Processes of Design Second lecture: Defining the Problem 3 October 2003

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Processes of DesignSecond lectureDefining the
Problem 3 October 2003

• William Newman

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Defining the Problem Overview
Goal ensure we know how to specify the design
problem at the outset.

• Issues
• What aspects do we need to define?
• What if we dont know all of them?
• Specifying the users needs.

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What do we need to definein order to start
designing?

• a form of solution
• the intended users
• a context in which the system will be used
• an activity, performed by the users, that the
  system will support
• a target performance for the activity.

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How to state all of these in one sentence

• Design a ltform of solutiongtto enable ltusersgtin
  ltcontextgtto ltperform activitygtin/with lttarget
  performancegt
• Example
• Design a ticket machine to enable travellers at
  a railway station to purchase a ticket in less
  time than at present.

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Arriving at the problem statement

• We discover the components by degrees
• Suppose we find we dont know
• The user?
• The context?
• The activity?
• The target performance?
• These questions force us to think.

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The Form of Solution

• Suppose we dont know what it is?
• Our initial problem statement reads
• students in libraries need to copy text from
  paper to word processor faster than typing
• This situation forces us to innovate!
• Reading assignmentNewman Lamming, Chapter 2.

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Whats coming next?

1. (today)
2. Fri 10 Oct User interface design
3. Fri 24 Oct Testing and evaluation
4. Then Ethnography and measurement
5. And Requirements
6. And Research methods
7. With Exercises and paper reading along the way.