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Practical ProgrammingCOMP153-08S
Week 5 L2: HCI
What is HCI?
• Human Computer Interaction
1. the study of humans
2. the study of computer technology
3. the study of how they influence each other
• Designing systems that are more usable
Usability
• Does what user wants in the way they can easily understand.
•Microsoft Entourage– has a calendar/diary– you can have reminders that events
are about to happen (eg meetings)– reminders appear in a popup
window– but they don’t appear on top of all
other windows– so you might never see them!
Poor Usability is seen in software
Apple puck mouse
– for a while was the standard mouse provided with Apple computers
– too small to fit into hand comfortably
– it’s round, so difficult to tell which way it is pointing
– people had to buy add-on covers to make it usable
Poor Usability is seen in hardware
Some Key Usability Concepts
1. Visibility
The control panel at the 5 mile Island Nuclear Power Plant. The controls were so badly designed that the user had to modify them.
Some Key Usability Concepts
2. Affordance
Te Taka’scrock
pot
Some Key Usability Concepts
2. Affordance
Some Key Usability Concepts
3. Mappings
Some Key Usability Concepts
4. Feedback
Red Blue Green Yellow White
US danger masculinity safety cowardice purity
France aristocracy freedom, peace
criminality temporary neutrality
Egypt death virtue, faith, truth
fertility strength
happiness, prosperity
joy
India life, creativity
prosperity, fertility
success death, purity
Japan anger,
danger
villainy future, youth
grace, nobility
death
China happiness heavenly Ming & others
birth, wealth,
death, purity
Some Key Usability Concepts
5. Understanding Users
Designing for Usability
1. Understand user needs– Study them – what really happens in the world?– Involve them
2. Prototyping– Early on build versions of the system that the user
can see and use
– Get comments
– Listen and adjust
3. Use design guidelines– Learn from others– Rules of good practice
So….
• Paper sketches– Show user, modify
• .net forms– Just layout– Some functionality– Again, show users, modify
Design guidelines
• Through experience and experiments, lots of good design advice available.
• You’ve seen a range in the Zak book:– Tooltips (why?)– Access keys (why?); choice of letter?– “If an operation is destructive, prompt the user to verify
that he or she wants to proceed with the operation” – Appendix B GUI Design Rules
• No easy, magic way for good design though. Guidelines are just guides…
Taking things further
• Read– “The psychology of everyday things” Don Norman.– Look at www.baddesigns.com (site about how bad
design makes life difficult)– Look at www.useit.com (site about usability)
• Practice good practice– Prototype your vb apps – sketch, show users,
redesign– Apply good design guidelines
• Do COMP258 (Engineering Usable Systems)
THE END
of the lecture