http://tc.eserver.org/dir/Articles/Usability/User-Interface A listing of the most recently indexed works about Articles and Usability and User Interface in the field of technical communication. en-us Copyright (c) 2005-08 by the EServer. All rights reserved. tclib-editorial@eserver.org (TC Library Editorial Board) webmaster@eserver.org (Geoffrey Sauer) http://tc.eserver.org/images/newlogo.gif http://tc.eserver.org/dir/Articles/Usability/User-Interface http://tc.eserver.org/35597.html http://tc.eserver.org/35597.html A common mandate at many software companies is “Make our products consistent!” I’ve heard this clarion call for consistency at every company I’ve worked for that has more than a single product or service. The rationale behind the consistency mandate is that it will reduce design and development costs, improve the overall quality of the software, strengthen the brand (“the products should all look like they come from the same company”), make learning easier for users, and reduce errors when multiple products are used together. These are all great goals, but there is a problem with the consistency mandate – consistency is complex, multi-dimensional, and sometimes at odds with other important goals like usability. http://tc.eserver.org/35573.html http://tc.eserver.org/35573.html Every programmer and user interface designer eventually comes to this point: You can’t decide how a specific part of your user interface should behave. It’s easy, of course. Just make it a preference, and everyone will be happy. http://tc.eserver.org/35577.html http://tc.eserver.org/35577.html Fortunately, you don't see dialogs in web apps much, but this sort of modal dialog lunacy is, sadly, becoming more popular in today's AJAX-y world of web 2.5. Those who can't learn from history are doomed to repeat it, I guess. http://tc.eserver.org/35578.html http://tc.eserver.org/35578.html This may sound a little harsh, but you'll see, when you do usability tests, that there are quite a few users who simply do not read words that you put on the screen. If you pop up an error box of any sort, they simply will not read it. http://tc.eserver.org/35307.html http://tc.eserver.org/35307.html From 0.1 seconds to 10 years or more, user interface design has many different timeframes, and each has its own particular usability issues. http://tc.eserver.org/35216.html http://tc.eserver.org/35216.html First person user interfaces can be a good fit for applications that allow people to navigate the real world, “augment” their immediate surroundings with relevant information, and interact with objects or people directly around them. http://tc.eserver.org/35173.html http://tc.eserver.org/35173.html Affordance allows us to look at something and intuitively understand how to interact with it. For example, when we see a small button next to a door, we know we should push it with a finger. Convention tells us it will make a sound, notifying the homeowner that someone is at the door. This concept transfers to the virtual environment: when we see a 3D-shaped button on a web page, we understand that we are supposed to “push” it with a mouse-click. http://tc.eserver.org/35092.html http://tc.eserver.org/35092.html A product is actually a service. Although the designer, manufacturer, distributer, and seller may think it is a product, to the buyer, it offers a valuable service. In reality a product is all about the experience. http://tc.eserver.org/34514.html http://tc.eserver.org/34514.html There are a exponentially growing amount of applications being developed. Some of them vanish at an early stage, while others grow to be quite (and sometimes extremely) popular. What really dazzles me is how sucky many of them (both the popular and the unpopular ones) are regarding how they deal with user-interaction. http://tc.eserver.org/33840.html http://tc.eserver.org/33840.html This paper focuses on managing constraints in a way that enables developers to create an accessible and usable user interface (UI). The constraining processes presented in this paper comprise of a language to describe a logical web page in an application, a basic bottom-up repository management system and the processing required for compiling pages. http://tc.eserver.org/33590.html http://tc.eserver.org/33590.html Welcome to Usability In Practice. This is the first in a series of columns that will focus on the design of the user experience (UX). In the past, user experience was not a high priority for most development projects, but that's changed. Today, end users have a lot of experience with the Web and with software. They want design that's easy to learn and use and that fits their workflow. This column will show you how to deliver such designs. http://tc.eserver.org/33495.html http://tc.eserver.org/33495.html With few exceptions, intuitive user interfaces really don't exist. Familiar interfaces do, however. But does that mean developers need to be locked into the same old design patterns? There's no reason why they should. http://tc.eserver.org/33453.html http://tc.eserver.org/33453.html Usage goes down as interaction costs increase. User motivation determines how fast demand drops, following an