive
computing using agile methods which will guide developers for development of pervasive
computing applications.
Pervasive computing is the technology that make users environment to have connectivity through
using wireless communication of multiple information devices (mobile) in the user environment,
the world pervasive means existing everywhere.
The pervasive computing concept introduced by Mark Weiser in 1990s (Liu et al, 2004). The
pervasive computing technologies introduced after the emergence of two wave computing
technologies. Pervasive computing is the third wave of computing technologies introduced after
the first and second wave been introduced.
Consider the Diagram below
a) First Wave
In the first wave, one computer was shared by many people via work stations, the computer was
called Mainframe computing which was introduced 1950s. Mainframe computing was used by
the large company such as IBM, Hitachi and only the big company could be able to afford
mainframe computing. This technology was very expensive, low speed compare with now days
pervasive computing technology. Also the application which was developed in the first wave for
the mainframe computers was also tended to be developed to target very specific users in the
market. After the time being, Second wave introduced.
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b) Second Wave
In the Second wave Personal computing era introduced, in this era users bound to the desktop
therefore each computer used by one person at the time and requiring a conscious interaction. In
this era the technology was affordable to people not only for the big companies. Personal
computing today is a rich ecosystem and it has expanded from the desktop to wherever people
need it to use such as in the meeting, on the road, at the desks etc. After the time being, Third
wave introduced
c) Third Wave
In the third wave Pervasive computing era introduced, one person able to handle and use more
than computers. This era has become more popular and used by many people all over the world.
Pervasive computing systems guide a larger degree of user knowledge and control the
surrounding environment such as at office, home or car.
Pervasive computing is considered as the new generation of Information Technology which has a
positive impact for several applications such as pervasive smart home, pervasive healthcare,
pervasive mobile etc.
Pervasive computing technologies has been classified into Mobile Computing, Mobile and
sensor networking, Embedded and Applied computing and Radio frequency identification
(RFID) technology and Sensors.
There is many difficulties which face pervasive computing since was introduced, all these
difficulties come from rapid change of technology. The rapid change of technology has made
pervasive computing to face some difficulties such as to have the products with its application on
the right time in the market, to satisfy different requirements of users, developing interaction
applications that will work with devices ranging from the smallest size and which will have
compatibility with other applications. As mobile platforms continue to get better in performance,
also the users expect a variety of mobile applications to increase.
Due to significant challenges in the pervasive computing environment, pervasive computing

application development requires a suitable development methodology such as agile methods
because Agile methods used to adapt dynamic situations where the requirements of pervasive
Page 168
computing applications are changing over a period of time and the teams that develop pervasive
computing application (mobile applications) most of the time are small to medium sized. Agile
methods enable changes to be acceptable at any stage during the software development processes
(Williams2003). The aim of using agile methods in pervasive computing is to adapt the rapid
change of technology in order to increase the competence of pervasive computing in the market
and provide a different aspect of flexibility to adapt to various customer requirements,
expectation and needs due to the rapid change of pervasive computing requirements as well as to
enable the development team to face the challenges of a dynamic environment.
B. The area which used with agile methods

Agile methods have emerged due to the strong pull from business, these methods introduced in
1990s (Highsmith, 2001), the agile methods focus on early releases of working products by
using collaborative techniques such as pair programming and having people work as team. The
company which has been use agile methods has been benefit to adopt the business environment
within a period of time and to make fast changes of customer demand as well as to gain the
competitive advantage in todays moving market.
There are different area where agile methods have been applied, among of the area which have
been applied agile methods are
a) Software development
Software usage is growing very fast due to high number of business depend on Information
Technology such as database system, websites, software, hardware and etc. Agile methods have
played a big role in the software development.
Agile methods considered to be suitable in focusing customer requirements compared to

traditional methods (Avison and Fitzgerald, 2006). This supported by (Whitaker K, 2010) agile
method is quite different than traditional way of software development processes and procedures.
The different company which has used agile methods for the system development have improved
not only efficiency of the software development but also to speed up the development process
and deliver the software which satisfies the user requirements.
Page 169
Agile methods emphasize the fast of software development by using iterative and incremental
Development. This approach seems to be very influential in the 21st Century. The software is
developed increments and each increment adds a new function to the system (Sodhi 1991). The
requirements of users may change at any time therefore require more incremental approach to insure
the user requirements are understood (Avison and Fitzgerald, 2006).

