Age-related differences in the initial usability of mobile device icons

Mobile devices offer much potential to support older adults (age 65+). However, older adults have been relatively slow to adopt mobile devices. Although much ongoing HCI research has examined usability problems to address this issue, little work has looked at whether existing graphical icons are harder to use for this population compared with younger adults. We conducted a qualitative exploratory study and a follow-up experimental study to determine which icon characteristics help initial icon usability for older adults. We found that our older participants did have more problems using existing mobile device icons, but that particular icon characteristics – semantically close meaning (i.e. natural, close link between depicted objects and associated function), familiar, labelled and concrete (i.e. those depicting real-world objects) – improved icon usability for them. We discuss how these findings can help icon designers to create mobile device icons that are more suited to the abilities and technology experience of older adults.     

A comparison between Maya hieroglyphs and computer icons

Thomas Erickson pointed out that interface design normally follows the traditional approach of art and design, which requires reworking to refine an idea through visual playfulness until a solution has been achieved. Erickson wrote that design by symmetry works by juxtaposing concepts that are similar at a very deep level — the concepts are symmetric in terms of some deep structure or underlying process. Once the underlying symmetry is established, the designer attempts to extend the symmetry farther, using what is known about one domain to suggest new ideas about the other. This article uses examples of Maya hieroglyphs, computer icons and parts of other contemporary symbol systems, either forced or as a natural development of visual language, to compare individual or reused elements of these systems; then to consider the potential of visual language systems that have been refined and used over a long period of time, against computer icons, which are a recent development. Certain comparisons have no relationships; they do however, expose the nature of computer icons.     

基于Web浏览器的SSL VPN网关系统的设计和实现

在分析IPSec VPN与SSLVPN各自优劣势的基础上,提出了一种基于Web浏览器的SSL VPN网关系统的体系结构并给出了具体的实现方法.系统主要由HTTP协议代理Applet、VPN网关上的Web服务器和VPN反向代理服务器组成.系统提供了两种安全访问内网的模式,即隧道模式和替换模式.用户直接通过浏览器从VPN网关上下载Applet或点击用户界面中提供的资源列表就可以安全地访问内部网络中的资源.     

Exploring interactive style and user experience design for social web of things of Chinese users: A case study in Beijing

This study designed an interactive IoT (Internet of Things) service on mobile devices based upon the concept of Social Web of Things (SWoT), with which users can interact with IoT in the same way they use the social network services. In order to integrate IoT into Chinese daily use, this study also investigated how Chinese users interact with things and IoT technologies. A four-phase study among users living in Beijing was conducted with a lifecycle of user-centered design. Results revealed that SWoT could activate users׳ intuitive understanding of social network services, and make the interaction with SWoT natural in their own ways. Users living in Beijing tended to be utility-oriented and highly emphasized efficiency; they were distinctive in uncertainty avoidance and preference of hierarchical way of managing things. Our results suggested implications for the design of user-centered IoT systems in China, and shed light on improvements for the performance of IoT systems and balance of requirements between users and system design.     

基于网页浏览器和在线服务的安全密钥设计

为了研究安全级别较高、用户满意度好、可操作性优良的安全密钥,提出一种基于浏览器在线服务的安全密钥。安全密钥是一种第二因子设备,提出的设计重点满足易于使用、易于开发和安全隐私性的特点。设计围绕注册、身份验证、设备认证和客户端数据展开。综合分析表明了提出的安全密钥能够提高安全等级和用户满意度。与一次性密码（OTP）相比,提出的设计平均身份验证时间更短。登录操作所需时间低于1?s,而注册操作时间在2?s以内,因而可以扩展到面向客户的网络应用。     

基于Web应用特点的界面组成及交互模型

针对Web应用的特点,从界面组成结构出发,提出了Web用户界面组成及交互模型;对构成模型的每一部分给出了抽象的形式描述;并分别对界面的组成对象、对象间的关系和抽象交互行为进行了较为详细的阐述。同时,利用已经设计实现的模型编辑环境中的可视符号,通过实例对界面组成对象的抽象交互行为进行了描述,证明了所提模型的适用性。     

