Developing and evaluating an interactive system for producing human-computer interfaces

The Author's Interactive Dialogue Environment (AIDE) of the Dialogue Management System is an integrated set of interactive tools for developing human-computer interfaces. AIDE is used by an interface specialist, called a dialogue developer, to implement an interface by directly manipulating and defining its objects, rather than by the traditional method of writing source code. This paper describes the structural dialogue transaction model upon which AIDE is based, describes the use of AIDE for developing human-computer interfaces, and describes an empirical study comparing use of AIDE with use of a programming language for implementing a human-computer interface. Results of this study empirically support, possibly for the first time, the claim that interactive tools for interface development, such as AIDE, can improve productivity and reduce frustration in developing interfaces over traditional programming techniques for interface development.