Iterative and incremental Development help developers for rapid software development process
because users are incorporated each iterations to give views of the software in order to allow
another steps to go on previous successive phase.
Prototype technique is one of the techniques which used in agile methods during the software
development, is an initial version of software development which demonstrates concepts of the
system. The benefits of using prototype in the software process is to improve system usability,
design quality and reduced software development efforts (Gordon & Bieman, 1995).
(Sommerville, 2001) supported that, even though applying the prototype technique, rework
during software development is avoided as customer request fewer software changes.
The prototype technique allows developers to rapidly construct the final quality of the software
and users can accept and be happy with it. Also generates initiatives and responsibility
approaches to solve problems which may rise during the software development process through
negotiation.
b) Business
Agile methods have been used for quantifying the costs and benefits to create the software products
which innovative (Highsmith, 2001). Agile methods used in organizations that are innovative and
creative (Strohmaie, 2005). Agile methods has provide the great positive impact in the business by
improving quality of the software, increase the satisfaction of the software and make the project to
be successfully.
Any business around the world need to be flexible based on the customer demands and
technology changes, agile methods make business to adapt any market changes and customers
demands by reducing cycle time of the software development (fastest time to the market) and
reduce operating cost.
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Agile has been accepted by many software development companies around the world (Griffiths,
2003). Changing requirements are welcome, even late in development. Agile processes harness
change for the customer's competitive advantage, the developers and business people must work
together daily throughout the whole project of software development (Williams, 2007). In this
situation many company and organization use agile methods to gain the competitive advantage in
todays moving market. The adoption of agile methods requires companies/organization to know
the requirements of the projects and internal/external of business environment.
c) Medical
The efficiency and pace of software development in the Medical device manufacturers can be
increased by implementing agile development methods (Bosch, 2007). Agile methods have the
potential to improve the functionality, cost effectiveness, and quality of medical device
software.
C. The successfully of agile methods

Agile methods change the view of the software process. The result of other software projects is
the outcomes of the good implementations of the agile methodology. Due to Chow and Cao
(2007) there are successes factors of using agile methods, those factors are mentioned below
a) Team Cooperation
In agile, people work together as team to support each other to make sure they meet the
objectives which have required being achieved (Krebs, 2009). Promares (2010) agreed on this by
saying, business people and developers work together as a team by having face to face
communication to make sure the system which will be developed has quality and meet the user
requirements. This help people to work with cooperation during working, the cooperation enable
good communication in the team and speed up the development process of the software.
Sometime Agile team go for continuous integration that help the team to build the system several
times per day which enable them to configure source control integration, unit testing and
automate compilation (Delgado, 2009). This approach makes software development team to be
responsible for their work and make the right and quick decision on the spot. Therefore team
cooperation is one of the key successfully of agile methods in the software development.
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b) Training and learning

