Interface Design Process

1. Interface Design Process Discovery Design Evaluation

2. Discovery • During the collection portion you will formally identify: • The people who are involved with the work • The things they use to do the work • The processes that are involved in the work • The information required to do the work • The constraints imposed on the work • The inputs required by the work • The outputs created by the work

3. Discovery Phase Framework

4. Exploring the Work Domain • Identify all stakeholders • The people that are involved either directly or indirectly in the work flow • The people who do the work • The people who manage the people who do the work • The people who are affected by the output of the work • The people who will benefit in some way from the work

5. Exploring the Work Domain • There are four types of stakeholders: • Primary—The person who uses the design directly • Secondary—The person who either supplies input or receives output from the design • Facilitator—The person who maintains or develops the design • Indirect—The person who is affected by the use of the design but has no contact with it, such as the user’s superior or coworkers and the client who is paying for the project (the client may or may not also be the primary stakeholder)

6. Exploring the Work Domain • The primary stakeholders should have the most impact on the eventual design. • A new system that is not designed to be integrated with the work that other people in the company do may cause needless disruptions All stakeholders should be considered during the design

7. Organizing the Discovery Process • What/How—What activities are involved and how are they accomplished? • This will include the documentation of the various computer-based and non–computer-based activities and deliverables. • Where/When—We need to understand the impact of physical location on the work flow. • Our design may involve changes to the physical location of the people who do the work • We also need to understand the temporal aspects of the work. • Are there any prerequisite activities, and, if so, in what order must they be completed?

8. Organizing the Discovery Process • Who/Why—We must understand: • Who is involved • Why they are involved • Their role in the present work flow • How they may respond to any changes implemented • These people are the stakeholders in the project.

9. Collection - Methods of Collection

10. Collection - Elicitation – Indirect - Questionnaires • Questionnaires are familiar • Questionnaires can contain open and closed questions • Questionnaires can include the following: • Mutually exclusive choices (radio buttons) • Non–mutually exclusive choices (checkboxes) • Ranges (overlapping, open-ended) • Scales (Likert scales, semantic differential scales) • Short-answer fill-ins • Comments

11. Collection - Elicitation – Indirect - Questionnaires • The following are guidelines for defining scales: • Identify the scale and the significance of the units • Use the most intuitive order • You can use positive or negative scales or a combination of the two • Use odd numbers when you want to allow neutral responses. • Use even numbers when you want to force a choice of positive or negative. • Provide a not applicable (NA) response when appropriate. • Do not use too many degrees within the scale; seven is considered a general limit. Likert scale.

12. Collection - Elicitation – Indirect - Questionnaires • Advantages of questionnaires: • They do not involve face-to-face contact and can be administered remotely. • They can be used to supply information for primary stakeholder profiles. • They can be used to ascertain whether proposed solutions will meet with acceptance as well as to elicit new ideas. • They can also be used to double-check the feedback obtained from one-on-one interviews. • They can reach a large audience with relatively little expense.

13. Collection - Elicitation – Indirect - Questionnaires • Disadvantages of questionnaires: • Vague questions will return ambiguous responses that will serve no useful purpose or the design. • People do not like to fill out long questionnaires. • Closed-ended questions can restrict responses. • Open-ended questions can be hard to quantify.

14. Collection - Elicitation – Indirect - Questionnaires • Guidelines for questionnaires: • Be consistent. • Phrase instructions clearly. • Speak the user’s language. • Avoid jargon or technical terms. • Order the questions beginning with the easy or less controversial ones. • Use logical grouping. • Avoid compound questions. • Use appropriate form elements, for example, radio buttons, checkboxes, and so on. • Use an appropriate scales for questions with discrete responses. • Avoid overlapping ranges. • Include a “None of the above” when appropriate. • Be sensitive to the balance of positive and negative questions

15. Research topics: • Experience w ms paint • Experience w / other paint progs • Purpose of use • Interface preferences • Demographics( age, gender, education) • Questions: • Have you used ms paint ? • if so how many years have you used ms paint? • Answer choices: 0-1,2-3,4+

16. What paint programs have you used ( circle all that apply ) • Ms paint • Gimp • Photoshop • Fireworks • Other, explain______________

17. Activity: Make a questionnaire • Make a questionnaire for your game • PURPOSE: get to know your end users (the people in this class) • At least 15 Questions for today • For milestone 1, you will likely need more. These should inform your • Stakeholder Profiles • Personas • DO NOT VIOLATE GUIDELINES FOR QUESTIONNAIRES

18. NEXT TIME: Activity: Answer Questionnaires • Everyone needs to answer a questionnaire. • Groups will trade. Then we will hand these back to the groups. • You can use these to discover useful information about your users (i.e., the other people in the class) • These will help to inform your stakeholder profiles and personas. • BRING 6 COPIES OF YOUR QUESTIONNAIRES FOR NEXT CLASS! • This will count toward your participation grade.

