COIS 12036 Assignment: In-depth Review of WA Museum Website

This report provides a comprehensive review and evaluation of the Western Australian Museum website, focusing on its interactive aspects and user interface design. The report begins with an executive summary and introduction, outlining the website's purpose and the museum's history. It then delves into a detailed discussion of the website's features, including its overview, elaboration of key elements, major aspects (both positive and negative), and opinions from external sources. The author uses HCI principles to critique the website's usability, accessibility, and overall user experience. The report also provides recommendations for improvement, particularly regarding security and user engagement. The conclusion summarizes the findings, highlighting the website's strengths and weaknesses, and emphasizes its role as a digital platform for the museum.

Running head: REVIEWING A WEBSITE
Reviewing the Western Australian Museum website
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1REVIEWING A WEBSITE
Executive Summary
This assignment aims to review and evaluate the significant aspects of the Western Australian
Museum website. The report is composed of all the features and attributes of the mentioned
website. This report gives a brief idea of the site and discusses all the critical elements. It also
takes the responsibility to recommend some of the measures the authority can take for the
maintenance of this website. This assignment at this moment concludes that the Western
Australian Website is a well maintained and a well hosted website with a user friendly
interface that is meant to attract many viewers all over the world.

2REVIEWING A WEBSITE
Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Discussion..................................................................................................................................3
Overview of the website.........................................................................................................3
Elaboration of the features.....................................................................................................4
Major aspects of the website..................................................................................................5
Opinions of outside sources...................................................................................................6
Recommendation........................................................................................................................7
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................7
References..................................................................................................................................8

3REVIEWING A WEBSITE
Introduction
The Western Australian Museum created this website with the purpose of serving the
viewers with relevant information about the museum. As the website apparently suggests, the
Western Australia Museum was established in the year 1891 in Perth. From then The
Western Australian Museum is carrying on with its legacy of antique specimens. The official
website of this particular museum suggests that it is a chain of museums that are spread all
over the world or are about to be made. The website has enabled the authority to attract
tourists not only within the country but also from all over the world. The museum is one of
the state’s asset as suggested by the website. Besides serving the purposes with relevance to
the museum, the website also provides the surfers with external links that are directed to other
social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter Instagram and Newsletter (Western Australian
Museum 2018). The purpose of this report is to clearly identify the key features of this
website and critically evaluate them according to the perceived understandings relying on the
basic framework of human computer interaction protocols.
Discussion
This section deals with the overview of the website, elaboration of the key features,
discussion of the major aspects and opinions from outside sources.
Overview of the website
As it appears, the nominated website is the Western Australian Museum website from
the region of Western Australia. The uniform resource locator suggests that it is a
government website hosted by the Western Australian Museum authority (Bennett 2013). It is
a virtual platform for the real world chain of museums. The website reflects that the chain of
Western Australian Museum was formed in the year 1806 in Perth and since then it has
spread out all across Western Australia. As it is a government website, the domain ends with
gov.au. This website is designed with a notable black stripe design along with contrasting
texts for better visibility. It is composed of several tabs among which some of them are the
drop down tabs for viewing the insights of the detailed website.
Apparently, the website seems to be stuffed with enough information and aims to
provide a soothing personal experience to all the visitors of the website. The maintenance
team seems to have put extra effort into structuring the style and content of the website
(Mustafa 2014). With accordance to the logo, the website supports the Australian culture.

4REVIEWING A WEBSITE
Special campaigns hosted by the Western Australian Museum authority are depicted in a
slide chain in the website. Among them, the horrible histories and the Aboriginal referendum
are the notable slide sections of the website. The website is composed of several web pages
with relevant information about the various sections of the Western Australian Museum
(VanWee, Geurs and Chorus 2013). The left top corner is composed of the logos from the
government of Western Australia along with the logo of the Western Australian Museum.
The Site map, the Accessibility, and the Contact Us section form the top right corner of the
website. Just under those sections is provided with the search space area for providing the
visitors with a customized search experience.
(Figure 1: Screenshot of the Western Australian Museum)
(Source: http://museum.wa.gov.au/)
Elaboration of the features
As discussed in the overview section of the report this government website appears to
be one of the prestigious websites of the government of Western Australia. The Site map
section present in the right top corner provide the visitors with an overview in each of the
inside sections. Each heading is linked with one another under this section for maintaining
fluency in the viewer experience. The Accessibility section on the other hand gives the clear
idea of the information regarding the Western Australian Museum and also gives a brief idea

