The contribution of apparent and inherent usability to a user's satisfaction in a searching and browsing task on the Web

Previous research found that apparent and inherent usability had big influences on user's acceptance of computer systems. This research extended these findings to the area of user's satisfaction. The study investigated the impact of inherent and apparent usability on user's satisfaction of Web page designs while the two main tasks on the World Wide Web, searching and browsing, were performed. The results indicated that inherent usability was the main factor contributing to user's satisfaction in both searching and browsing. General principles and specific recommendations for the design and evaluation of Web page designs are derived from these findings.     

The Importance of Userware

Although most MIS managers don't realize it, the way users react to a system often determines whether the implementation of that system is successful. Thus, MIS managers should devote more of their attention to the personal side (i.e., the users) rather than the technical side (i.e., hardware and software concerns) of systems development. This column examines the importance of userware – the user's reaction to a system –and how MIS managers can make it part of their management strategy.     

Participatory knowledge-management design: A semiotic approach

The aim of this paper is to present a design strategy for collaborative knowledge-management systems based on a semiotic approach. The contents and structure of experts' knowledge is highly dependent on professional or individual practice. Knowledge-management systems that support cooperation between experts from different (sub-)fields need to be situated and tailored to provide effective support even if the common aspects of the data need to be described by ontologies that are generic in respect to the sub-disciplines involved. To understand and approach this design problem, we apply a semiotic perspective to computer application and human–computer interaction. From a semiotic perspective, the computer application is both a message from the designer to the user about the structure of the problem domain, as well as about interaction with it, and a structured channel for the user's communication with herself, himself or other users of the software. Tailoring or “end-user development” – i.e. adapting the knowledge-management system to a specific (sub-)discipline, task or context – then refines both the message and adapts the structure of the interaction to the situated requirements.The essential idea of this paper is to define a new perspective for designing and developing interactive systems to support collaborative knowledge management. The key concept is to involve domain experts in participatory knowledge design for mapping and translating their professional models into the proper vocabularies, notations, and suitable visual structures for navigating among interface elements. To this end, the paper describes how our semiotic approach supports processes for representing, storing, accessing, and transferring knowledge through which the information architecture of an interactive system can be defined. Finally, the results of applying our approach to a real-world case in an archaeological context are presented.     

Extending the Usability of Heuristics for Design and Evaluation: Lead,Follow, and Get Out of the Way

User-centered design practitioners have often relied on discount usability engineering methods using heuristics. Top 10 lists of design and evaluation heuristics have proliferated during the 1990s, leading to a plethora of heterogeneous heuristic guidelines for a multitude of user interfaces. A simple, unified set of heuristics that might be applicable across different technologies, understood between disciplines, and equivalent to metrics used to measure ease of use can be beneficial.

Lead, follow, and get out of the way (LF&G) theorizes that the optimal human-computer interaction (HCI) experience is analogous to a facilitative learning relation-Like a good teacher, mentor, or coach, the usable user interface leads the user to successful completion of tasks and goals; follows the user's progress and provides appropriate feedback and information when needed; and gets out of the way of the user to allow efficient and effective completion of tasks as the user attains mastery of the system, its concepts, and operations. A set of 18 heuristics grouped under the 3 general principles of the title are provided for use across the tasks of design guidance, development refinement, and end-user evaluation of computer systems.

This article provides background into the development of LF&G, case studies on its use in real-world product design and development, and directions for further research needed to develop this approach into an empirically based method for defining, describing, designing, and predicting the ease of use of interactive human-computer systems.     

Analysis of quality standards for industrial collaborative robots based on user-centered design framework

Industrial collaborative robots have become increasingly important in recent years due to their ability to work safely and efficiently alongside humans. As a result, there is a growing need for evaluation standards to ensure the quality of collaborative robots. However, existing studies only consider system-centered and technical aspects of collaborative robots, and there is a lack of research on user-centered quality evaluation. In this study, we identified 21 user requirements based on a user-centered design framework and confirmed the limitations of existing quality standards by reviewing the standard clauses for collaborative robots. It was found that user needs to be related to performance, safety, and even usability and enjoyment are already being expressed according to the user-centered design framework, but the quality standards for these needs only present design principles or do not consider them at all. This study provides information on the quality attributes that need to be fulfilled to satisfy user requirements and suggests the need and direction for further research on the user-centered evaluation of collaborative robots. Accordingly, the user's perception and experience of collaborative robots are expected to improve.     

