CS 4750 Human Computer Interaction

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CS 4750Human Computer Interaction
Fall 2003

• Jim Foley
• foley_at_cc.gatech.edu

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Acknowledgements

• The presentations and assignments have been
  develop by the Georgia Tech HCI faculty over a
  period of years, and continue to evolve.
  Contributors include
• Gregory Abowd, Jim Foley, Diane Gromala,
  Elizabeth Mynatt, Jeff Pierce, Colin Potts, Chris
  Shaw, John Stasko, Bruce Walker
• Feedback is most welcome!

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Agenda

• Introductions
• Course Information
• A little about HCI
• Project Information

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Introductions - Jim Foley

• Professor in College of Computing
• Courtesy appointment in ECE
• Founded GVU Center in 1991
• Research
• HCI - now focused on technology in education
• Computer Graphics
• Information Visualization
• Technology Transfer
• Office - CCB 261
• Hours 11-12,130-230 TuTh

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Introductions David Krum

• Your TA
• CS PhD Student
• Office Hours
• Wed 1-2, Th 430-530
• CCB Darts Lab (second floor lounge)
• dkrum_at_cc.gatech.edu

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Introductions - You

• Name, Degree, Your specialization
• What youd like to get out of the class
• Previous HCI experience
• An interesting fact about yourself
• This week - put a page with your picture on the
  class Swiki (Co-Web)

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Course Information

• Books
• Design the User Interface, by Ben Shneiderman 3rd
  Ed, Addison Wesley,
• The Design of Everyday Things, by Donald Norman.
  Currency/Doubleday, 1990.
• Web Site
• Syllabus/dates/readings/lectures
• Dates subject to change
• Assignments
• Policies
• Discussion areas
• HCI resources

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Course Information

• Grading
• Mid-term final exams (30)
• Group project, 4 parts (40)
• More info to come...
• Homeworks (20)
• Participation (10)
• Class involvement

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Policies

• No lates accepted without documented personal
  issues (serious illness, family emergency, etc)
• Individual homeworks done individually
• Team projects original!

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Course Information

• Resources
• Previous courses, courses elsewhere
• Content, lectures, projects,
• Books
• Web sites
• Go further
• Move beyond lectures book
• Further courses
• Step into research

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Course Overview

• Human abilities
• Evaluation (without users)
• Evaluation (with users)
• Design
• Dialog interaction
• Special topics
• CSCW, InfoVis, Ubicomp, 3D Interaction, Adaptive
  Interfaces

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Course Aims

• 1. Consciousness raising
• Make you aware of the issues
• 2. Design critic
• Question bad design
• 3. Improve design evaluation skills
• Go forth and do good work!

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And were off!

• HCI what is it?
• Can you define / describe it?

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HCI

• What happens when a human and a computer get
  together to perform a task
• task - write document, calculate budget, solve
  equation, learn about Bosnia, drive home,...
• Yes, thats a little simplistic.
• Key points are that user has to
• Express task (execution)
• Interpret results (evaluation)
• Note not just desktop computers!

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Why should we care?

• Computers (in one way or another) now affect
  every person in society
• Increasing utilize computers at work and home
• Tonight - count how many in your home/apt/room
• Want to increase satisfaction, utility,
  efficiency, and safety
• Product success may depend on ease of use, not
  necessarily power
• Macintosh vs. Windows

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Goals of HCI

• Allow users to carry out tasks
• Safely (Three-mile Island, ATC)
• Effectively
• Efficiently
• Enjoyably
• Bottom line is lives or dollars or intangibles

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Usability

• Important issue
• Combination of
• Ease of learning
• High speed of user task performance
• Low user error rate
• Subjective user satisfaction
• User retention over time

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What is difference between

• User-friendly interfaces
• and
• Programmer-friendly interfaces?

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Famous Quotations

• It is easy to make things hard. It is hard to
  make things easy. Al Chapanis, 1982
• Learning to use a computer system is like
  learning to use a parachute if a person fails
  on the first try, odds are he wont try again.
  anonymous

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Key Historical Event

• Design of the first Mac 1983-1984
• The computer for the rest of us

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How do we improve interfaces?

• Educate software professionals
• Do NOT wait til the end
• Draw upon accumulating body of knowledge
  regarding HCI interface design
• Integrate UI design methods techniques into
  standard software development methodologies now
  in place

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UI Design / Develop Process

• User-Centered Design
• Analyze users goals tasks
• Create design alternatives
• Evaluate options
• Implement prototype
• Test
• Refine
• IMPLEMENT THE REAL SYSTEM
• Be prepared for further iterative refinement

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Know Thy Users!

• Physical cognitive abilities ( special needs)
• Personality culture
• Knowledge skills
• Motivation
• Two Fatal Mistakes
• Assume all users are alike
• Assume all users are like you
• Please leave your ego at the door

You Are Here
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User Expectations (1)

• Some users expect the computer-based system to be
  just like the old system.

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User Expectations (2)

• Other users expect the system to work magic..

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Design Evaluation

• Both subjective and objective metrics
• Some things we can measure
• Time to learn
• Speed of performance
• Rate of errors by user
• Retention over time
• Subjective satisfaction

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• And now more about that project

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Project Structure

• Design and evaluate an interface
• 0 - Team formation topic choice
• 1 - Understand the problem
• 2 - Design alternatives
• 3 - Prototype evaluation plan
• 4 - Evaluation
• Main 4 parts worth 10 each

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Project Details

• Part 0 - Topic definition Due 8/28
• Identify team topic, create web notebook
• Part 1 - Understanding the problem Due 9/18
• Describe tasks, users, environment, social
  context
• What are implications for design?

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Project Details

• Part 2 - Design alternatives Due 10/7
• Storyboards, mock-ups for multiple different
  designs
• Explain decisions
• Part 3 - System prototype eval plan - Due 11/6
• Semi-working interface functionality
• Plan for conducting evaluation

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Project Details

• Part 4 Evaluation Due 11/25
• Conduct evaluation with example users
• Characterize whats working and whats not

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Project Groups

• 4 people
• You decide
• Diverse is best!
• Consider schedules
• Cool name
• Some time available at next class for recruiting
  members

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Project Presentations

• Informal poster session
• Feedback on ideas, both class periods
• October 2
• Other students and expert gallery
• Formal project presentation
• Final week of classes
• 15 minute summary

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Project Topics

• Set of possibilities
• Max of 2 teams per topic
• First-come, first-served
• By next Thursday
• Set up web notebook
• Real client

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Previous Project Topics

• Mobile/handheld (cars, tour guides, etc.)
• Wedding planner
• GIS
• Calendar agent (speech)
• Audio / Web sites
• Domain that you know well
• More on Class Co-Web
• http//swiki.cc.gatech.edu8080/cs6750

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What Makes a Good Project

• Access to domain experts users
• Real clients
• Interesting human issues
• Rich domain for design

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An Experiment

• Pre-recorded lectures
• Powerpoint
• Talking head - me )
• Multiple uses
• View in advance of class
• Alone or with your team
• May have short set of questions
• View during class
• With instructor or with facilitator
• For review
• For distance learning