Ευχρηστία και διαδίκτυο

Η αναγκαιότητα χρήσης του Internet στις μέρες μας είναι προφανής ακόμα και για ανθρώπους που δεν έχουν άμεση ή έμμεση σχέση με το αντικείμενο των Ηλεκτρονικών Υπολογιστών. Ο πλούτος της παρεχόμενης πληροφορίας, η αμεσότητα ενημέρωσης οι προσφερόμενες υπηρεσίες και τα εργαλεία που συγκροτούν την έννοια που αποκαλούμε συνολικά διαδίκτυο, προκαλεί δέος. Πολλοί μάλιστα μιλούν για "τεχνολογικό αποκλεισμό" σε περίπτωση που κάποιος δεν προσπαθήσει να προσαρμοστεί και να ενσωματώσει τη νέα αυτή πραγματικότητα στο τρόπο ζωής και εργασίας του. Προφανώς λοιπόν το έργο που έχει να επιτελέσει η επιστήμη της Ευχρηστίας Λογισμικού σε αυτό το τομέα είναι σημαντικό και θα πρέπει να γίνει κατανοητή από όλους μια πιο ανθρωποκεντρική θεώρηση της διαδικασίας σχεδιασμού και ανάπτυξης λογισμικού για το διαδίκτυο. Το Internet έχει αρχίσει να ενηλικιώνεται και πλέον πρέπει να βελτιωθεί με τέτοιο τρόπο ώστε να προάγει μια ευρύτερη ουμανιστική αντίληψη της χρήσης του υπολογιστή με κέντρο τον άνθρωπο και μέσο τον υπολογιστή που έχει σαν πάγιο στόχο να εξυπηρετήσει αρτιότερα, ταχύτερα, πιο ευχάριστα και πιο πλήρως τις ανάγκες του.

University of Patras. (Greek) Articles>Education>Usability>Web Design

Computer and World Wide Web Usage of WSU Undergraduates

At Wichita State University (WSU), computers and the Internet continue to be incorporated into the course curriculum. We have noticed At Wichita State University (WSU), computers and the Internet continue to be incorporated into the course curriculum. We have noticed there are a wide range of computer skills and web experience among the students enrolled in courses offered in the Dept. of Psychology. We were interested in surveying our undergraduate students at Wichita State to determine just how much computer and web experience they actually have. To do this, we conducted a survey to 488 undergraduates (32% male and 68% female) enrolled in our Introductory Psychology course in the Fall of 1999. Fifty-one percent of the participants were freshmen with a mean age of 21.7 (range 16 to 54 yrs). at Wichita State to determine just how much computer and web experience they actually have. To do this, we conducted a survey to 488 undergraduates (32% male and 68% female) enrolled in our Introductory Psychology course in the Fall of 1999.

Chaparro, Barbara S., Michael Bernard, P. Moseley and B. Bartelloni. Usability News (2000). Articles>Usability>Education

Designing for Motivation and Usability in a Museum-Based Multi-User Virtual Environment  

This National Science Foundation (NSF) funded research project is creating and evaluating graphical multi-user virtual environments (MUVEs) that use digitized museum resources to enhance middle school students' motivation and learning about science and its impacts on society. MUVEs enable multiple simultaneous participants to access virtual contexts, to interact with digital artifacts, to represent themselves through “avatars,” to communicate with other participants and with computer-based agents, and to enact collaborative learning activities of various types. Initially, MUVEs were based only on textual descriptions); now, many MUVEs are graphical in nature, or use graphics to enhance textual descriptions. Our project's educational environments are extending current MUVE capabilities in order to study the science learning potential of immersive simulations, interactive virtual museum exhibits, and 'participatory' historical situations (http://www.virtual.gmu.edu/muvees/). To accomplish this, we have built our own MUVE shell based on the Sense8 WorldToolKit (http://www.sense8.com/).

Dede, Chris, Diane Ketelhut and Kevin Ruess. Harvard University (2000). Articles>Education>Instructional Design>Usability

Disciplinary Boundaries: Where (and How) Should Usability Testing Be Taught?    

With the rapid rise of interest in usability testing, especially with the demise of a daily increasing number of dotcom companies (and the headlines resulting from the 'butterfly ballot'), the question arises as to where (and how) a course in usability testing should be taught. When I first started teaching a graduate course in technical and professional communication, I created it to focus on documentation issues and to educate future technical communicators about the role they could play in testing and inadvocating usability testing for their products. The argument went something like this: who better than the technical communicators--the user advocates–to initiate usability testing within organizations. What better place to start than with the documentation?

Barnum, Carol M. CPTSC Proceedings (2001). Articles>Education>Usability

E-Commerce, the Consumer Decision Process, and the Theory of Reasoned Action

More and more companies are relying on e-commerce as a principal method of revenue. However, little is known about the behaviors of online shoppers. The focus of this research was to assess users’ attitudes regarding online consumer behaviors. This research considers nine Internet behaviors across five consumer behavior processes: (a) Motivation and Need Recognition, (b) Information Search, (c) Alternatives Evaluation, (d) Purchase Decision and Purchase, and (e) Purchase Outcomes. The behaviors studied include: clicking on banner ads, reading e-mail advertisements, searching for product information in online stores and using search engines, using comparison engines and online reviews to evaluate alternatives, purchase products, and accessing online customer support via e-mail and websites.