Beyond the User Preferences: Aligning the Prototype Design to the Users’ Expectations

It is important for practitioners to conceptualize and tailor a prototype in tune with the users’ expectations in the early stages of the design life cycle so the modifications of the product design in advanced phases are kept to a minimum. According to user preference studies, the aesthetic and the usability of a system play an important role in the user appraisal and selection of a product. However, user preferences are just a part of the equation. The fact that a user prefers one product over the other does not mean that he or she would necessarily buy it. To understand the factors affecting the user's assessment of a product before the actual use of the product and the user's intention to purchase the product we conducted a study, reported in this article. Our study, a modification of a well‐known protocol, considers the users’ preferences of six simulated smartphones each with different combination of attributes. A sample consisting of 365 participants was involved in our analysis. Our results confirm that the main basis for the users’ pre‐use preferences is the aesthetics of the product, whereas our results suggest that the main basis for the user's intention to purchase are the expected usability of the product. Moreover, our analysis reveals that the personal characteristics of the users have different effects on both the users’ preferences and their intention to purchase a product. These results suggest that the designers should carefully balance the aesthetics and usability features of a prototype in tune with the users expectations. If the conceptualization of a product is done properly the redesign cycles after the usability testing can be reduced and speed up the process for releasing the product on the market.     

Capturing Design Space From a User Perspective: The Repertory Grid Technique Revisited

The design of an artifact (e.g., software system, household appliance) requires a multitude of decisions. In the course of narrowing down the design process, "good ideas" have to be divided from "bad ideas." To accomplish this, user perceptions and evaluations are of great value. The individual way people perceive and evaluate a set of prototypes designed in parallel may shed light on their general needs and concerns. The Repertory Grid Technique (RGT) is a method of elucidating the so-called personal constructs (e.g., friendly-hostile, bad-good, playful-expert-like) people employ when confronted with other individuals, events, or artifacts. We assume that the personal constructs (and the underlying topics) generated as a reaction to a set of artifacts mark the artifacts' design space from a user's perspective and that this information may be helpful in separating valuable ideas from the not so valuable. This article explores the practical value of the RGT in gathering design-relevant information about the design space of early artifact prototypes designed in parallel. Ways of treating the information gathered, its quality and general advantages, and limitations of the RGT are presented and discussed. In general, the RGT proved to be a valuable tool in exploring a set of artifact's design space from a user's perspective.     

The concept of an information management system and its use within design studies

Abstract

This paper describes the concept of an information management system (IMS) and its association with a user centred approach to the design of equipment which acts as a medium for the user to attain a goal. The case is taken where such mediating devices (MDs) involve computer based processing, storage and communications arrangements, and transactions with either a physical environment or engineered facilities. Particular attention is drawn to the designer's role in defining the data transformations within an MD, and hence to information that is available to the user and the means of carrying out transactions with it. transforming it into knowledge and attaining a goal. There is also special emphasis on the usability (= operability + trainability) aspects of the user's interface with the MD. The means of exploring design options are described along with the possible assessment techniques. It is concluded that the concept of an IMS offers considerable benefits for studying a range of design issues and matters of scientific importance.     

Extending the engineering trade-off analysis by integrating user preferences in conjoint analysis

The ongoing technical improvements in architecture design with improved features of mobile or smartphones do not automatically guarantee user acceptance, because technical and commercial aspects primarily drive the development of mobile communication systems and devices. Especially in early stages of technology development, user preferences and values are not adequately considered, which might even have a negative impact on acceptance issues. The aim of this study was the implementation of a quantified understanding of user needs in terms of values into the system design process of cell-phone processors. Moreover, we aimed for an extension of the engineering’s trade-off analysis by using conjoint analysis in order to investigate trade-offs between specific device characteristics. Finally, our aim was the evaluation of empirically based user-oriented research methods.Results of the first study revealed that battery life, speech quality, signal quality and data-transmission rate are the most important device characteristics. Results from conjoint analysis indicated a clear trade-off between battery life and the three other characteristics. Moreover, this research demonstrated that technology acceptance research benefits considerably from an interdisciplinary and multi-method approach. Besides, implementing the users’ preferences into early stages of the product development process offers several advantages concerning effectiveness as well as economic aspects of development.     

