Journal of HCI Vistas

This website is meant to provide insights into various multi-disciplinary aspects of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). It looks at this subject particularly from Indian perspective. HCI Vistas publishes at least two original articles every month. It offers latest research papers as downloads. It also presents Comptoons and survey reports. The website is meant to provoke new thinking in the HCI domain.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2005). Resources>Human Computer Interaction>Usability>User Experience

User Persona: Its Application and the Art of Stereotyping

I feel that creation of user persona is nothing but realistic stereotyping or a simplified outline of the user. The word 'realistic' is more important as realism can be achieved only through user study. (I am not referring to the fictional personas applicable in futuristic technologies). Humorists, cartoonists and filmmakers are gifted with the art of stereotyping. But they tend to exaggerate a lot. Therefore the personalities they render appear like caricatures. We must avoid caricatured user personas. While stereotyping, you generalize and oversimplify. And when you do that you pick or eliminate some details. That makes all the difference.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Personas

Lessons from a Street-Side UX Designer!

This example offers some insights into how ‘the arousal of the feeling of trust’ is dependent on the design of features and overall user experience, for the business transaction to kick off. The learning can be particularly applied in the context of online business portals and websites.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>User Experience>Case Studies

The Prism of User Experience

Practitioners of User Centred Design method tend to focus only on immediate user goals and short focused usability. What is meant by long term usability and long term user experience? It needs due attention because only then the impact of products on our environment and health gains prominence! If we take a long term perspective then what we consider usable based on our immediate experience might turn out to be a disastrous product.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>User Experience

Technical Communicators as Potential Usability Reviewers

There are many articles on the web, which have deliberated upon technical communication (TC) and usability together. Apparently, there are two distinct regions of usability where technical communicators can contribute.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>TC>Usability

Caution: Stereotypes Under Construction

Now that I have your attention, I’ll tell you up front that what Janea follows is not a rant. It’s not even a statement for or against Triplett political correctness. It’s a caution–words of warning about the creation of personas and the practice of user profiling. Even if one calls it the development of an archetype or ideal type, it is still a stereotype.

Triplett, Janea. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Personas

Sensing of Meaning and Introvert Products

The human mind is geared to derive meaning out of what it perceives. And this attribute is so fundamental to it, that it may even be the most basic building block of human cognition. In our zest to dig out some meaning from everything, we even go to extreme lengths. There have been diviners, oracles, and witch-doctors who try to read meaning from chicken entrails, yarrow sticks, tea leaves, bird flights, etc, with the same seriousness that a doctor reads an x-ray, or a hot-air balloonist reads weather patterns. The famous metaphysical saying “there is no such thing as a coincidence” is something which rides on the underlying philosophy that says - there is always a meaning in everything - if you can find it. Understandably, this philosophy can be a highly devious tool in the hands of occultist quacks, and yet the motive behind it is a fundamental driving force of human cognition.

Sapkal, Pankaj. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>Language>User Centered Design>Cognitive Psychology

Ten Steps to Personas

Having worked with personas before the method ever came to be known as personas there are, from my research and practical experience, three important areas that have to be considered: the data material, engagement in the personas descriptions, and buy-in from the organization which is part of the development process whether it is redesign or a development from scratch. This is the rationale behind my development of 10 steps to personas, an attempt to cover the entire process from initial data gathering to ongoing development.

Nielsen, Lene. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Personas

Beware of Style in Icon Design!

The icons or baby faces used as part of user interface have now turned into a major aspect of product branding. With powerful computers, enhanced graphics capabilities, advanced tools for illustration, and professionals to advocate rich user experience, icon design has become more important and complex than ever before! Windows Vista has raised the standard of quality icons even higher. An interface design project forced me to think about ’style’ in icon design. It raised some basic questions in my mind.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Design>User Interface>Graphic Design

Spatial Descriptions by Children

Drawing a map is cognitively challenging. It requires you to do some abstract visualization.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>Graphic Design>Technical Illustration>Children

Cultural Ethnography: A Brief Report

There is a lot of curiosity about ethnography in design among designers, especially the academicians. Context study or field study are the other similar activities discussed in the domain of usability. I happened to have carried out an ethnographic assignment almost a decade ago. I thought, sharing that experience (good or bad) will be useful to many.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>Usability>Ethnographies>Case Studies

User Persona: Its Application and The Art of Stereotyping

There is so much discussion about user personas, but very few examples are reported on Internet with some evidence of its actual usage. So here is a persona that I explored long back. It was useful!

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>Personas>Case Studies

Usability Testing: A Reality Show?

In a typical on-camera usability test, in the lab environment, we ask the subjects to perform certain tasks using the product. Such tests are time-bound and follow strict procedures in terms of user profiling, briefing, task descriptions, actual performance and think aloud exercise, screen capturing (in case of software), etc. You do the video recording of usability test to observe the user performance, their response and behavior. All this is perfectly fine. Coming back to certain observations from the Big Boss reality show. I found that the participants of Big Boss have evolved through distinct psychological stages, which are sequentially progressive.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2007). Articles>Usability>Testing

Opportunity India: Interaction Design Market Potential

The Indian community of Interaction Designers and Usability Professionals is growing by rate of 20% annually which is far too less. Around 6 to 8 new design institutes have suddenly opened up in past couple of years (to name a few- Symbiosis Institute of Design, MAEER MIT’s Institute of Design and Creative-I College, Pune, Raffles Design International, Mumbai, IILM School of Design, Gurgaon, Wigan & Leigh College, New Delhi) But all these are indirect contributors to interaction design, as they do not offer education in that area.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2006). Articles>User Experience>Interaction Design

Use of Cognitive Tricks in Web Advertising

Web advertisers resort to many unethical approaches (in my personal opinion) under the pretext of creativity. Let us learn about it.

Katre, Dinesh S. Journal of HCI Vistas (2006). Articles>Web Design>Marketing>Cognitive Psychology