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about the website’s physical access, accessibility of the website along with the disability
inclusion plans. The Accessible Web Design section included in the Accessibility section
provides a declaration stating that the website has been successful in following the web
content accessibility guidelines (Ahmad and Khan 2017). The innovative approach of this
website allows it to be accessible to people with disabilities, people with comparatively
slower internet connections and the people in rural areas. The Contact us section of the
website provides the viewers with contacts for general enquiries, branch phone numbers,
specific divisions of the museum and the curatorial contact list. The search section just below
the three sections on the website is meant to serve the purpose of the customized search
experience. The designed website is supported by illustrations and critical explanations
especially in the accessibility section (Johnson 2013).
The nine tabs in the blacked heading are composed of several subtopics under which
lies all the relevant information (Subić, Krunić and Gemović 2014). The coding of this
dedicated website appears to be performed with the help of Personal Home Page (PHP)
language, which is an amalgamation of the Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML) along
with the JavaScript. This language is extensively used in website development. The data
appears to be implemented with the help of Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) language that is
generally used for describing an online presentation.
Major aspects of the website
The website covers up both of the positive and negative aspects. The positive aspects
are more in number as compared with the negative aspects of the website. The Western
Australian Museum website has a very rejuvenating appearance since it is composed of
contrasting colours and designs. The interface appears to be user friendly and thus maintains
all the protocols of the Human Computer Interface (HCI). As per the HCI guidelines, the
website has been kept simple, accessible and useful for a general viewing experience (Lazar,
Feng and Hochheiser 2017). No hyperlinked sources used in the website is kept dangling or it
is redirected to another website hosted by a different domain. This is definitely a positive
aspect of the website since it doesn’t involve any complex traffic structures that may lead up
to a congestion of the online traffic hindering the user experience. Too much traffic is a
setback for the users with a relatively slow internet connection. The website adheres to the
conceptual, empirical and technical web design guidelines thus helping to reach out to the
people with disability issues (Waddell, Zhang and Sundar 2015). Clinging on to the same

6REVIEWING A WEBSITE
positive side the website, the interface is simple for which the people residing in the rural
sectors of the country could easily access it in accordance with their requirement.
There are minimal negative aspects of the website when compared to the positive
aspects, as the percentage is very less. However, one of the significant negative aspects of the
Western Australian Museum website is that the security of the serving site is not well
maintained. This governmental website, which is a digital platform for the Western
Australian Museum, lacks security in its Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP) (Husák et al.
2015). Lack of security of the website may unintentionally invite the prying eyes of hackers
and may also lead up to a data breach. Prestigious information could easily be transferred
from the website to other sources that may disrupt the privacy of the website. A worst case
scenario may include a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack for which the retrieval of
sensitive data becomes impossible leading to permanent termination of the website (Frantz et
al. 2014).
Opinions of outside sources
The two outside sources that are invited for reviewing the nominated website of
Western Australian Museum is titled as Source 1 and Source 2 with respect to the context.
Both Source 1 and Source 2 are male students. Source 1 is a student reading in school while
Source 2 is a college goer. Source 1 and Source 2 are a minor and an adult respectively.
According to Source 1, the website of the Western Australian Museum is a thoroughly
well maintained website that consists of all the relevant information about the Western
Australian Museum. The colour combination of the website is fine as well as it serves the
purpose of any visitor reaching out for then website considering all his needs about the chain
of museums in Western Australia. According to him, there are no issues as such.
According to Source 2, the website of the Western Australian Museum is definitely a
well maintained website maintaining all the HCI guidelines. However, he considers the facts
that are some of the faults relating to the hosting of the nominated website (Lazar, Feng and
Hochheiser, 2017). According to him, the uniform resource locator of the website lacks
security and that may pose a threat in the further development of the website.
It is evident from the above opinions that both the sources has contributed to the
report according to their own perspectives. Both the opinions match directly or indirectly to
the evaluations drawn in the above sections (Basson, Kanevsky and Oblinger 2015). Since
Source 1 is still a minor and reading in school, he could not figure out the security issues of