elasticity curve. http://tc.eserver.org/33461.html http://tc.eserver.org/33461.html Many winners employ dashboards to give users a single overview of complex information and use lightboxes to ensure that users notice dialogs. Also, the Office 2007 ribbon showed surprisingly strong early adoption. http://tc.eserver.org/33293.html http://tc.eserver.org/33293.html Are touchscreens always good news for users? Our consultants suggest guidelines to ensure touchscreen devices are both usable and useful. http://tc.eserver.org/33179.html http://tc.eserver.org/33179.html At present, we do not know how to optimize reading via electronic equipment. In this chapter, some considerations that may help us do this in the future will be raised, and some of the relevant evidence and theory that do exist will be cited and briefly highlighted. The focus of this paper is on reading of continuous text, whether in linear form or hypertext form, and with or without the presence of graphics or other types of information. http://tc.eserver.org/33011.html http://tc.eserver.org/33011.html From my outsider’s point of view, automobile interior design seems to be first and foremost about appearance, about style. Function matters, but it is not the primary focus, except for anomalies, such as when consumers force cupholders down the throats of reluctant designers or insist upon easy to fold rear seats for SUVs and the ilk. It feels as if dashboard designers see functions as irritants: so many controls and devices, so little room. How can we ever manage? http://tc.eserver.org/31996.html http://tc.eserver.org/31996.html One of the most frequent tasks on many intranets is finding people within the company. Providing an effective way to search people is thus a key goal in designing intranets. This goal becomes even more important for an organization like Emirates, a leading international airline, which has over 35,000 employees with over 140 nationalities and where more people are likely to use this feature more frequently. http://tc.eserver.org/31907.html http://tc.eserver.org/31907.html Should the OK button come before or after the Cancel button? Following platform conventions is more important than suboptimizing an individual dialog box. http://tc.eserver.org/31916.html http://tc.eserver.org/31916.html Application usability is enhanced when users know how to operate the UI and it guides them through the workflow. Violating common guidelines prevents both. http://tc.eserver.org/31113.html http://tc.eserver.org/31113.html A blog post that discusses the XO laptop, and the risks that the designers and developers took when creating the user interface for the device - for the most part they succeeded in creating an intuitive interface and a usable computer. http://tc.eserver.org/30824.html http://tc.eserver.org/30824.html The problem of the perpetual super-novice is the tendency of people to stop learning about a digital product--whether it's an operating system, desktop application, Web site, or hardware device. http://tc.eserver.org/30196.html http://tc.eserver.org/30196.html Applications can give users access to a richer feature set by using the same few commands to achieve many related functions. http://tc.eserver.org/29819.html http://tc.eserver.org/29819.html Due to limitations on screen size and resolution, the usability of web maps relies heavily on their interface design. The main goal of this research is to find better interface designs for web maps and to facilitate their usage by the public. The research consists of two stages of investigation: (a) a survey on the operation interfaces of popular web maps; and (b) a usability evaluation of simulated interfaces by measuring task performance and conducting subjective evaluations. http://tc.eserver.org/29793.html http://tc.eserver.org/29793.html What do customers want from our software and documentation? They want to accomplish tasks, and to obtain information about tasks, as quickly and painlessly as possible. Do they also expect to be entertained along the way? No, not when there is work to be done. Years of usability analysis in the software industry indicates very clearly that clarity and ease-of-use is topmost on the minds of software users. http://tc.eserver.org/29051.html http://tc.eserver.org/29051.html In visual querying, users analyze data for their decisions and problems by interacting with graphics that are dynamic and linked. This querying paradigm is new, a dramatic break from the more familiar retrieving of data via search statements and displaying of it in static charts and graphs. For this new visual querying paradigm, analysts conceptually and operationally need to master new approaches. To discover salient relationships, they need to manipulate displays. To drill down for detail or causes, they have to select data of interest directly from a graph. And to draw inferences, they have to consider meanings across several dynamically linked graphics. With the aim of studying users success in these new approaches, particularly focusing on the approach of directly selecting data from graphs, I conducted a scenario-based usability test with 10 data analysts. They interacted with visualizations