The aim of having training and learning in agile methods is to make sure stakeholders understand
the software requirements and can be able to analyze it (Alleman 2002).
Rally software Development Corporation (2005) supported this by saying, in agile methods the
training and learning is the key fundamental which make agile to be unique from other methods
such as traditional methodologies. Author agree by saying training is very important during the
software development because enable staffs to gain new knowledge and share different
knowledge and information, this help people as a team to participate fully in the project to
achieve the goals of the software project.
c) Involvement of Users in Iteration during System Development
Users involvement in iterations during System Development make agile to be differentiated
from one methodology to another. In agile methods users are involved in daily exercise of the
system development while in traditional methodology users are involved during the beginning of
the project and end of the project (Awad, 2005). The involvement of users for each stage of the
system development makes close relationship between Users, stakeholders and developers by
incorporate the users experience.
The requirements of users of the system can be change within any time and stage, more
incremental approach is needed to ensure the user requirements have been clearly understood in
order to avoid users problems (Avison and Fitzgerald, 2006).
Due to the user involvement in iterations during the software development process by having
discussion about the software development make easy for software developers to move from one
stage to another stage. This approach enables development team to gather different opinion from
different users and build the system which will satisfy high number of users. By having different
opinions and requirements from users will speed up the development process of the software
development.
d) Changes of Requirements
In agile methods, the requirements are acceptable and accommodated for each stage (Larman,
2004). This approach ensures the final system after been developed will contain all requirements
and the system will have high quality after been completed. Agile allow changes to be done
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easily without affecting the entire system while in traditional methodologies such as waterfall,
there is no chance to go to the previous stage to make requirements changes.
The acceptances of users requirements in each stage of the system development in agile ensure
the system project meet deadline and budget as well. This is one among the reason which make
agile to be popular and successfully in the world of developers. This is one of the reasons which
makes agile to be successfully and more popular to the developers.
e) Agile methods address Testers
Testers have great positive impact in an Agile Methods due to the continuous testing (Quality
assurance) throughout the development process (Cohn and Ford 2003). In agile all Testers need
to work closely with developers during the whole development of the system. In Agile processes
there is no separate coding and testing phases, the code is written during iteration must be tested
and debugged on that iteration. This approach helps developers to face few bugs of the system
after been completed to be developed.
f) Light Documentation
Even though documentation is very important in system development, but in agile does not been
considered among the first priority in system development (Agile manifesto). Due to increase the
speed of the software development, agile developers focus on documenting only the essential
documentation that focusing deeply on developing the required software. Agile methods focus
much on quality, requirements, cost and schedule than other methodologies in the system
development (Szalvay 2004).
This technique has been proven by (Ambler, 2009) to speed up the development process not like
traditional methodologies which pay attention on heavy documentation and enable to slow down
the development process (Avison and Fitzgerald, 2006).
All company or organization need to have the system on the right time in the market, time is very
crucial and much considered in the market, therefore by developers paying attention on the
developing software and less attention on documentation may speed up the system project to be
on-time in the market. But also researcher disagrees on this because by having the too little
documentation may cause the problems of system maintenance, system audits or system
troubleshooting in the future.
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D. Application for pervasive computing

Pervasive computing becoming increasingly important every day, although many potential
applications have not yet been fully realized. Even though Pervasive computing has a variety of
applications but has been applied in home care, healthcare, transportation and etc.
a) Healthcare
Pervasive computing offers many opportunities in the healthcare. Pervasive computing applied in
healthcare for managing diseases, patient administration and patient treating (Parliamentary,
2006). This supported by Borriell et al (2007), one of the contexts which improving healthcare is
pervasive computing.
Its true that, Pervasive computing have been applied in many healthcares. In the healthcare there
is other part which needs to be taken attention such as surgical field, In this field surgeons and
nurses must control and monitor surgery very carefully. Due on this pervasive computing help
the surgeons to perform their task easily, pervasive computing provide sensors to the surgeons to
know where exactly to pay high attention during surgery and to detect patterns of concern that
could require immediate action. Wearable sensors may offer better patient freedom and mobility
within hospitals and save money and time by reducing the need for repeated testing.
Through telesurgery, remote physicians able to consult another physician to undergo surgical
procedure on a patients successfully all these performed by pervasive computing.
Every day population increase in many countries as well as diseases in all over the world, all these people
need care and well treatment from healthcare. By Improving methods for monitoring health of people
will increase the life span of people. Example, now days there is sensors for monitoring heart rates, blood
pressure, diabetes and other physiological variables. There is sensors which can embedded to home place
to detect the temperature change
Emergency care is another context to hurry access to medical records to bring experts to the
scene virtually. Pervasive computing has help the healthcare to access faster the medical records
for the patients in the emergency situation and having the appropriate medical professional ,
therefore better care can be delivered not only to the situation but also based on the patients
history.
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The benefit of Pervasive computing in healthcare:

-
Pervasive computing makes expert care during on their healthcare work performance.
The time by getting appropriate care to the people who need it much faster than
previously has been reduced.
- Pervasive computing makes individuals to be responsible and maintain the health.

