Design and validation of a user-centered Web browser

New user-centered features were proposed based on the analysis of human limitation in using web browsers. A conventional browser and an enhanced browser were built by using JavaScript and Common Gateway Interface (CGI) programming to rewrite the interface of Netscape Navigator. An experiment was conducted with 64 subjects to test four hypotheses concerning the relationship between search strategies and task types and the usability of the enhanced browser. Different search strategies are found between two tasks. Once the subjects became skilled at using the enhanced browser their performance was superior to using the conventional browser. In the enhanced browser, the subjects were more satisfied in using the reference window and the shopping list and less satisfied in using the pull back and the preview information than using the conventional browser.