IGeLU 2026

Conference

As part of a large consortium, the ETH Library provides extensive resources from various libraries in its discovery system, with multiple access options. This increases complexity. Our usability improvements aim to reduce clicks and decisions.
Although the ETH Library regularly collects user feedback on the discovery UI, we are cautious about changes, as adjustments may confuse users. The introduction of the NDE UI opens an opportunity: as users must adapt to a new environment, this enables optimizations affecting not only the UI but also the underlying configuration.
As part of our NDE UI project, we identified promising functional areas and evaluated them systematically. We applied a mix of methods, bringing together internal expertise and user insights by combining expert reviews, usability tests, and surveys.
This presentation shows our approach, methods, and findings, demonstrating how expert knowledge and user feedback enable effective optimizations in complex search systems.

User Experience / Discovery

Primo