Understanding user interface needs of e-commerce web sites

With the growth in the number of web sites, users must choose among many alternative web sites and designers must face the challenge of keeping the user's duration. Web site design is an iterative process of fine-tuning to enhance user satisfaction. According to the hygiene–motivation theory, the emotions of satisfaction and dissatisfaction are caused by two different categories of characteristics. Lack of dissatisfaction does not mean satisfaction, and lack of satisfaction does not mean dissatisfaction. This study proposes a parsimonious and effective multidimensional evaluation tool: a max–min approach to combine the hygiene–motivation factors and thereby provide a strategy to compare the competitive position of different web sites. The interfaces of eight e-retailer web sites for computer and communication products were targeted for evaluation. Four hygiene factors (navigation, information display, ease of learning and response time) and five motivation factors (interaction with people, screen complexity, user empowerment, visual appearance and achievement) are measured. The evaluations on hygiene and motivation factors were transformed into max and min effectiveness scores using the proposed models. Three zones (zone of intolerance, zone of efficiency and zone of satisfaction) were described to illustrate the role of strategic planning of a site interface in shaping a competitive position among the observed web sites.     

可定制高可用性Web应用程序界面的设计和实现

应用程序用户界面(UI)在体现终端用户所需功能的同时,应使用户高效、方便地使用这些功能。因此,友好的UI应该为用户提供一个可配置,可个性化设置并且具有高可用性的环境。在分析目前一些流行的系统所采取的用户界面方案之后,通过内蒙农牧林业科技信息服务平台(简称NMLPTii)的工程实践,提出一系列设计和实现可定制的、高可用性的Web应用程序界面的方法和原则,并在此基础上,依托信息体系结构的构建,提出多维度信息浏览和导航、多种交流模式、错误校验框架的应用以及可视化的管理等方法以提高Web应用程序的可用性。     

Web服务器端藏文字符串长度的近似算法

藏文属于拼音文字,她的书写规则与英语书写规则一样是从左向右,从上到下,但每个单词之间没有空格,只用音节符把每个单词给分隔开.根据藏文文法,藏文的换行只能发生在音节符、单垂符,双垂符与空格的后面.目前主流浏览器(如Firefox,Netscape等)都不能处理藏文的这一断行特性,所以这些浏览器无法正常显示藏文文本,如Firefox将整个一段没有空格文本当作一个单词,造成在屏幕的右边无法换行.结果是用户必须拖动鼠标来浏览整篇文章,给用户带来了很大的麻烦.又由于藏文中大部分的拼音字母的宽度是不同的,在编写HTML文档时候也无法根据藏文字符串的多少来决定字符串的长度.该算法将采用了一个粗略的方法得到一个字符串长度的近似值,再根据行宽的限制在字符串的适当的位置找到一个可断行点进行断行.虽然得到的是近似值,但是基本上解决了主流浏览器无法处理藏文排版的问题.     

The effects of usability and web design attributes on user preference for e-commerce web sites

This study examines the relationships among perceived usability before actual use, task completion time, and preference, and the effects of design attributes on user preference for e-commerce web sites. Nine online bookstore web sites were used by ten participants. Results indicate: (1) pre-use usability and task completion time were correlated; (2) the relationship between pre-use usability and preference was greater than that of task completion time and preference; (3) design attribute assessments after actual use were highly intercorrelated; and (4) organizational structure and layout had a greater effect on user preference than aesthetic aspects, such as color and typography. These findings can be used to construct a conceptual framework for understanding user preferences and to develop design guidelines to yield more highly preferred e-commerce web sites. Also, the methodology in this study can be applied to other computerized-applications.     

Design of icons for use by Chinese in mainland China

The objective of this study was to investigate the impacts of cultural differences in cognitive abilities between the American and Chinese users on their performance with icon displays. The goal was to provide insight for software developers whose products might have potential Chinese users. The key factor in this study was the presentation mode of icon displays, which could be alphanumeric elements only, pictorial elements only, or a combined mode (both elements). An experiment was conducted with 30 American and 30 Chinese subjects. The subjects performed recognition tasks using different presentation modes. Results indicate that for the American subjects there were advantages to alphanumeric and combined modes, compared to the pictorial mode, in terms of performance time and errors. For Chinese subjects, there were advantages to pictorial and combined modes, compared with alphanumeric mode; their initial error rate also was lower using a combined mode than when using an alphanumeric one.     

An experimental research study on the effect of pictorial icons on a user-learner’s performance

This experimental counterbalanced repeated measures study on the effect of three types of icons (abstract, pictorial and drawing) on the learning and performance of two types of learners (abstract and concrete) was conducted during the Spring 2000–Spring 2001 semesters at the University of Central Florida. The counterbalanced lesson followed by a counterbalanced and completely randomized quiz on three levels was field tested in the Spring–Summer 2000 on 37 UCF graduate students and final tested in the Fall 2000–Spring 2001 on 53 UCF graduate student subjects. A general linear model repeated measures ANOVA revealed that icon type had a significant effect on the learning and performance of both types of learners. Pictorial icons resulted in best scores. No significant interaction was found between icon type and learner type even though on a matched condition, abstract learners with abstract icon resulted in better scores than when concrete learners were matched with concrete (pictorial and drawing) icons. Implications for future research are drawn as well as practical applications identified in the field of teaching, learning, training and performance.     