b) Homecare
Pervasive computing has make larger input to society due to many computing devices to be
linked together. In United States of America high numbers of homes equipped with homeautomation devices (Willey, 2008). Smart homes and offices contain the intelligent services
which are accessible to users via pervasive computing devices connected over wireless links. In
homes the television, computer, lighting, heating control and home security system can talk to
each other through home intranet. This communication can be controlled through different
devices such as cellular phone, home computer, PDA or even Television.
Example: Sunbeams corded Home Linking Technology (HLT) products can communicate with
one another product by using an embedded technology called PLC (Power Line
Communication) (Willey, 2008). The HLT alarm clock can manage the entire mornings
schedule by goes off the Kids rooms lights, the heating or cool system, and start the
coffeemaker.
Consider the diagram below which show one device can coordinate and communicate with
more than devices, this is application of pervasive computing in homes
Security is most important in our homes, pervasive computing has play a role part to strengthen
the security in home place, now days there is cameras (surveillance) which can be able to records
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all events outside and inside of our house. Due to the cameras the house owners are able to
secure their homes.
Also people can attend meeting while they at home through using teleconferencing. Instead of
the person to go physical to the meeting which is conducted from another country, pervasive
computing enable people, company and organization to save cost and time through using
teleconferencing. Also people can communicate more than one person at the same time all over
the world at home through using internet. Time ago was difficult to communicate remotely with
people like now days.
c) College
Devices like Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) give a wide range of information access. As
described Nie (2006), by the use of PDA student can be able to access online course syllabus,
books, and video classroom which allow student to share information profile with others. PDA
has been used with many colleges where student may access the college database and check the
modules result, class timetable and so on through using the wireless technology.
d) Transportation
According to Parliament (2006), the greater communication between Vehicles through receiving
and exchanging information by using wireless technologies become capable which enable the
programmed integrated devices to communicate and alerting drivers to traffic congestion, road
closures and accident hotspots.
The Parliament idea supported by Willey (2008) in his study, now days every vehicles, airplane
and ship has computer on board to drive the engine, control exhaust emissions and regulate fuel
consumption.
The private and public transportation has been plays and still plays a big role in our daily lives.
Today, computerized become increasingly applied in the vehicles, train, and airplane. The
technology has been moving to pervasively connect passengers with vehicles, train, and airplane.
One of the examples in pervasive computing in transportation is the use of transportation system
which enables airplane, ship and other transportation to have communication from the departure
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location and destination location through using wireless connection technology. Pilot can
communicate with destination location or departure location and know the weather if its good or
bad in order to protect from any disaster will appear.
Also pervasive computing has being used in our daily life in the angle of transportation by
simplify the life of people. E.g. in Malaysia there is system called SmartTAG toll gate, in this
technology the sensor device is kept inside the car, so when it reach nearest the toll gate sensor
will communicate to another device which has sensor and money will be deducted automatically
and the gate will open to allow the car to pass.
Refer the Diagram below which show SmartTAG toll gate.
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E. Challenges faced by Pervasive computing

Although, the companies, industries, manufactures and organization are accepting this
technology, there are some challenges in adoption of pervasive computing. Among of the
challenges are:
a) Scalability
Scalability is the crucial problem in the in pervasive computing (Satyanarayanan, 2001). The
users personal computing space and his/her interaction surrounding environment increases due
to the increasing demand of using technology. The presence of multiple users gives negative
impact on bandwidth, security protection and data storage (shifting from large enterprise
database to the creation of smaller).
In larger Pervasive computing environment such as smart offices or smart home may consist
smart number of devices communicate together through using wireless across multiple security
to provide information security such as access control, and authentication, scalability is more
challenging (Yurcik et al, 2010) .
As the smartness environment grows every day, future pervasive computing environment need to
face the increasing of users networked devices, application and their interaction in order to
overcome challenges of scalability.
b) Invisibility
The reasonable approximation of invisibility is measured through having the system which
requires minimal human intervention (Plymale, 2005). Shaout (2009, pp. 6-14) stated that, the
abilities to act as expected and bother the user as little as possible are core ideas to the field of
pervasive computing.
The environment and objects need to tune themselves to meet users expectation frequently
without distracting users. The current manual techniques for configuring a device with default
gateways, subnet masks and etc are time consuming in pervasive computing. The networks need
to be dynamically reconfigured through using automated techniques. Furthermore, pervasive
computing still not meets the large amount of users expectation.
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c) Integration
Due to the number of applications and devices increase every day, integration of applications and
devices in a single platform becomes more difficult and complex. It is not easy to manage the
growth of users, applications and devices in pervasive computing. E g Servers must handle the
growth of high number of client connections. Integrating pervasive computing components is to
be in a single platform still challenge to developers and programmers. The settlement of
Integration challenge will have implication on quality of security, service, reliability and
invisibility implications for pervasive networking.
d) Hardware and Software
As explained by Wattinger (2006), Hardware and software are the one of the challenges faced
mobile devices, the challenges which face these devices are memory size, CPU performance, and
screen size. Also these challenges may face the development of mobile application. As supported
by Ryan (2007), wireless devices has limitation to access information from the websites
compared with the traditional computers due to the screen size and even memory size.
e) Security
As discussed by Ryan (2007), security is one of the challenge face mobile application. To build
and protect the applications in the pervasive computing environment is still challenging, the
security challenges in pervasive computing are virus protection, encryption mechanisms and
access controls. Even though enterprises are dealing with security issue in pervasive computing
environment to some level in efforts to secure both consumer applications and enterprise residing
on the same devices.
F. The importance of agile methods to pervasive computing