What makes expert systems survive over 10 years—empirical evaluation of several engineering applications

This case study analyzes eight expert system applications that have successfully been in industrial use for a long time. We have personally been involved in the development of these applications and are thus in a good position to analyze what is important for a successful application and what kind of mistakes can be made. Since the development of the applications started in 1986–1990 and some of them are still in use we are able to observe what has happened to those applications during their lifetime. Our key observations are related to the scope of the applications, to the trade-off between usability and automation, to the role of human experts in the use and development of expert systems, on the technical solutions used, on aspects of the operation of the expert system and on the similarities between expert systems and information systems. The key findings are expressed as 20 hypotheses for successful expert systems. The support of each application to the hypotheses is discussed.     

Anatomy of the design of an undo support facility

This paper presents decision making elements in an anatomy of the design of undo support in the GNU Emacs environment. Apart from providing design guidelines for undo support, it illustrates how to bring a design from an abstract conception to a concrete realization and how to balance trade-offs in the process. Undo support is a usability feature of interactive computer systems which allows a user to reverse the effects of executed commands. GNU Emacs was chosen as a suitable environment to demonstrate how to design undo support because of its sophistication and practical significance. User's opinions about which aspects of the existing undo support facility in Emacs need to be improved were solicited by conducting an informal survey among Emacs users. The results of the survey are discussed and were used to tailor a proposal for an improved undo support facility for Emacs. In order to test the adequacy of the proposal, it was subjected to an informal expert walk-through and a review of Emacs users opinions was conducted through a computer network. These evaluations are discussed and revisions to the proposal elicited. After the revised prototype of the design was implemented, a post-mortem evaluation was carried out and its results were incorporated in the final implementation.     

An Experiment on the Integration of Hypertext within a Multi-User Text Retrieval System

Currently, few hypertext systems allow an author to incorporate electronic textual information into a hyperdocument without first copying it from the environment in which it is stored. In order to extend a hyperdocument, an author must either manually type in the new information or import a copy of the text. To avoid this inconvenience and thus improve the user's efficiency of operation, hypertext systems must be integrated into other environments so that an author can incorporate existing text into a hyperdocument without the necessity of duplicating the text. This paper presents the results of an investigation into how hypertext could be integrated within a multi user text retrieval system and describes the design and implementation of a prototype system called Hyperbrowser.     

基于本体推理的终端用户数据查询构造方法

基于数据分析的智能决策对提升企业竞争力具有重要意义.根据待分析的问题，从内部信息系统的数据库中查询并获取与问题密切相关且信息完整的数据，是企业数据分析过程中的关键环节.基于本体的可视化数据查询系统为不掌握计算机专业技能的终端用户提供了高效获取数据的手段，近年来成为研究热点.然而现有工作仅采用简单的映射规则，将数据库中的表、字段、外键关系等元素直接映射为本体中的概念、属性和关系，向终端用户暴露了过多数据库设计的技术细节，增加了用户理解的难度，降低了系统的可用性.而通过人工编写映射规则来屏蔽数据库细节，既低效又缺乏通用性.针对这一问题，提出了一种基于推理的终端用户本体查询构造方法.该方法利用本体模型的语义表达能力和推理能力，在原有基于数据库简单映射所生成的本体模型基础上注入领域知识，从而优化查询构造流程，使终端用户得以从其更为熟悉的业务知识的视角，而非数据库设计的视角来看待和操纵数据，提高系统可用性；同时，增加了对分组统计的支持，扩展了方法的适用范围.最后，通过对"餐饮前台信息管理"领域真实案例的分析，验证了该方法相对于已有方法，其可用性提高了53.44%，表达能力提高了20.43%.     

Design for usability on supply chain management systems implementation

Supply chain management (SCM) systems implementation has become a fashion due to advances in information technology and pressures of market competition. Unfortunately, successful implementation was rare. In this article, the concept of usability was extended in an explorative case study to crystallize design for usability (DFU) principles in a large‐scale SCM systems implementation project at a leading semiconductor manufacturing company in Taiwan. Proposed was a holistic usability framework to guide the analysis of DFU as well as the compilation of an evidence database composed of design documentation, post hoc evaluation, semistructured interviews, and participant observation. This research revealed a set of usability needs and coping strategies found throughout a series of systems design and redesign processes at the case company. As a result, an emergent usability framework in the form of ICOM (Input, Control, Output, and Mechanism) dimensions was proposed to guide the implementation of SCM systems. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