to complete a realistic complex analysis evaluating employee performance. Test findings reveal a range of difficulties in visual selection that, at times, gave rise to inaccurate selections, invalid conclusions, and misguided decisions. To overcome these difficulties, support for visual selection needs to be built into interfaces and help. Results and recommended improvements are presented. http://tc.eserver.org/28668.html http://tc.eserver.org/28668.html Of all the objects that occupy our digital spaces, there are none that capture the imagination so much as icons. As symbols, icons can communicate powerfully, be delightful, add to the aesthetic value of software, engage people's curiosity and playfulness, and encourage experimentation. These symbols are key components of a graphic user interface--mediators between our thoughts and actions, our intentions and accomplishments. http://tc.eserver.org/28464.html http://tc.eserver.org/28464.html A study of the benefits of big monitors fails on two accounts: it didn't test realistic tasks, and it didn't test realistic use. Productivity is a key argument for workplace usability, but you must measure it carefully. http://tc.eserver.org/28375.html http://tc.eserver.org/28375.html 大きい画面の利点についてのテストには、2 つの間違いがあった。現実的なタスクでテストしていなかったことと、現実的な利用方法でテストしていなかったことだ。生産性は、労働環境のユーザビリティを語る上で重要な項目になるが、それを計測する場合は、注意深く行わなければいけない。 http://tc.eserver.org/28018.html http://tc.eserver.org/28018.html A usability assessment entailing a paper prototype was conducted to examine menu selection theories on a small screen device by determining the effectiveness, efficiency, and user satisfaction of a popular cellular phone's menu system. Outcomes of this study suggest that users prefer a less extensive menu structure on a small screen device. The investigation also covered factors of category classification and item labeling influencing user performance in menu selection. Research findings suggest that proper modifications in these areas could significantly enhance the system's usability and demonstrate the validity of paper-prototyping which is capable of detecting significant differences in usability measures among various model designs. http://tc.eserver.org/27573.html http://tc.eserver.org/27573.html Software is sometimes poorly designed to begin with and the interface should be scrapped and rebuilt from scratch. But more often than not, I see software that started with a decent design and has since had features added onto it with each release, squeezed into the existing design rather than being designed in. People aren't in a design mindset but an 'enhancement' mindset somehow. http://tc.eserver.org/27580.html http://tc.eserver.org/27580.html As I write the 'how to' documentation based upon the in-process design, the weaknesses of my original design become apparent and I go back and forth from writing text to designing the software until it all flows. http://tc.eserver.org/27543.html http://tc.eserver.org/27543.html This study investigates the breakdown of the psychomotor components of three different input devices, the mouse, trackball, and RollerMouse™ using the Stochastic Optimized Submovement Model. Primary movement time (PMT), Total Movement Time (TMT), Primary Movement Distance (PMD), and Total Movement Distance (TMD) were examined for each device. Results showed that psychomotor variables related to the primary phase of movement help to pinpoint how performance efficiency is affected by a particular device. For example, the relationship between %PMD and efficiency suggests that a device that affords users an initial accurate movement decreases the need for more or longer corrective submovements, thus reducing movement time. http://tc.eserver.org/27542.html http://tc.eserver.org/27542.html This study reports a psychophysical comparison of four ergonomic mouse-type devices to the standard mouse. It was hypothesized that muscle activity transferred from the distal to proximal limbs for some of the ergonomic mice may result in increased load on the shoulders and declines in target acquisition performance. Results revealed a potential tradeoff between performance and safety with the devices as participants performed the best with the standard mouse but reported more wrist exertion with this device. http://tc.eserver.org/27360.html http://tc.eserver.org/27360.html The concept of an affordance was coined by the perceptual psychologist James J. Gibson in his seminal book The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception. The concept was introduced to the HCI community by Donald Norman in his book The Psychology of Everyday Things from 1988. There has however been ambiguity in Norman's use of the concept, and the concept thus requires a more elaborate explanation. http://tc.eserver.org/27319.html http://tc.eserver.org/27319.html The days of a single remote for the TV or cable box are long gone. Like ants at a picnic, the control pads have invaded the nation's coffee tables. But unlike ants, remotes evolve rapidly. Not only are there more, but many sport added buttons and complexity added each time a model is upgraded with new features. http://tc.eserver.org/26785.html http://tc.eserver.org/26785.html