Automatic identification of the interests of web users

In the present article an approach to automatic determination of a user’s sphere of interests is proposed. The approach is based on a method involving clustering of documents which the user is interested in. The process of clustering of documents is reduced to a problem of discrete optimization for which quadratic-and linear-type models are proposed. Identification of interests makes it possible to determine the context of a request without any effort on the user’s part. Different methods are proposed for determining the context of a request. An ant algorithm for solving a quadratic-type discrete optimization problem is also proposed in the present study.     

Applying relationship theories to web site design: development and validation of a site-communality scale

Our study investigates whether relationship theories can be of help in designing web sites which foster greater customer loyalty. Based on literature reviews of Communal-Relationship Theory from Social Psychology, communality from marketing research and related concepts (e.g. commercial friendships), we develop and refine a multidimensional measure of 'site communality' using a sample of 305 participants. Each visited one among several real web sites chosen across three industries (i.e. banking, pharmaceuticals and insurance). We define site communality as the extent to which web site content signals that a company's relationship with its customers goes beyond the formal, 'tit for tat' business dealings that are typically expected from purely commercial exchanges, and instead, more closely abide by the norms and behaviours evocative of friendships and/or family relations. Our results indicate that demonstration of caring, role spanning and authenticity/genuineness are its most important dimensions. Preliminary, findings also show that site communality is positively related to the benevolence dimension of online trust which is an important antecedent of loyalty. The practical implications of our study are discussed in the form of recommendations to help companies in designing web sites high in site communality.     

内容、结构及界面——Web设计的三要素

随着Web技术的发展,Web已经成为继印刷媒体、广播、电影、电视之后的崭新的信息传播媒体,基于Web的信息设计与传播也成为了一个令人瞩目的崭新的设计领域。相比于传统媒体,Web有着独特的媒体特性和信息传播优势。本文将结合Web新媒体的新特性,从内容、结构及界面三个方面对基于Web的信息设计与传播作一初步论述。     

用户体验设计——网页界面设计的重中之重

国内目前的网页设计,大多以视觉效果作为网页界面设计的首要考量,因而容易忽视网页设计的可用性。而网页界面设计,不仅应当给使用者带来视觉上的愉悦,更应当很好地帮助用户浏览网页内容,引导用户操作以完成网页服务。转变设计师以视觉效果为首要考量的固有设计习惯,将用户体验作为设计的重点,才是设计出具有良好互动性的网页的开端。     

Coping with consistency under multiple design constraints: The case of the Nokia 9000 WWW browser

Consistency is a commonly accepted but sometimes problematic design goal. External and internal consistency may conflict, and sometimes the best solution is inconsistent in both respects. We describe user interface design issues and several usability studies for the Nokia 9000 Communicator WWW browser and for WWW pages optimised for the browser. The results show how within the same, restricted design domain, different forms of consistency have to be favoured over others in solving various design problems.     

面向Web检索服务的个性化词典的研究与实现

为了更好地向用户提供个性化的Web检索服务,实现了一种改进的个性化词典的生成算法——IGAUPD,用于在用户浏览的大量兴趣网页中挖掘出真正符合用户兴趣的词语,以此缩小传统词库的容量,使得在用户兴趣建模时,能更快更准确地形成兴趣网页的特征描述,并更好地支持个性化检索。IGAUPD算法采用新的词权计算公式IWTUPD,以更好地描述词语在网页集中的重要性,有效排除频繁词。最后,用实验验证了由IGAUPD算法生成的个性化词典的优势。     

Iterative process of design and evaluation of icons for interactive TV menu

This paper shows an iterative process of design and evaluation of icons for future interactive TV services. In doing the RNRT (French National Network of Research in Telecommunications) iTV project, we tried to generate icons easy to identify, associate and memorise for 32 categories and services of our iTV system.

Through an iterative process, the Multiple Index Approach was applied until an acceptable icon set was achieved. In addition to existing evaluation criteria such as the intuitiveness, associativeness, preference and suitability with subjective certainty of users, we emphasised the importance of the learnability measured by recall tests.

As a conclusion, we propose a methodology of icon design and evaluation for information appliances that integrate unfamiliar features with common users.