An AGENDA for testing relational database applications

Database systems play an important role in nearly every modern organization, yet relatively little research effort has focused on how to test them. This paper discusses issues arising in testing database systems, presents an approach to testing database applications, and describes AGENDA, a set of tools to facilitate the use of this approach. In testing such applications, the state of the database before and after the user's operation plays an important role, along with the user's input and the system output. A framework for testing database applications is introduced. A complete tool set, based on this framework, has been prototyped. The components of this system are a parsing tool that gathers relevant information from the database schema and application, a tool that populates the database with meaningful data that satisfy database constraints, a tool that generates test cases for the application, a tool that checks the resulting database state after operations are performed by a database application, and a tool that assists the tester in checking the database application's output. The design and implementation of each component of the system are discussed. The prototype described here is limited to applications consisting of a single SQL query. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Investigating enterprise systems adoption: uncertainty avoidance,intrinsic motivation,and the technology acceptance model

Enterprise systems are gaining interest from both practitioners and researchers because of their potential linkages to organizational and individual user's productivity. Information systems (IS) researchers have been investigating the implementation and adoption issues of enterprise systems based on the organizational IS management perspectives. However, there are few papers that investigate enterprise systems management and implementation issues based on the informal control mechanisms, although the enterprise systems are control tools in the organization. Specifically, this paper applies Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) adoption and implementation to the informal controls, such as cultural control and self-control, which can be viewed as a tacit perspective in knowledge management. Uncertainty avoidance and perceived enjoyment are used as informal controls in the ERP implementation in this paper, and are linked to the technology acceptance variables to investigate the relationships among them. Sociotechnical design, organizational control mechanism, knowledge management, and individual motivation are reviewed to support this potential linkage in the model. Field data via the online survey of ERP systems user group (n=101) are analyzed with partial least squares and supported our hypotheses. Uncertainty avoidance cultural control and intrinsic motivation as self-control are the important antecedents of ERP systems adoption. Furthermore, the result helps the systems manager understand that informal controls should be applied to the ERP systems implementation to enhance tacit and social aspects of IS management.     

Testing the Boundaries of Two User-Centered Design Principles: Metaphors and Memory Load

This experiment examined how varying implementations of two user-centered design principles affected the usability of a computer program. Drawing from human-computer interaction, as well as cognitive psychology, the following principles were implemented and tested: maximizing use of the user's expectations and stereotypes and minimizing the user's memory load. Nine interfaces were created using Hypercard' s datebook program. On each interface, the graphics and text were manipulated according to the design principle and the related cognitive psychology research. A total of 108 people participated. Of the five hypotheses, only one was supported by the data. The data suggest that for less complicated programs and tasks, strict adherence to design principles may not be required.     

Formal Modeling and Reconfiguration of User Interfaces for Reduction of Errors in Failure Handling of Complex Systems

Controlling and observing complex systems is central to the study of human–machine interaction. In our understanding, there is much to be gained from integrating formal modeling and analysis, including the reconfiguration of user interfaces, with the development of user interfaces with high usability. To this end, we introduce a new approach to modeling and reconfiguration of user interfaces jointly with a newly developed set of tools for interactive and visual creation and automatic transformation of user interfaces' interaction logic to a formal language based on Petri nets. Reconfiguration will be embedded into a process for adapting user interfaces to the user's cognitive representation of the controlled system. This process involves practicing the use of a given user interface, adapting it to the user's needs through reconfiguration, and applying the resulting adaptations to the formally defined interaction logic. An evaluation study confirms that this process reduces errors in interaction.     

Supporting Roadmapping of Quality Requirements

Would slightly better performance be significantly more valuable from a market perspective? Would significantly better performance be just slightly more expensive to implement? When dealing with performance, usability, reliability, and so on, you often end up in difficult trade-off analysis. You must take into account aspects such as release targets, end-user experience, and business opportunities. At the same time, you must consider what is feasible with the evolving system architecture and the available development resources.Quality requirements are of major importance in the development of systems for software-intensive products. To be successful, a company must find the right balance among competing quality attributes. How should you balance, for example, investments for improved usability of a mobile phone's phone book and better mobile positioning? In the context of quality requirements, decision making typically combines market considerations and design issues in activities such as roadmapping, release planning, and platform scoping. Models that address requirements prioritization in a market-driven context often emphasize functional aspects. (For a comparison of other relevant techniques with Quper, see the sidebar.) Quper provides concepts for reasoning about quality in relation to cost and value and can be used in combination with existing prioritization approaches.