The progression of technical advance in the areas of software, computer and communication
technology increase and become popular for many people. The rapid change of technology has
increase the positive impact of applying pervasive computing in our environment. All technology
is supported by the software running devices; the impact of technology is increasing pervasive
technology.
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There is several advantages arise through agile methods. Agile methods satisfy todays actual
business needs (Cockburn, 2002). Agile methods, shows a new approach to build up a system in
speedy form. The following part provides overview of agile methods, focusing on their
suitability for mobile application development.
a) Adoption changes and Risk Minimization
Agile methods are considered to be better in addressing adoption changes compared to other
methods (Avison 2006).
One example of the software which use agile methods and bring the positive impact is Android
mobile development. Android mobile Application development use different methodologies
depend on the urgency, size of the project, client requirements and so on. But one of the
methods used to develop Android mobile Application is agile methods which has helped the
Android application projects to adopt changes quickly and to minimize the overall risk of the
projects (Android mobile application, 2011).
The adoption changes which done by agile methods can make the software to be delivered on
time in the market, improve team productivity and fits the businesss objectives. Also due to
acceptable changes in agile methods, risk is reduced through delivering the quality software
which can be acceptable in the market. In agile methods, requirement changes continue
throughout the system development life cycle and thus minimize the need for major changes in
the future and satisfy customer needs.
Furthermore, Pervasive computing environment become new and amazing every day, Due to
frequently changes occurs in pervasive computing such as application requirements changes,
portable devices requirement changes, agile methods enable pervasive computing to meet those
changes. The requirement changes which offered by agile methods are champion and suitable for
pervasive computing system development environment.
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b) Cost Reduction
Cost reduction is one of the importances in agile methods. Agile methods have been used in Android
mobile Application development to reduce the cost of customer requirements changes or
modification (Android mobile application, 2011). The agile method which has been used to reduce
the cost of customer requirements changes in Android mobile Application development is

Extreme Programming (XP).
To reduce cost during development of the application mobile enable mobile companies to sell its
products to customers in low cost and products can be affordable by larger number of people and
still the company can make profit as well. Furthermore, cost reduction during mobile application
development can help the mobile companies to compete with its competitors.
c) Team cooperation
Agile methods at Nokia have used to promote the cross-team communication. The agile methods
have provides positive impact to Nokia by enable Nokia to solve multi-team management issues
during the mobile application development (kahkonen, 2004).
The use of the agile methods can be considered as successful due to be used by many software
development organizations and companies. Agile Methods rely much on collaboration,
communication and empowerment of teams hence the team is key factor for success (Avison,
2006). There must be a good working mood and relationship between developers and customer
to insure collaborative nature. Furthermore, mobile companies face some challenges during the
mobile application development, and one of the challenges may be caused by not having good
team cooperation. Therefore agile methods in mobile companies make team to have solidarity
and perform task with one heart to achieve the objective of the project.
d) Customer collaborations
Agile Methods emphasizes customer collaborations and valuable as one of the key value
requirements for system development success (Fowler and Highsmith, 2001).
Ericssons appear to be one of the worlds largest software telecoms industry company. The
software of Ericssons has been one of success stories for many years. Gunnar Heldebro (2011),
Head of R&D at Ericssons Business Unit Multimedia said that, Agile approach plays an
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important role in fulfilling Ericssons end-to-end streamlined software-development

