Usability for Pseudo-Techs

1. Usability for Pseudo-Techs Or… How to Not Try to Cater to Your Grandmother SCCC, ITC 200 Class

2. It’s all about me.. I have worked in product management and marketing for over 15 years I have done sales (yes, I can admit it) of large-scale technical products I am trained as an engineer and love design challenges I did own several pairs of bell bottoms back in the 70’s. SCCC, ITC 200 Class

3. The Vision for the iCEBOX: • A device specifically designed for the kitchen environment • A device that could • Inform • Entertain • Communicate (enable communication) • A UI that had to be a vast improvement on the PC experience • Avoid (like the plague) the moniker of …. “Internet Appliance” SCCC, ITC 200 Class

4. What was the design problem we wanted to solve? • The activities for life in the kitchen require some of the attributes of PC’s, but not most of them. • PC’s are a work in progress (even Mac’s) so we wanted to avoid their neg. aspects • We wanted to enhance the experience of a family in the kitchen. • We assumed a certain comfort with technology based on some of the familiar paradigms from the PC user experience • The kitchen has a “magic triangle” of activities: • The stove • The refrigerator • The sink SCCC, ITC 200 Class

5. A day in the life… • 6:00 AM – user turns on news; wants to know weather – how to dress kids • 6:30 Young child wants to watch Barney DVD • 7:00 Spouse checks traffic on Web • 7:15 Turn back to TV • 8:00 Check email / IM co-worker • 4:00 PM Parent gets home, tunes in Opra • 4:30 Parent puts in education DVD for homework time for kids • 5:00 Checks traffic – spouse will be late • 5:30 Checks recipe for dinner on Web • 5:45 Checks on baby upstairs via Monitor • 6:00 Spouse arrives, checks stocks • 6:30 Put on Classical CD while eating dinner SCCC, ITC 200 Class

6. Social Pressure and Mistakes • Gross generalization: Men focus on chipsets and Operating Systems; Women focus on “How can this make my life easier?” • We had to overcome the masculine aspects of the PC experience • Nimble operation vs. Raw processing power • Often-used features vs. “But can yours do this?!!” • Durability in the kitchen vs. the “High Alter of Geekdom” • If the errors could be undone or were NOT catastrophic, women would feel comfortable with this product. (And the guys would realize it was pretty cool too.) • Cannot infect with a virus • Most updates are behind the scenes • The browser is a simple version of IE5.5 SCCC, ITC 200 Class

7. “Error Tradeoff”? Our paradigm was new! Opportunity: To make the experience easier and faster than the PC Risk: When to deviate from learned behaviors (from PC usage) without causing errors SCCC, ITC 200 Class

8. Examples of Error Avoidance • Slip Error – Users told us they wanted touch screen, but they took a while to get use to it. (The product team started touching the screens of their PC’s.) – feedback was immediate {capture type?} • Slip Error - Color coding the KB and remote – errors common to TV / VCR usage. {mode type?} • Setting up a Internet connection – stepping back out, the way you came in - “OK” or “Cancel” [forcing function] – easy to “undo” • Keyboard buttons - TV vs. Monitor locations – is that my house or the latest episode of “The Sopranos”? [forcing function] SCCC, ITC 200 Class

9. Lessons Learned • It’s very hard to get usability right the first, second or third time. • For any design project, seek out and build bridges with competent, fun people. • Sometimes you have to go outside your company to get the usability testing you need (politics?). • All design is political. • Watch what users do, not what they say. • Use-based scenarios are a simple but powerful tool. • When dealing with users (especially consumers) look for the “wow” factors as THEY see them e.g. Monitor mode for iCEBOX. SCCC, ITC 200 Class

10. Thanks! SCCC, ITC 200 Class