7REVIEWING A WEBSITE
the website. However, being a college goer it was not tough for Source 2 to figure out the
security issues in hosting the website.
Recommendation
As discussed in the above sections the website appears to be packed with information
about the Western Australian Museum and is a significant source of digital advertisement.
More number of people can get involved in receiving the new updates. From a viewer’s
perspective the website is well designed and well maintained (Billingham 2014). The only
negative aspect of the nominated website is that it lacks security maintenance. The website is
not protected since a secured Hyper Text Transfer Protocol is not used. The lack of security
of the website may increase the number of data breaches and phishing issues. To ensure the
safety of this website, the government could take strict measures to counter the problem of
loose security issues. In addition to that, several other measures could be taken for the
development of the website by increasing the number of website cookies for better user
experience. Campaigns that are launched with the help of social networking sites could
advertise more on other media to reach out to more number of people. This will enable the
website to outsource more employees to other parts of the country.
Conclusion
From the above report, it can be concluded that the website of the Western Australian
Museum is a website that serves the digital purpose of the physical locations of the Western
Australian Museum. This government website of Western Australia is meant to serve the
people with relative information and news about the website. The website is a well
maintained and well designed website that is meant to serve every visitor visiting the website.
It follows all the protocols of the Human Computer Interaction where the information
provided is conceptual, empirical and theoretical. The website has taken special initiative to
keep the website simple and useful. People paying a visit to the website could easily access it
according to their desire. The security issues of the website of the Western Australian
Museum is what the government of Western Australia should look for ensuring the safety of
people paying a visit to the website in search of information.

8REVIEWING A WEBSITE
References
Western Australian Museum. 2018. Museums | Western Australian Museum. [online]
Available at: http://museum.wa.gov.au/museums/.
Bennett, T., 2013. The birth of the museum: History, theory, politics. Routledge.
Lazar, J., Feng, J.H. and Hochheiser, H., 2017. Research methods in human-computer
interaction. Morgan Kaufmann.
Waddell, T.F., Zhang, B. and Sundar, S.S., 2015. Human–Computer Interaction. The
International Encyclopedia of Interpersonal Communication, pp.1-9.
Husák, M., Cermák, M., Jirsík, T. and Celeda, P., 2015, August. Network-based HTTPS
client identification using SSL/TLS fingerprinting. In Availability, Reliability and Security
(ARES), 2015 10th International Conference on (pp. 389-396). IEEE.
Frantz, M., Wittenstein, A., Eynon, M., Mather, L., Lloyd, J., Schumacher, J. and Murphy,
D., EMC Corp, 2014. System and method for network security including detection of attacks
through partner websites. U.S. Patent 8,756,684.
Basson, S.H., Kanevsky, D. and Oblinger, D.A., International Business Machines Corp,
2015. Predictive user modeling in user interface design. U.S. Patent 9,165,280.
Ahmad, A. and Khan, M.N., 2017. Developing a website service quality scale: a confirmatory
factor analytic approach. Journal of Internet Commerce, 16(1), pp.104-126.
Lazar, J., Feng, J.H. and Hochheiser, H., 2017. Research methods in human-computer
interaction. Morgan Kaufmann.
Billingham, L., 2014. Improving academic library website accessibility for people with
disabilities. Library Management, 35(8/9), pp.565-581.
Mustafa, S., 2014. Is an Accessible Website a More Usable One?. Dietrich College of
Humanities and Social Sciences at Research Showcase@ CMU.
Johnson, J., 2013. Designing with the mind in mind: simple guide to understanding user
interface design guidelines. Elsevier.
Subić, N., Krunić, T. and Gemović, B., 2014. Responsive web design–Are we ready for the
newage. Journal of Applied Knowledge Management, 2(1).

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VanWee, B., Geurs, K. and Chorus, C., 2013. Information, communication, travel behavior
and accessibility. Journal of Transport and Land Use, 6(3), pp.1-16.