Population aging and environmental concern are two important factors that will effect the design of vehicles in the future. In response to the potential conflict between them, the authors propose a shift in focus from individual vehicles to transport services, from '€˜A Car for All'€™ to '€˜Mobility for All'€™, and offer strategies, scenarios and case studies of how this might be achieved. New service and vehicle typologies are introduced and discussed, and an area of future research and development is identified. http://tc.eserver.org/26034.html http://tc.eserver.org/26034.html Although the new screens at Waterloo station use the latest screen technology and look very impressive, they have not been designed with the hassled and hurried commuter in mind. http://tc.eserver.org/25470.html http://tc.eserver.org/25470.html What if something neither looks nor quacks like a duck, but users think it is a duck? The cranky user comments on baby duck syndrome and how it can trap users with systems and interfaces that don't really meet their needs. http://tc.eserver.org/25061.html http://tc.eserver.org/25061.html Designing a user interface using minimalist principles for guided exploration can reduce the amount of paper and text necessary to document the system. Graphics in the interface can help the user grasp the concepts of the system, while dialog boxes, status information, and error messages can aid in recognition of success and recovery from errors. Online help can then be used as a backup for users if they get stuck. Reducing text and paper can reduce translation and printing costs, making this process very attractive. http://tc.eserver.org/24808.html http://tc.eserver.org/24808.html Technical communicators who work as members of software development teams often act as user advocates. Part of this role includes working with developers to design screens that allow users to easily use the software and understand the information presented. This two-part workshop presents various exercies and handouts which help attendees develop an easy-to-use and understand interface for users. http://tc.eserver.org/23873.html http://tc.eserver.org/23873.html Beyond just the undeniable importance of a usable form and voting mechanism, is the need to consider the comfort and satisfaction of voters dealing with sometimes radically changed voting systems, especially when the move is from paper-based voting systems to electronic systems. http://tc.eserver.org/23879.html http://tc.eserver.org/23879.html In the world of usability, Thomas Gilbert, human performance engineer; John Bowie, information engineer; and Genichi Taguchi, quality engineer, are singing a three-part harmony. Exemplifying different generations as well as three distinct but overlapping domains, these experts converge at a vantage point from which they should be jointly capable of conducting the whole orchestra. This article explains the contributions each individual has made, directly or indirectly, to the domain of software development. http://tc.eserver.org/23872.html http://tc.eserver.org/23872.html The useful features of digital cameras are not enticing enough to trade for the simplicity of the non-digital design that meets the fundamental goals of the majority of users. As for me, I have learned my lesson with digital cameras. I will keep my user-friendly, old fashion, but reliable non-digital camera. http://tc.eserver.org/23856.html http://tc.eserver.org/23856.html Most businesses have seen a dramatic increase in the amount of information employees require to perform tasks. Traditional approaches to training such as paper documentation, instructor-led training, or computer-based training (CBT) may have been effective in the past, but are not suitable to respond to the rapid changes in time, cost, and delivery of information today’s marketplace requires. At Unisys Corporation we have piloted an electronic performance support system that provides self-instruction for our clients at their point of need. http://tc.eserver.org/23717.html http://tc.eserver.org/23717.html Users have goals when they use software applications. Their goal is NOT to 'use' the application. Their goal is to complete an activity or task using the application. Performance support is defined as providing users what they need to be successful in completing their activity or task when they need it – at the point of need. Technical communicators can benefit from incorporating performance support elements into their work, even if they are not creating a performance support system. http://tc.eserver.org/23276.html http://tc.eserver.org/23276.html 台のリモコンを見れば、複雑で統一性のないユーザインターフェイスによって引き起こされる問題が明らかになる。 