DESIGNING THE INTERACTION

AND A SOLUTION
Usability Engineering: Process,
Products, and Examples
Chapter 7

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DESIGN PROCESS IN USABILITY
ENGINEERING
 Design of Interaction
 Design of Interface
 Both design activities are driven by the specification and occur at a
high and low level.

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DESIGN OF INTERACTION

 Design of the interaction is concerned with the design

of the overall "look and feel" of the user interface and
the design of individual interactions.
 High-level design activities focus on the selection of an
interaction style and selection of the general pattern of
interaction.
 Low-level design activities focus on the design of individual
interactions.
 Design decisions include choice of content and
arrangement of menu options, selection of button
types, selection of background colors and so on.

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DESIGN OF THE INTERFACE

 Design of the interface is concerned with the

design of the actual software that will drive the UI.
 Designing the interface is really another software
design problem.
 High-level design activities include selecting an overall
architecture for the software (overall pattern of
procedure calls, assignment of workload and distribution
of communication).
 Low-level design activities include design of classes,
member functions, data structures and data members.

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INTERACTION STYLE

 An interaction style is how a user interacts with a

computer system.
 The concept of interaction style is central to our ability
to characterize and understand the diversity of
interactive systems.
 The categorization of a particular interface into a
particular style is often fuzzy.
 The appropriate choice of interface style depends on:
 the user
 the task

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MANIPULATION OF VISUAL
ELEMENTS INTERACTIONS
 Some of examples of interactions which include visual elements
are:
 Menu-based interactions
 Windowed interactions
 Form fill-in interactions
 Direct manipulation interactions

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CONVERSATIONAL
INTERACTIONS
 Some of examples of interactions which include conversational
elements are:
 Command-line interactions
 Natural language interactions
 Question-and-answer interactions

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MANIPULABLE AND COMBINATION
INTERACTIONS
 A variety of interactions do not fit the two previous categories.
These include:
 Haptic interactions
 Multimodal and multimedia interactions
 Virtual reality interactions
 Games interactions
 Interactions for mobile and handheld devices

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GENERAL DESIGN GUIDELINES

 Facilitate the development and use of workable mental models.

 Use meaningful analogies and metaphors.
 Avoid anthropomorphism.
 Minimize modal interactions.
 Reduce the cognitive (mental) workload on the user.
 Let the user be in control.

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FACILITATE THE DEVELOPMENT AND
USE OF WORKABLE MENTAL MODELS
 Present the interaction consistently across actions and
terminology.
 Allow the user to build a mental model of the system
based on the tasks that they actually perform with it
rather than what the system actually does.
 The interface should guide new users through normal
and reasonable patterns of usage.
 Use words and objects in the same ways throughout
the interface.
 Use clear landmarks and directions to enhance
“wayfinding”.

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USE MEANINGFUL ANALOGIES
AND METAPHORS
 Choose a concrete metaphor with limited interpretation.
 Choose a metaphor that is appropriate to the task and the user.
 For example, choose a familiar metaphor for novice or first-time
users.

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AVOID ANTHROPOMORPHISM

 The word anthropomorphism means to assign human

characteristics to an inanimate or non-human entity.
 Anthropomorphism is bad and should be avoided!

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MINIMIZE MODAL INTERACTIONS

 Modality is defined as a set of user actions that has a different

outcome in one context than in another.
 Avoid modal interactions.

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REDUCE THE COGNITIVE (MENTAL)
WORKLOAD ON THE USER
 When users develop mental models of systems, the
characteristics of the interface can influence their "cognitive" or
mental workload in constructing the model.

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REDUCING COGNITIVE
WORKLOAD
 Present options clearly and explicitly and avoid presentations
that include multiple reasonable interpretations.
 Avoid interface elements that attract the user’s attention away
from the meaningful elements.
 Reduce the number of cognitive transformations or translations
from the interface to the user’s mental model.

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 LET THE USER BE IN CONTROL

 Allow the user to accomplish tasks quickly and reliably.

 Allow users to try again.
 Allow users to recover from errors.
 Provide feedback.
 Accommodate users with different levels of expertise and
experience.

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CONCLUSIONS

 Once the problem that you are to solve has been

specified, your next job is to develop a design.
 The design process involves both the design of the
interaction and the design of the interface.
 Both of these design activities possess high-level
and low-level aspects.
 You can choose from many interaction styles.

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