objectives.
The Ericssons industry-recognized agile methods had increase customer responsiveness by
working closely with them through the entire software development and delivery process.
This show that, customer consider themselves to be responsible for the project during the
software development and engaged closely throughout the whole project. This approach make
agile to be successfully because users are incorporated each iterations to give views of the
system and allow another new stage to go on from previous successive stage.
e) Quality improvement
One of the key factors of software is quality. Many companies fight to get quality in the software
because is the key measure of the software success. In Ericssons, software quality had been
improved when the industry applied agile methods for software development (Heldebro, 2011).
If there is no quality in the software is difficult attain customer to have product, Quality
emphasize customer to feel the product and ensure the customer get what they needed and what
they expected to get. By delivering the quality software to the customers consistently can
increase the customer trust, needs and expectation.
f) Empower developers
Ericssons industry applied Agile methods to empower developers by creating a good
environment where can be able to control their work (Ericssons, 2011).
This approach is made possible due to developers team members working together in close
proximity allowing for quicker access to decision makers and hence speedy development. This
approach however can create some problems such as some team members not agreeing to the
decisions of the others in the team and also conflict of interests among the team members. Such
challenges can result in the development process slowing down as the internal issues are being
resolved. However, despite these challenges, a development team built from motivated
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individuals (Larman 2004) can help reduce such challenges and create teams of highly focused
and motivated players.
All advantage of agile methods as mention above contributes in different ways to speed up the
development process of the pervasive computing projects.
G. Related work
The Agile Development Methods for Mobile Applications project which conducted by Spataru
(2010) aimed to evaluate how agile methods is suitable for mobile application development
projects. The author tried to bring a set of mobile application improvements to an established
agile method called Mobile-D with the tool support to enable the improvements of Mobile-D
method and facilitating the performance testing. But the work did not explain how developers
will follow the Mobile-D method during the development of the mobile application, therefore the
gap which found in Spataru research there is no proper guidance which may lead developers
during the mobile application development process when they use Mobile-D method.
Another related work is Mobile application development: A Natural Fit with Agile
Methodologies. The research conducted by Holler (2006) suggested that, due to the challenges
which face mobile application such as short application lifecycles, constant changes in
technology and requirements, extreme demands for product quality, business adaptability
challenge, and customer feedback complement for mobile development, Agile is the best method
which can be able to overcome the challenges faced by mobile application development
(pervasive computing application). Holler defending his point by continue saying to deliver the
highest business value in a shorter period of time and ensures much greater reliability and
opportunity to incorporate users feedback in order to deliver the products which has quality,
agile development techniques need to be considered and given the priority to be used.
H. The existing methods used for pervasive computing

a) Waterfall Methodology
One of the methods which used in pervasive computing for software application is waterfall
methodology (Development and Quality Assurance Process Guideline, 2008). Even though this
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methodology has its advantage but also has disadvantage compare with the agile methods.
Waterfall methodology does not allow changes to the previous stage once the stage is completed,
it is very difficult to go back and make some changes in the previous stage. Due to researcher
opinion of this paper, waterfall is not suitable for the pervasive computing software application
because is not flexible in changes and not allow for much reflection or revision, flexible in
changes is very important because can lead the project to meet the customer requirements.
Furthermore, in agile methods users given priority to raise their issues and having close
collaboration with the team developers while in waterfall methodology users doesnt see
anything real until very end of the development stage.
Below it show the comparison between the Waterfall and Agile methods (Kee, 2009).
(Kee, 2009)
b) Rapid Application Development (RAD)
RAD has been used to develop the mobile application in order to speed up the development
process (Keane, 2007). RAD involves user participation thereby increasing chances of early user
acceptance and it performs well in sections like usability, features, and/or execution speed. Even
though RAD speed up the development process as agile methods but it has disadvantage such as
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there are times when developers team ignores necessary quality parameters such as, reliability
and consistency in order to meet deadline of the project because time is very crucial in RAD.
Another disadvantage of RAD is that, there are no frequently peer-review processes which may
cause problems to stakeholders to minimize trust and might find it difficult to get the information
they need.
I. Applicability of agile methods to pervasive computing

There are a high number of the projects around the world that have applied agile methods and
they have successfully on their projects. In this section, the case studies of the project which has
implemented agile methods and achieves good results after implementation is shown below.
a) Case study of BMC Software (Martens, 2006)