http://tc.eserver.org/23113.html http://tc.eserver.org/23113.html It's worth remembering the downsides to centralized computing. We must take steps to keep users in control as we grow the power of the network. It's essential that we keep a strong front end to balance out improved back-end features. http://tc.eserver.org/22920.html http://tc.eserver.org/22920.html Principles of information style and design have been around for years. Look at the shelf life of Strunk and White's classic The Elements of Style, published in 1959 and still a bestseller. Producing Quality Technical Information is a gem of a book, whose precise, bullet-style list of seven requirements and a checklist is now even more insightful in the fast-paced world of online information and the World-Wide Web. As a writer, I'm amazed how the IBM authors crystallized the essence of good information design in less than 100 pages. This commentary describes how the book's seven qualities and thirty individual requirements can easily and usefully be extrapolated to address key issues of interface design and usability for today's professional designers and developers. http://tc.eserver.org/21872.html http://tc.eserver.org/21872.html If you know a user experience that irritates you, don't just site there and grouse about it. Send it in to ThisIsBroken.com, a compilation of bad experiences: products, services, places, and Web designs that don't put the user first. http://tc.eserver.org/21873.html http://tc.eserver.org/21873.html UPA's Voting and Usability project is tracking several important trends toward greater usability in voting technology across the globe: Verified voting, The NIST Voting Symposium, FEC Brochures, Voting Developments in the UK and in the Republic of Ireland. http://tc.eserver.org/21094.html http://tc.eserver.org/21094.html The argument most frequently advanced in the United Kingdom in favour of implementing electronic voting is that it will increase turnout. In the UK, the under-25s tend to avoid voting in elections of any type. Local government and European Parliament elections rank among the worst for turnout (below 40 percent) and demonstrate a continuous downward trend in recent years. http://tc.eserver.org/21093.html http://tc.eserver.org/21093.html It's been two-and-a-half years since we started the Voting and Usability Project. This project started as we all realized with some horror that usability problems in our voting systems could affect the results of an election--effectively disenfranching some voters through the design of the ballot, as Susan King Roth put it in the report on her research. Since then, our interest has expanded into a more general interest in the usability of voting systems and usability professionals can help make voting systems more usable for everyone. http://tc.eserver.org/21084.html http://tc.eserver.org/21084.html This article discusses turn signals and how they are used. Turn signals improve safety because they give people time to react and they reduce driving ambiguity. However, they are only effective when people actually use them. Several lessons are applied to web usability. http://tc.eserver.org/21071.html http://tc.eserver.org/21071.html I recently purchased an 'old' Palm Vx of off eBay.com. Let me tell you, I couldn't be happier with it, except maybe if it had a color screen and the resolution were a little bit higher. It has a couple usability flaws from the original Palm V model, but nothing that dramatically decreases the user experience. http://tc.eserver.org/21015.html http://tc.eserver.org/21015.html Software bugs and system crashes result in huge productivity losses and undermine users' ability to form good models of how computers work. Website designers can help improve user confidence by prioritizing quality and robustness over features and the latest technology. http://tc.eserver.org/20858.html http://tc.eserver.org/20858.html Traditionally, human-factors specialists have had a rather severe attitude toward human performance with computers: their goal was maximum throughput, often measured in transactions per minute. This attitude was justified when computers were mainly work-related; in some cases it still proves wise. For example, a usability improvement that shaves one second off the time it takes a directory-assistance operator to search a database for a telephone number saves several million dollars per year in the U.S. alone. This performance-obsessed approach to usability led many early user interface experts to condemn the popular term 'user friendly' with the argument that users didn't need "friendly" computers, they needed efficient designs that let them complete their tasks faster. http://tc.eserver.org/20816.html http://tc.eserver.org/20816.html User interface standards can be hard to use for developers. In a laboratory experiment, 26 students achieved only 71% compliance with a two page standard; many violations were due to influence from previous experience with non-standard systems. In a study of a real company's standard,developers were only able to find 4 of 12 deviations in a sample system, and three real products broke between 32% and 55% of the mandatory rules in the standard. Designers were found to rely heavily on the examples in the standard and their experience with other user interfaces. http://tc.eserver.org/20818.html http://tc.eserver.org/20818.html Several new user interface technologies and interaction principles seem to define a new generation of user interfaces that will move off the flat screen and into the physical world to some extent. Many of these next-generation interfaces will not have the user control the computer through commands, but will have the