Volk, Fred. Usability News (2001). Articles>Usability>Education

Education: More Needles in the Haystack

One of the great challenges -- and joys -- of teaching takes place outside the classroom. Whether on Saturday or Sunday, in the heat of August or chill of early January, class preparation plays a major role in developing the best possible learning environment for students. Access to current resources is paramount. For HCI educators, the World Wide Web is becoming an essential link to such information.

Gasen, Jean B. SIGCHI Bulletin (1996). Articles>Education>Usability

Education: Some Progress and Some New Questions

For each of the last five years, there has been a workshop on HCI Education at the annual CHI conference. What makes these workshops so interesting isn't just the variety of people it brings together or issues discussed, it's the way the workshops have changed over the years. Just as HCI has evolved as a discipline, the topics of these and other workshops have also evolved. These changes are one indication of how much we have learned and what we have left to understand.

Sears, Andrew. SIGCHI Bulletin (1996). Articles>Education>Human Computer Interaction>Usability

Forums for Improving HCI Education

As HCI continues to mature as a discipline, educators face a challenging task. HCI educators need to keep up with the changing definition of HCI, understand what industry is experiencing, and where research is heading. To do this, HCI educators must continue to discuss the discipline and how they teach it.

Sears, Andrew. SIGCHI Bulletin (1997). Articles>Education>Usability

Guided Surfing: Development and Assessment of a World Wide Web Interface for an Undergraduate Psychology Class  

Although the World Wide Web has great potential as an educational tool, and many educational practitioners have begun utilizing the Web in many ways (e.g., Dodge, 1995; Logan, 1996; Mounts, 1996; Weiler, 1996), as yet, there has not been much systematic, theory based, research aimed at examining these methods. The principal purpose of this experiment was to begin to address the issue of how best to structure an interface between learners and the vast jumble of resources at their disposal on the Web. The need for the development and investigation of such an interface is indicated by research, which has found that some degree of learner guidance is particularly important in effective web learning (Anderson & Joerg, 1996).

Hall, Richard H. University of Missouri-Rolla (1997). Articles>Web Design>Education>Usability

HCI Education and CHI 97

Education always plays an important role in the annual CHI conference. The tutorial program provides a valuable opportunity for both HCI practitioners and researchers to explore new topics. Other venues, including workshops, panels, special interest group sessions, and papers are also used to explore educational issues. This year HCI Education was represented by a panel, a Special Interest Group, and several short papers discussing issues important to HCI education.

Sears, Andrew and Marian Williams. SIGCHI Bulletin (1997). Articles>Education>Human Computer Interaction>Usability

HCI Education and CHI 98

This year, the CHI conference placed special emphasis on three application domains: education, entertainment, and health care. The education domain included everything from pre-school for children through continuing education for working professionals. HCI education was well-represented, and was the focus of a paper and a panel.

Williams, Marian G. and Andrew Sears. SIGCHI Bulletin (1998). Articles>Education>Human Computer Interaction>Usability

HCI Education: Past, Present and Future?

The roots of HCI came from a number of separate disciplines, including computer graphics, human factors, ergonomics etc. (Hewett et al., 1992). In higher education, HCI was also represented as separate disciplines and sub-disciplines with separate courses or modules within the various disciplines. In contrast, the 1980's began to recognize the multi-disciplinary nature of the field. Conferences such as SIGCHI and books on HCI (e.g. Baecker & Buxton, 1987; Card, Moran & Newell, 1983; Norman, 1988; Shneiderman, 1987) appeared that brought the various disciplines together in new ways.

Gasen, Jean B. SIGCHI Bulletin (1996). Articles>Education>Human Computer Interaction>Usability

HCI Education: Where is it Headed?

As HCI continues to mature as a discipline, we must continue to question the bounds of the field. We must define what is within the realm of HCI and what is not. To begin, we can explore some of the proposed definitions for the discipline.

Sears, Andrew. SIGCHI Bulletin (1997). Articles>Education>Human Computer Interaction>Usability

Mapping the Expanding Landscape of Usability: The Case of Distributed Education    

As the environments in which we use technology become more complex and more diverse, we need to extend and expand our notion of usability to include a broad spectrum of users and user activities. We take as an example the case of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's distributed education program for human-computer interaction (HCI). While HCI is the subject matter for the courses, the courses themselves present a challenging case study in HCI usability.

Grice, Roger A. and William Hart-Davidson. Journal of Computer Documentation (2002). Articles>Usability>Education>Online

Old Dogs, New Tricks

What if we could offer a course or two on usability, on thinking like a user, on design thinking, on the user-centered design process?

