VUG Home Page -> NIST Web Metrics -> Technical Overview -> WebVIP Overview -> WebVIP Operation

Variable Instrumenter Program | Download | Installation | Operation | Results
Setup Wizard -- Page 1 of 3
Select experimental website		 This page is the entry point for the WebVIP application. Enter a name for the experimental website or choose a name from the list of existing sites. This name will be inserted in the FLUD log files to identify the instrumented site used to generate the data. Use the 'View Summary' button to determine whether this is the experiment that you are interested in. Use the 'Select and Continue' to set the selected site for further processing.
Setup Wizard -- Page 2 of 3
Copy the website		 During installation you were prompted about whether you intended to use w3mir to copy websites. If you answered 'Yes', you may enter the URL of the website that you wish to copy.
  • If you select 'Submit', WebVIP will pop up a dialog box and a browser window displaying the first page of the site. You should verify that this is the intended target.
  • If you have already copied the site either manually or by a previous use of w3mir, you may choose 'Skip' to continue with Step 3. Alternatively, if the site has changed in any way, you may select 'submit' to copy it again.
If you do not have w3mir installed or if you wish to copy the site manually, you should do that before proceeding to Step 3. Place the root of the website at: /WebLogs/<experiment name>/website/
Setup Wizard -- Page 3 of 3
Select user interactions for capture		 The logfile produced by WebVIP is based on the FLUD format. It will include all detectible widget events (such as form elements, changes in checkboxes, menu selections and the like), window events (such as raising or resizing), and webpage operations (such as loading a new page). Lower-level user actions may be included or not as specified in the options table.

There are two possible motivations for including them: 1) if you want to examine the user's internal activity when interacting with a form element (e.g. examining how a user fills out a text entry, as well as the final contents of the entry), and 2) if you want to keep track of user interaction outside of form elements.

The default set of events for capture are 'Key Up', 'Mouse Up', 'Enter Widget' and 'Leave Widget'. You may set as many or as few as you need for your experimental design. If you select no events, the pages of the site will be stripped of WebVIP instrumentation, i.e., it will be a copy of the original site.

Running the Test
  • From the list of test URL's on Page 1 of the Setup, select the appropriate page labeled 'userbegin.html'.
  • You can customize the contents of this page. Do not modify the text that appears after the warning "DO NOT DELETE BELOW." If you prefer to add information to all userbegin.html pages, such as your company's logo, edit the master in / WebTools/WebVIP/userbegin_siteExists.dat.
  • Assign IDs or names for your Subjects.
  • The small window that pops-up contains three fields:
    1. Task area -- useful Task ID's are numeric or descriptive text strings. The START button alternates with a STOP button, depending on whether the subject is currently performing a task.
    2. Comment area -- subjects may leave notes for the investigator. These notes will be logged.
    3. The "COMPLETE" button will be used by the subject to indicate that ALL tasks are complete.
Instructions for subjects
Sample instructions for subjects:
  1. Your user ID for this test is: _____________
  2. Type http://_________/userbegin.html into the the address field of your browser.
  3. Enter your user ID and press "Begin the test".
  4. You will use the small window that pops up to
    1. enter each test ID that you perfrom.
    2. only check "Complete" when you finish the entire set of tasks.
    3. use the "Comment" box to make annotations that you would like to submit to the test administrator.
Overview | Installation | Operation | Results
Version 2.5
Page last modified: 15 May 2002
About this installation