computer adapt the dialogue to the user's needs based on its inferences from observing the user. This article defines twelve dimensions across which future user interfaces may differ from the canonical window systems of today: User focus, the computer's role, interface control, syntax, object visibility, interaction stream, bandwidth, tracking feedback, interface locus, user programming, and software packaging. Keywords: Agents, Animated icons, BITPICT, DWIM, Embedded help, Eye tracking, Generations of user interfaces, Gestural interfaces, Help systems, Home computing, Interactive fiction, Interface paradigms, Noncommand based user interfaces, Prototyping, Usability heuristics, Virtual realities, Wizard of Oz method. http://tc.eserver.org/19324.html http://tc.eserver.org/19324.html With so much good advice available, and the need for user input being so much a matter of common sense, it seems fair to ask why usability issues are so common amongst websites and applications - even those which have invested significant resources in development. What is it that drives otherwise sensible organisations and businesses to build products and services that are counter-intuitive and actively annoying for many users? The answers to these questions are revealing, in the sense that they illustrate how easily usability can be subverted by alternative agendas. And they highlight the need for a user champion within the organisation, an individual outside any internal interest groups, and potentially the company itself, who acts as a corrective to the forces that can leave usability on the back burner. This list is not one of objections (no time, no money, etc.), most of which are spurious, but rather of explanations for apparently baffling decisions that are often taken without even thinking about the consequences. http://tc.eserver.org/18320.html http://tc.eserver.org/18320.html This report illustrates the design of a novel user interface feature to provide simple and rapid navigation and user customization of the contents of a complex, multipart document. Within a performancesupport application for classroom teachers, the objective was to provide an efficient and instantly learnable scheme for direct user control over the parts to be included in the document as well as quick access to any part of the document. The design relies on the techniques of instructive interaction, an innovative approach for making user interfaces self-teaching even when they incorporate novel or non-standard features. http://tc.eserver.org/18315.html http://tc.eserver.org/18315.html У эргономиста могут возникнуть трудности в отстаивании своих позиций. Иногда сложно определить интересы всех участников обсуждения и найти сильную аргументацию для парирования возражений коллег. Задачей данной статьи является подготовка к ведению деловых бесед по вопросам проектирования и разработки пользовательского интерфейса. Представленный материал поможет добиться понимания и принятия позиции эргономиста в проекте при отстаивании интересов пользователя. http://tc.eserver.org/14992.html http://tc.eserver.org/14992.html Discusses three key areas of visual communication--information access and navigation, icon recognition, and visual appeal--as related to usability research. http://tc.eserver.org/13740.html http://tc.eserver.org/13740.html Jared Spool goes out of his way to position himself as anything but a user-interface designer. Yet through his company, User Interface Engineering (UIE), he is a frequent keynote speaker on effective Web design, produces a monthly publication reviewing Web sites for effectiveness, and runs a series of workshops of effective Web design. Founded in 1988, UIE is an independent research, training, and consulting firm specializing in user-interface design and product usability issues. It has grown into one of the United States' leading usability research practices, conducting more than 400 usability tests each year on software and Web sites. http://tc.eserver.org/11833.html http://tc.eserver.org/11833.html Projects critical to the missions of business organizations fail, devastating operations as well as IS budgets. Other systems are created or purchased at great cost only to be underutilized or plagued with non-standard 'work-arounds' that undermine the core efficiencies of the system. Fortunately, many of these systems can be recovered. They are technically adequate and potentially usable. User’s perceptions that they are unusable can be changed* through a multifaceted intervention process that we call Mission Critical System Optimization. http://tc.eserver.org/10584.html http://tc.eserver.org/10584.html Many usability problems are instances of what we call 'conceptual gaps.' A conceptual gap arises because of some difference between the user’s mental model of the application and how the application actually works.If the gap is large enough, it can stop the user’s work. For example, a user who wants to search the web for free local concerts may not know how to formulate a query that will yield this information. The gap between the search engine’s syntax and the user’s understanding of that syntax may prevent the user from accomplishing their goal.