19. QUESTIONNAIRE REQUIREMENTS FOR MILESTONE 1 There is no requirement for the number of questions, but be anticipating filling in the information for your stakeholder profiles and personas, (which we will cover soon) DO NOT VIOLATE GUIDELINES FOR QUESTIONNAIRES (p119 in book)

20. Documentation • Requirements Document • Requirements • Functional • Information • Physical • Inputs/outputs • Constraints • This is similar to the project description

21. Interpretation – Use Cases • Use cases represent a formal, structured approach to interpreting work flows and processes • Designed to describe a particular goal and explore the interaction between users and the actual system components. • Jacobson et al. (1992) • Incorporated into the Unified Modeling Language (UML) standard.

22. Interpretation – Use Cases • The two main components of use cases are the actors and the use cases that represent their goals and tasks. • Actors: similar to stakeholders, but can also include other systems, networks, or software that interacts with the proposed system. • Use Cases: Each actor has a unique use case, which involves a task or goal the actor is engaged in. • Describe discrete goals that are accomplished in a short time period • Describe the various ways the system will be used and cover all of the potential functionality being built into the design

23. Interpretation – Use Cases Use case diagram of “schedule a meeting” process.

24. Interpretation – Use Cases • There may be diverse paths through a Use Case • Basic Path: The primary path through the use case is the one that is completed without any diversions from error conditions or extenuating circumstances • Alternate Path: Alternate paths test the exception-handling capabilities of the system. • They capture • premature termination of a process • choosing of a different method • possible error conditions

25. Interpretation – Use Cases • Scenarios: Each unique path through the use case is called a scenario. • Scenarios represent discrete instances that combine to create the complete use case. • They are the lowest level of the use case and should cover all conceivable paths and alternatives.

26. Example: Scenarios for ‘schedule a meeting’ • Basic path – coordinator books room and a/v equip. contacts team members and they reply, “ok” • Alt path 1: the a/v equipment is unavailable • Alt path 2: booking is ok, but team members don’t reply

27. Example: Flow of events • 1. coord. checks book and sends a group email • 2. coord checks email responses • 3. if no response, coord uses an alternate method • Instant messaging • Face to face • Phone • 4. Coord creates a list of available times • 5. Coord checks room schedule and reserves room • 6 checks a/v equip sign up sheet. • If a/v not available, alter room schedule (go back to step 5) • End Loop

28. Activity: Use Cases for your game • Design a Use Case for your game • For today, limit it to one or two scenarios • For the Milestone 1: you need all use cases for your entire project. • Directions: • Take a look back at your ‘Requirements Document” • 2. Draw a Use Case diagram • 3. Write out a ‘flow of events’

29. USE CASES REQUIRMENTS FOR MILESTONE 1 • Use cases • Multiple scenarios that include both primary and alternate paths • Include for each: • Diagrams • Flow of events

30. Interpretation - Primary Stakeholder Profiles • Primary Stakeholder Profiles are used to define the target user • The constructs covered include: • Context of use • Cognitive ability • Physical ability • Individual profile

31. Interpretation - Primary Stakeholder Profiles

32. Interpretation - Primary Stakeholder Profiles • Context of Use for a common office desktop system

33. Interpretation - Primary Stakeholder Profiles • The cognitive abilities of the target user affect the design • The cognitive abilities of the target user may be specific or more general • Describe situations where cognitive ability must be specific and where it is more general

34. Interpretation - Primary Stakeholder Profiles Domain expertise may not correlate with computer literacy

35. Interpretation - Primary Stakeholder Profiles • The human condition includes wide ranges of abilities • visual • auditory • haptic • Describe situations when physical ability will affect design

36. Interpretation - Primary Stakeholder Profiles • There are situations when personal user information is required • Describe some design situations that require personal information

37. STAKEHOLDERS REQUIREMENTS FOR MILESTONE 1 • Create stake holder profiles for your primary stakeholder(s). • THESE SHOULD BE BASED ON THE INFORMATION THAT YOUR QUESTIONNAIRE GATHERS • You don’t have to actually get people to answer all your questions, but make sure you cover all the information you need for your stakeholder profiles.