While users were generally successful finding materials, barriers connecting the user to the item sought were still sufficiently high that they needed additional attention by the system designers. Based on this feedback, the following changes were introduced to WorldCat Local.

On the brief results list, users were frequently perplexed by reviews that appeared higher in the list than the item itself. This hindered their ability to locate the item, so changes were made to the ranking algorithm so that reviews wouldn't necessarily float higher than the item in question.

The detailed record screens clearly presented more challenges for our users, so more attention was paid to them. Figure 12 shows a screen shot of what early users of WorldCat Local would see if they looked at a detailed record for a book:

• Note the Request Item button in the upper right corner of the screen. The button was orange, and it was thought during development that the prominent placement and bright color would draw the user's attention. Clicking on this button would lead the user to the appropriate request system: in this case, the Summit consortial system. However, many users did not see this button, and at least one commented that it appeared to be an ad of some sort since that's where ads are usually placed on screen. It was obvious to those observing that the controls were not well placed.
• The block headed “Location and Availability” was the second area that received attention. While it was easy to see the location of materials available at the University of Washington, most users didn't care which Summit libraries held an item and how many copies they had. As we'll see in just a moment, this expanded view could be problematic if there were many holdings for a given item.
  In addition, messages were added to the system that provided users a better idea of next steps if the item was not available or requestable. These changes were intended to reduce the number of dead ends experienced by users.
• Just beneath the Locations and Availability block were the two “do it” features available at first release: “Add This Page to Favorites” and “Link to this Page.” As more features and functionality were added to WorldCat Local, these items were moved off into their own area with a bit more prominence.
• OCLC can map an IP address to a geographic region and present customized information based on this. Just above the tabs is a line of relevant services offered to users based on their computer's IP address. For the most part, it made sense that WorldCat Local inherit the features offered by WorldCat, but this is one very clear case in which it does not (WorldCat no longer displays these options, but did at the time of testing). The services available in that line were generally misleading to the users. In the case of a monograph, a user would not want to choose “Check for UW journal holdings.” “Request item through Interlibrary Loan” would not be appropriate in this case. “Search the UW Libraries catalog” is redundant (Didn't the user just search the catalog? Most thought so.) and takes the user into a totally different interface with no clear path for how to get back. And users had no idea why they'd need to choose “OCLC FirstSearch.” Of all the services presented, only “Ask a Librarian” was appropriate.
• The second biggest problem with this screen—and one of the ways in which WorldCat Local still deviates from WorldCat.org—was the default tab. At the time of testing, the Libraries tab was the default and was what users saw when they first came to the screen. This was problematic for two reasons. For one thing, in the context of a local system, you expect that the UW Libraries would have the item, so you wouldn't need that information. Also, most users didn't care who else had something as long as they could request or otherwise obtain it through this interface. Probably more important, though, was what happened when a user first loaded this page.
  Once a user selected an item from the brief results list and wanted to see the details, WorldCat Local began the process of fetching detailed holdings and circulation data. While the detailed record screen “built,” the user saw all the information in the bibliographic block first. The availability block was mostly blank and had a spinning green circle (indicating that the system was busy doing something). Then the tabs were displayed, with the Libraries tab showing as the default. Consistently, users wouldn't wait for the availability block to build, but would click straight into the UW Libraries link in the Libraries tab. After selecting that link, they would be taken to that record in the UW local catalog.
  This was not really an issue for monographs, as there was generally a good record-to-record match between the two systems and users were able to successfully complete the task (albeit not through the interface we were testing). However, much more is findable in WorldCat Local than just monographs. When these steps were repeated by users trying to find an article in our catalog (for which there was no metadata), it was immediately obvious that this design decision needed to be changed and quickly. If users were lucky, they would find themselves at the record for the journal title, but very few knew how to make the leap from the journal title to the article content. This was a path from which it was easy to stray and almost impossible to recover.

Figure 13 shows an example of a detailed record screen for an item with many holdings. Note that the holdings in Summit (not clearly identified as Summit here, but under the expanded UW holdings) took up virtually the entire screen. With this arrangement, a lot of white space was wasted and the remaining relevant information was pushed below the fold.

Figure 14 shows a detailed record screen for a journal: The Economist. As with the monograph example above, we had the problem of the action button—in this case Access Online—being hidden in the upper right corner and easily being mistaken for an advertisement. We also had the expanded Summit holdings taking up much screen real estate.

More troubling in this example, though, was that if the user missed the Access Online button, then there was no easy way to discover that this title was available online. WorldCat Local knew that electronic content was available at the University of Washington, yet forced users to click the button to find specifically what was available. “Why not show electronic information up front?” we wondered. This dead end was fixed as a result of this testing.

One other issue with this display (not shown in figure 14) was that links for electronic materials available through Summit would sometimes also appear along with links to UW items. This was problematic because our users couldn't access electronic resources licensed by other Summit libraries. Users suggested that these irrelevant links not even be shown in the interface, and OCLC listened.

Sometimes the trigger for displaying the fulfillment buttons needed some refinement, as in the Ocean's 11 example in figure 15. You can see that both the Request Item and Check for Online Access buttons display. The former is correct (users can request this video be sent to a library close to them), but the latter is not. The presence of a URL in the 856 field triggered the appearance of the Check for Online Access button, even though the link was just to a review of this movie. Now the system correctly displays only the Request Item button and correctly labels the link to the review.

As a result of this round of usability testing, in addition to changes made to WorldCat Local, the UW interlibrary loan office made changes to the look and feel of the ILLiad request screens. Throughout the testing, users made various negative comments about the out-of-the-box interface and past experiences with the system. Now the screens look like any other Web page on the UW Libraries site, and user reaction has improved.

Interestingly, now that WorldCat Local has been live for over a year, many users (students especially) feel the “Interlibrary Loan” link on our home page is redundant and should be taken away. Their rationale is that you can get to interlibrary loan through integration in our other various systems, so why do we need a link to it on the home page?