BMC Software is the company which develop software of pervasive computing and sell it to
larger IT companies, this company founded September 1980. Most Information technology
companies all over the world rely on BMC pervasive computing Software across distributed,
mainframe, virtual and cloud environments. BMC offers a comprehensive approach platform
that helps IT companies to reduce risk, cut cost, and make business profit.
BMC decided to make move in agile methods to deliver a major product to the market with
higher quality than previously possible and in less time. Target delivery of the releases of the
products was taking time. In a move, the BMC company see the only way to meet the challenge
was to adopt agile development methods. BMC decided to adopt the Scrum method for planning
and managing development activities.
As BMC adopted agile development practices was supposed to work within some constraints
such as distributed development resources. BMC make a different of changes to the company to
ensure the agile process is succeeding. BMC starting to train, coordinate the team in order to help
to resolve issues and facilitate communications among the team.
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As time goes on, BMC became familiar with agile method; the team reorganized by assigning
responsibilities and become accountability for the project. Due to different team in the project,
each team has a ScrumMaster, product manager, developers, tester, and documentation
resources. All team were responsible and accountable to deliver the tested and quality
components into the integration environment
Over a period of time, the teams built a test environment and continuous integration that reduced
the time of development. BMC attain this objective by paying attention on talented resources and
management focus.
Scrum enabled BMC to develop products in a good responsive to changing customer needs.
Also, Agile promotes ties BMC closer to its customers and within a short time developers got
quicker feedback on the usefulness features developers were creating.
Therefore BMC has been succeeding to accommodate customer requirements quickly at any
point in the product life cycle such as Accelerating Time to Value, Embracing Fast-Changing
Customer Needs to quickly adapt the market changes and take advantage of new opportunities.
Also using agile method, BMC returns are improved. Agile is at BMC to stay (Martens, 2006).
b) Case study of EffectiveSoft (effectivesoft, 2011)
EffectiveSoft is the company which offer mobile development services with cutting edge
technologies to create mobile software solutions for such platforms as , Android,
BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Java and Symbian. Effective Soft has expertise in both wireless
and mobile application development for Smartphone, iPhone, and for Pocket PC.
EffectiveSoft teams have successfully adopted agile software development methods and use it
at the selectable areas depending on the customer requirements and scope of the projects.
Agile has been proved by Effectivesoft to be efficient and cost-wise methods for software
projects that are weak to emergent changes.
Through applying agile methods, the team members of EffectiveSoft are located in the same
office in order to promote the knowledge sharing and better understanding and solve the urgent
issues which may rise.
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Each team in Effective system include programmers, business analysts, product managers,
technical writers, interaction designers, and other specialists depend on the scope of the project.
EffectiveSoft always put into practice the Agile Manifesto principles which help to speed up the
development process, meet the customer requirements and deliver the quality products to its
customers on time, one of the agile manifesto which used by EffectiveSoft are Customer
satisfaction by rapid, continuous delivery of useful software, Close, daily cooperation between
business people and developers, Working software is the principal measure of progress,
Projects are built around motivated individuals who should be trusted, Face-to-face
conversation is the best form of communication, Regular adaptation to changing circumstances
and Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design.
The things which make EffectiveSoft company to still use agile methods during its
development of software is because during on the project, the customers requirements based on
some circumstance may change at any time, agile methods emphasizes easy and quick
adjustment requirements changes to new requirements. EffectiveSoft project managers and
business analysts agreed that work should be done in a highly collaboration and be flexibility to
continuous changes.
Effectivesoft has been success by reduced project development time frames, minimize the
Business risks by delivering project on time, also EffectiveSoft has been trusted with its
customers by having high close interaction between customer and a team.
c) Case study of Motorola Wireless systems Group (Kee, 2009)
The Motorola Wireless systems Group dealing with Wi-Fi and WiMAX networks that support
data, video and voice communications, enabling a broad range of fixed and mobile applications
for private and public systems.
The agile methods have begun slowly to be adopted by Motorola Wireless Systems Group
(WSG) to improve their process (Kee, 2009). WSG has conducted several projects through using
agile methods, and those projects has shown the positive results such as reduced risk, improved
cycle time, improved quality, and so on.
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Reduction in escaped defects and improvement in productivity has been achieved by Motorola
Wireless Systems Group after using the agile development method.
Based on the case study shown above, companies have been successfully to deliver product as
quickly as possible with quality, improve customer collaboration as well as adapt the changing
requirements. The proofs of the case studies above show how agile simplify development
process and speed up the development process. Now days companies are starting to shift from
traditional methodologies to agile methodologies due to its advantages compare with traditional
methodologies.
J. Conclusion
The literature review has been conducted in order to clarify the problem domain and identify the
concepts which supposed to be applied during the research study. The literature review is
presented with some case study of the company which show how the companies has been
successfully by using agile methods and also, the successfully of agile methods, application for
pervasive computing, challenges faced by pervasive computing, the importance of agile methods
to pervasive computing and the existing methods for pervasive computing. Even though agile
methods adopted by many companies such as pervasive computing companies but researcher
found there is no agile methods guideline for the pervasive computing.
The problem which exist from the literature review there is no proper guideline to follow for the
development of pervasive computing software application. This issue can resolved through
analyzing the Criteria of selecting the proper agile methods for pervasive computing software
application development and evaluate it, by getting expert opinion (feedback) whose have using
agile method to develop the mobile application from different companies through conducting
interview and prepare questionnaires, and so on.
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11.APPENDIX E: Questionnaires questions & Evidence of Questionnaires

