You also want to be specific.
So, the previous example I gave you is specific.
Another good example would be to find the calories, vitamins and
minerals in a one cup serving of broccoli.
That's a specific task.
A bad task would be, find nutrition information.
You haven't said what information you want them to find,
you don't know what the food is they're looking for, and
that leaves users kind of wondering what they're supposed to do.
They don't know when they've completed the task and
they're not sure what you're looking for.
So, your user shouldn't have to do any work to figure out what you want them
to accomplish.
That said, it's important that your not giving instructions in your task.
So, another example of a good task would be to use Google Maps to
find a street view of the Empire State Building.
A bad tasks that is too specific would really give instructions on
how to do that.
It might say, like go to maps.google.com, in the search box enter 350 5th Avenue,
New York, New York, click on search.
Then using the zoom scale on the left side of the map,
click the person icon to see street view.
That's just telling the person exactly what to do.
So you're not testing the system,
you're really testing if the user can follow your instructions.
So you want to make sure that your tasks are a thing a user would come to
the site to do.
They wouldn't come to the site to follow that set of instructions, but
they would come to find that street view.