Applied Human Computer Interaction

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Applied Human Computer Interaction

• CM52401-2

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Jenny works in a greengrocers. She only weighed
6 pounds when she was born, but now, aged 18, she
is 5 foot 10 inches tall and her measurements are
38-24-36. What does she weigh?
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Introduction

• After this weeks sessions you should know
• What the module is about
• What HCI is
• Why it is important in systems design
• How you will be assessed

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HCI

• Man Machine Interface (1970s) to Human Computer
  Interaction (1980s)
• HCI is a discipline concerned with the design,
  evaluation and implementation of interactive
  computer systems for human use and with the study
  of major phenomena surrounding them ACM SIGCHI,
  1992

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What makes a design good?

• Considers the capabilities of the user
• Considers the job to be done
• Considers
• Safety
• Effectiveness
• Efficiency
• Usefulness
• Usability

Goals of HCI
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Exercise

• You have been asked to design a system/product
  which allows two people to communicate with each
  other

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Scope and concerns of HCI
Interface
Group or individual
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Factors in HCI

• Organisational training, job design, politics,
  roles, work organisation
• Environmental noise, heating, lighting,
  ventilation
• Health and Safety stress, headaches,
  musculo-skeletal disorders
• Users cognitive processes and capabilities,
  motivation, enjoyment, satisfaction, personality,
  experience levels
• Comfort seating, equipment layout
• User interface input devices, output devices,
  dialogue structures, use of colour, icons,
  commands, graphics, natural language, 3D, user
  support materials, multi-media
• Task easy, complex, novel, task allocation,
  repetitive, monitoring, skills, components
• Constraints costs, timescales, budgets, staff,
  equipment, building structure
• System functionality hardware, software,
  application
• Productivity increase output, quality,
  creativity and innovation, decrease costs,
  errors, labour requirement, production time

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Factors associated with design of computer systems

• Typically technicians as designers
• Great technological advances over recent years
• Marketable to general public - huge reductions in
  price
• Shocked into using computers - commonplace and
  indispensable
• More subtle designs required ubiquitious
  computing

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Smart Car of the Future
Major problems - driver distraction and human
error

• Solution
• Optional driving
• Voice recognition/activation system

But what about the environmental and cost factors
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Disciplines that contribute

• Cognitive science psychology
• Computer Science/Computing Science
• Linguistics
• Sociology, Philosophy Anthropology
• Ergonomics Human Factors
• Artificial intelligence
• Design
• Linguistics

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Attitudes to design

• Focus of systems design should be on the
  interface, together with user performance, rather
  than how the HW/SW performs
• people costs exceed machine costs for 95 of the
  time
• in production terms people efficiency is more
  important than machine efficiency

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Design and development process

• Typical System-Centred design

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Typical systems development lifecycle

• Feasibility
• Investigation
• Analysis
• Design
• Implementation
• Test
• Review
• Monitor

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Problems with this

• Organisational information does not provide
  adequate information about users
• Designers are unable to properly understand the
  needs of the different users
• Users are given no opportunity to be involved in
  the design

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Hence..

• Users are required to remember too much
  information
• Systems are intolerant of minor errors
• Systems seem confusing to new users
• Interaction techniques are used inappropriately
• Systems do not provide the functions users
  require
• Systems force users to perform tasks in
  undesirable ways
• Systems cause unacceptable changes in
  organisational structure and practices

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User centred design

• Benefits
• reduced training time for end users
• reduced support costs
• reduced need for modifications and revisions
  after implementation
• increased productivity
• greater willingness to accept and use systems
  effectively
• greater efficiency and utilisation of resources
• increased awareness of user centred design

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User centred system design
Problem statement
Observation of existing systems
Hierarchical Task Analysis
Task analysis

• Requirements statement
• functional
• non-functional

Requirements gathering
Usability guidelines and heuristics
Technical, legal, etc constaints
Design and storyboard
Storyboard
Prototype implementation
Prototype
Evaluation
Transcript and evaluation report
Final implementation
Installation
From Human Computer Interaction, Serengul
Smith-Atakan
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User centred design

• Results of poor design

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Conclusion

• HCI covers a wide range of issues with regard to
  system design
• HCI is important in designing quality systems
  i.e. usable, effective, efficient, useful and safe