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Design Methods

Explore the effectiveness of prototyping by comparing different interface designs and evaluating the benefits of testing multiple prototypes. Investigate user feedback and the transition from ethnographic observations to iterative prototyping.

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Design Methods

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  1. Design Methods Kelly Nigh

  2. Prototyping Exercise • Split into groups of 2-3 and choose one of these interfaces (or another of your choice) • a new car display (including speedometer, odometer, etc.) • a new weather forecast display • a system that keeps track of a person’s prescription drugs • a new social networking site • a system to replace Stanford’s Axess • Individually, come up with a design and rapidly develop a prototype • use paper, scissors, colored pencils/markers, post-it notes • or another tool of your choice (i.e. Adobe Flash)

  3. Compare your prototypes. What can you learn from comparing a variety of designs?

  4. Getting the Right Design and the Design Right: Testing Many Is Better Than OneMaryam Tohidi, William Buxton, Ronald Baecker, Abigail Sellen (2006) “…Help the designers in selecting the right design, before proceeding with getting the design right.”

  5. Evaluation of One Prototype vs. Multiple Prototypes • Three prototypes of same system (House Climate Control System) • Research subjects split into four groups • Evaluate only prototype #1 • Evaluate only prototype #2 • Evaluate only prototype #3 • Evaluate all three prototypes • Hypotheses • Evaluating multiple prototypes will yield… • Lower overall score for each prototype • More negative, less positive comments • More suggestions for improvement

  6. Results • Subjects who evaluated only one prototype (in comparison to those who evaluated all three)… • gave it an overall higher score (for all three cases, but results significant in only 2/3) • gave more positive and less negative comments • provided the same number of suggestions for improvement • but also tended to give more superficial suggestions

  7. (Results similar for other two prototypes)

  8. “Perhaps the focus in usability testing should remain in detecting errors, not soliciting ideas.” Do you agree? Can untrained users provide good ideas, or is a background in design necessary to make valid suggestions?

  9. Other questions based on class critiques…

  10. Reinventing the Familiar: Exploring an Augmented Reality Design Space for Air Traffic ControlWendy E. Mackay, Anne-Laure Fayard, Laurent Frobert and Lionel Medini (1998) Revisit a question from ethnography discussion:How do you bridge the gap between collecting information and coming up with a design?

  11. Reinventing the Familiar: Exploring an Augmented Reality Design Space for Air Traffic ControlWendy E. Mackay, Anne-Laure Fayard, Laurent Frobert and Lionel Medini (1998) Revisit a question from ethnography discussion:How do you bridge the gap between collecting information and coming up with a design? Ethnographic study Brainstorm/Prototype Evaluate

  12. Results of Ethnography • Controller routine: constantly checking that planes on radar correspond with flight strips • Strips as mental representation: controller keeps an active picture of planes’ current states in mind • Layout of flight strips • Physical act of writing to remember changes • Communication between controllers: physical, non-verbal interactions that indicate different levels of urgency

  13. Prototype design • Goal: provide support for communication • Keep strips, as they fulfill controller’s needs • Digitized version of strip • Main needs: • capture information from strips • graphics tablet with pen input, touch-sensitive screen, video camera • track location of strips • video camera, stripboard that detects resistance in strip holders • present information onto strips • video projector, computer monitor or LCD screen, touch-sensitive screen

  14. Evaluation • Process • Present scenarios based on observations made during ethnographical study • “Wizard of Oz” techniques • Iterative design • Based on observations, make changes to prototype and reevaluate • Findings • Need for evolution (i.e. set of annotations) • Simplicity, mental representations important

  15. End Result • “Interaction browser” • Controllers can experiment with different types of annotations • Conclusion: • “Physical objects play an important role in cooperative work and automation efforts that get rid of them risk losing important aspects of the interface.” • Solution: some combination of automation and physical representation that leverages benefits of each

  16. Did this paper succeed in demonstrating the transition from ethnographic observations to iterative prototyping? Was it lacking?

  17. Did the researchers really try different designs, or just iterations on the same design? By taking the results of an ethnographic study into account, is a designer restricting the design space too greatly?

  18. Other questions based on class critiques…

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