Sampson, Fred. Usability Professionals Association (2007). Articles>Usability>Education

Practitioners as Students: What We Can Learn About Teaching Usability  

This paper presents the results of a study that contributes to our understanding of how to conduct and manage usability in the workplace. The study’s participants provided the dual perspective of practitioners working in industry and who are simultaneously enrolled in graduate studies. Recommendations for industry and academia are offered. The results have implications for helping technical communication professionals prepare for their expanding role in user-centered design.

Levine, Barbara J. STC Proceedings (2004). Articles>Education>Usability>Workplace

A Psychologist Astray in Computer Science

While more universities continue to develop HCI degrees and concentrations, things have not progressed this far in most computer science departments. Most computer science students still experience HCI as a single course that is frequently designed for juniors or seniors. Marilyn provides insight gained through ten years of teaching such a course to undergraduate computer science students at the University of Toronto. She began by accepting the reality of a single course, the diverse backgrounds of her students, and fact that many of these students may eventually be designing interfaces.

Mantei-Tremaine, Marilyn. SIGCHI Bulletin (1998). Articles>Education>Usability>Cognitive Psychology

Research And Technology Stem Overview  

The Research and Technology stem offers 47 sessions in the areas of usability, online documentation, hypertext and multimedia, the Internet, advancing technology, and academic research--including a few miscellaneous topics. As much as possible, the sessions in each area have been scheduled in different time slots.

Dean, Morris. STC Proceedings (1994). Articles>Usability>Research>Education

The SIGCHI Educational Resource Development Group

Dynamic HCI curricula strike a balance between understanding concepts, knowledge of facts, and acquisition of skills in analysis, design, implementation, and communication. The interdisciplinary nature of HCI provides another dimension upon which to build exceptional curricula. Unfortunately, it has been difficult for HCI educators to achieve this balance while drawing upon interdisciplinary expertise. One reason is the lack of a central depository for the information and resources that are otherwise distributed both geographically and across disciplines.

Sears, Andrew, Julie A. Jacko and Marilyn Mantei. SIGCHI Bulletin (1997). Articles>Education>Usability

SIGCHI Tutorials To Go Program

The Tutorials To Go program enables local SIGs to sponsor professional seminars for their members, both for purposes of professional development and for purposes of outreach to others who might eventually become members of the local SIG. These seminars are based on successful CHI Conference Tutorials, chosen by a committee of SIGCHI members, and agreed to by the developers of each Tutorial. The program is sponsored by the ACM SIGCHI Executive Committee, and was developed by Tom Hewett and colleagues listed below.

ACM SIGCHI (1999). Articles>Education>Usability

Students Perform Usability Testing for Industry Clients  

This paper describes how undergraduate students at Mercer University designed and performed hands-on usability tests on seven different products from a wide range of outside clients. Though the projects were challenging and quite difficult for undergraduates, they resulted in significant learning for students and important usability data for the clients. The professor describes the course design and discusses the clients and projects, and three undergraduates report their experiences serving on project teams as project leader, usability specialist, and technical specialist.

Davis, Marjorie T., Corley S. Brown, Erik T. Lindborg and Katherine T. Watson. STC Proceedings (2004). Articles>Education>Usability>Testing

Teaching Usability Design Through Pattern Language

For interface designers to produce really usable software they require both knowledge of tools and methodologies and appropriate attitudinal, aesthetic and creative characteristics. Usability design patterns, based on the ideas of Christopher Alexander, offer an approach to this educational need. We discuss three approaches to incorporating design patterns into teaching: teaching about pattern language, teaching throughpattern language and discovering patterns. We suggest that developing an ability to see successful usability design solutions as patterns is more important than knowing a canonical set of particular patterns, but that this is an extremely difficult skill to acquire.

Griffiths, Richard N. and Lyn Pemberton. University of Brighton. Articles>Education>Usability

Technology Transfer of Heuristic Evaluation and Usability Inspection

Participants in a course on usability inspection methods were surveyed 7-8 months after the course to find out what methods they were in fact using, and why they used or did not use the methods they had been taught. The major factor in method usage was the quality of the usability information gained from the method, with a very strong correlation between the rated benefit of using a method and the number of times the method had been used. Even though the respondents came from companies with above-average usability budgets (7% of development budgets were devoted to usability), the cost of using the methods was also a very strong factor in determining use. Other observations were that technology transfer was most successful when methods were taught at the time when people had a specific need for them in their project, and that methods need to have active evangelists to succeed.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (1995). Articles>Education>Usability

Training Teachers and Serving Students: Applying Usability Testing in Writing Programs    

Teachers often test course materials by using them in class. Usability testing provides an alternative: teachers receive student feedback and revise materials before teaching a class. Case studies based on interviews and observations with two teaching assistants who usability tested materials before teaching introductory technical writing demonstrate how usability testing can make novice teachers more confident about and help them predict student experiences with their assignments. By helping to train teachers, usability testing can also help better serve students.

McGovern, Heather. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2007). Articles>Education>Usability>Testing