responds
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Questionnaires questions
Page 194
Page 195
Page 196
Page 197
Page 198
Page 199
Page 200
11.2
Evidence of Questionnaires responds
Page 201
Page 202
Page 203
Page 204
Page 205
Page 206
12.APPENDIX F: Interview questions
Page 207
Page 208
Page 209
Page 210
13.APPENDIX G: Testing questions & Evidence of the result

a. Testing questions
Page 211
Page 212
Page 213
Page 214
b. Evidence of Testing result
Page 215
Page 216
Page 217
14.APPENDIX H: Fast -Track Ethical Approval Form
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Page 219
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Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites: Mhina Mpeho Ombeni [TP017080] 2011

NAME: MHINA MPEHO OMBENI [TP017080]

SUPERVISOR: NARESH KUMAR

A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULLFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS OF

Dissertation: MSc. of Information Technology Management

Dissertation: MSc. of Information Technology Management

Dissertation: MSc. of Information Technology Management

Tanzania universities websites

Dissertation: MSc. of Information Technology Management

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY........................................................ 11

Website usability ................................................................................................................. 11

Important of Usability ......................................................................................................... 11

The Usability Goals ............................................................................................................ 11

Internet penetration in Tanzania ......................................................................................... 12

Tanzania universities websites ............................................................................................ 12

Background of the research ........................................................................................................ 13

Research Problem ....................................................................................................................... 16

Project Aims and Objectives ....................................................................................................... 17

Justification of the research ........................................................................................................ 17

Outline of the Dissertation.......................................................................................................... 20

Definition of the terms used ....................................................................................................... 21

Scope of the Research................................................................................................................. 22

Research Deliverable .................................................................................................................. 22

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW .......................................................................... 24

Web Interface Design.................................................................................................................. 25

Current issues of web usability ................................................................................................... 25

Evaluation of the web design framework ................................................................................... 28

The Guideline for web usability .................................................................................................. 31

Dissertation: MSc. of Information Technology Management

Overcome the issues of Universities websites usability ............................................................. 35

Current issues of the Tanzania universities websites ................................................................. 37

Successful implementation of Universities websites in other countries .................................... 38

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY ..................................................................................... 42

Justification for the Paradigm and Methodology ....................................................................... 43

Research Approach ..................................................................................................................... 45

Design of Study exploration ........................................................................................................ 45

Research Procedures .................................................................................................................. 46

Data Collection ............................................................................................................................ 47

Introduction to Paradigms used........................................................................................... 43

Data Analysis Method ................................................................................................................. 48

Quantitative Analysis .......................................................................................................... 48

Qualitative Analysis ............................................................................................................ 48

Ethical considerations ................................................................................................................. 49

CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS ...................................................................................... 52

Profile of respondents ................................................................................................................ 52

Personal Information of the respondents............................................................................. 53

Evaluation of performance and effectiveness of the Tanzania universities websites ......... 76

Dissertation: MSc. of Information Technology Management

Interview Findings ....................................................................................................................... 94

Lessons Learned from interview 1 and 2 ............................................................................ 98

Category E: General Suggestion ......................................................................................... 89

CHAPTER 5: ARTEFACT .............................................................................................. 101

Introduction .............................................................................................................................. 101

Guideline for usability of Tanzania universities websites ......................................................... 104

Preparation and Planning .................................................................................................. 105

University website Structure and Content......................................................................... 106

Support navigation ............................................................................................................ 109

University webpage Design .............................................................................................. 111

Evaluation of University website ...................................................................................... 113

University website Management and Maintenance .......................................................... 115

Conclusion ................................................................................................................................. 115