Usability experts are into user testing to evaluate the quality of an interface since they need to be sure that the designed interface is usable, accessible and close to the user needs.
These evaluations are managing different artifacts, such as heuristic tests, thinking aloud sessions, interviews, surveys, eye tracking analysis, etc. All these tools have a motive: to collect statistical data in order to analyze it and go back to refining and re-designing - if necessary.
Any mistake during the preparation of a usability test can make it fail. So, to select the right target users and the right questions, items, topics, tasks, etc. to be performed is a very difficult decision. Despite nowadays there are thousands of templates; they will require adaptations to fit the application purpose.
Because of that, and because the visual communication is easier to understand by designers, I’ve been thinking why don’t we change the rules and the roles and let the user sketch the interface exactly as they are perceiving it, however.

This sketching test can be interesting for different reasons:
Help designer to know whether users have understood the hierarchy, the most important items and the general idea or not.
And you, what do you think? Does it make any sense?
A very illustrative slides to make us know the answer of those and other questions.
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If I knew the bus to choose, I wouldn't have to consult the map.

Focusing on the wrong problem, well, focusing on just one of the solution of the problem will make this situation happens. I just wanted another way of visualizing the same information, exactly an standard way like the map.
Anyway, it was a long time without writing, at least, I did the first step.
Simple question, right? How can we know when there's something in our software application or website that looks unusable? It's easy:
Seriously, if you cannot wait to a thinking-aloud user test, try to "listen" what your personas would ask when they're in front of the desktop.
It works for me when I cannot see, in a first sight, from where the smells is comming.