Overview of 203CR Term 2

Comparative Analysis of Hi and Lo fidelity Prototypes for more valid evaluations of mobile devices

Reading Exercise Block 4, Week 3

The following shows that I have skim read through "Comparative Analysis of High and low fidelity Prototypes for more valid usability evaluation of mobile devices". I have skim read this paper i n 45 to 60

Problems authors discussed concerning evaluation of prototypes

- Validation of low -fidelity prototyping test results test is difficult, because they cannot claim whether the results are the effect of prototype itself or the essence of the design concept they try to evaluate.
- Will cost too much to implement a fully functional prototype and there is no stabilized consensus.
- The evaluation process is more complicated and unpredictable, especially if a low fidelity prototyping technique is being used. Reason is that is is harder to claim whether the evaluation findings are originated by the actual concept of the system of by the innate characteristics of the prototype.
- Low fidelity approaches like paper prototyping are insufficient to precisely capture interactivity.
- Found it difficult to claim the scientific validity of the test results.
- The validation of prototype based evaluation results would not be possible, if they used a wrong prototyping technique apropos to the evaluation goal.
- The needed to select a product that is not too complicated but has critical aspects of mobile computing products.
- One the most important issues that they had to go back on was the cost, which they had to check how costly each prototyping technique would be.
- Each different prototyping technique can reveal the same kind of usability problems.
- Using one prototyping techniques would not discover all the possible problems.

The following shows the main recorded actions as usability problems during the testing sessions:

1. Users push a wrong key (button).
2. Users explicitly express problems in their think aloud protocols and gestures.
3. Users repeat the action they already completed in order to check if they did right or not.

Benyon, Benyon and Turner Designing Interactive Systems (Course text) 56 - 75)

The following shows that I have have completed a reading exercise. By reading through Designing Interactive System by Benyon and Turner, which was pages from 56 to 75.
I have made bullet points on main points when I was speed reading through. I was mainly focusting on desging principles and synthesis, which these invovled describing how two of the design principles relate to the usability heuristics.


Broad Reading
I have speed read the material in about 55 minutes, which I did not spend longer on it in order to get more practice and feel on the speed reading exercise.

The following are the main 6 bullets points that I came up with:

• Design principle and websites, in terms of Navigation around a website enable people to discover the structure and content of a specific site and how to find their way to a particular part of the site is a key issue.
• Interactive system design is different in different contexts and on different technological platforms.
• Achieving a balance of usability between four principle factors of human-centred interactive system design, PACT- people, activities, context and technologies.
• The 12 main design principles which are visibility, consistency, familiarity, navigation, affordance, control, feedback, recovery, constraints, flexibility, style and conviviality.
• Key features of acceptability are political, convenience, cultural and social habits, usefulness and economic.
• The 12 design principles allow designers to evaluate design ideas. Therefore design principles 1-4 are concerned with access and learnability, principles 5-7 concerned with ease of use, principles 8-9 concerned with safety, principles 10-12 accommodating differences between people.

Main points of Broad reading

• Designing for windows are the usability techniques windows used so that there product covered all users.
• Pact analysis which helps in usability design. The designer can concentrate on the main points of the pact analysis which are people, context, activities and technologies so that they cover all aspect of designing for usability so there product or software is a success because it covered all the main points.
• The 12 main design principles which are visibility, consistency, familiarity, navigation, affordance, control, feedback, recovery, constraints, flexibility, style and conviviality.

Focussed reading

The following shows that I have found the Design Principles section. Identified the design principles and defined each in my own words.

1.) Visibility: Meaning the key common and key features are visible to the user. For example all the righ buttons and links on site are on the right place for the user, avoiding the activity of looking around for them.

2.) Consistency: Meaning that every page has the same style layout. For example a website not having the home page blue with different buttons and the next yellow with different buttons. To let the user to be not confused.

3.) Familiarity: Using common and known symbols including languge. This will allow the user to recornise the symbol or sign and know what it means straight away. Eg: On a webpage, an icon showing a picture of a house to illutrate that it goes to homw.

4.) Affordance: Meaning that the design has to be designed clearely for the purpose of whats its outcome should be.

5.) Navigation: Meaning that support is provided to the user, in terms of enabling them to go through the website in and out without having any problems. This also means enabling users to go forward and backwards to any specific page that they want.

6.) Control: Specifying and making it clear that who is in control and what is in control. Therefore allowing the user to take control, mostly the navigation.

7.) Feedback: Meaning that in case of an error message, there systems needs to have an alternative or how this can be resolved. Therefore allowing the user to fix any mistakes that has be done.

8.) Recovery: This also relates to the feedback, which means that if there is an error or mistake there should be recovery action that will put back the settings to what it was previousely.

9.) Contraints: Meaning that a prevention is made by including a contraint in the system. This will restrict users to not do things that they are not supposed to do, therefore protecting the users.

10.) Flexibility: Meaning the systems or navigation allowing the user to have different options in doing a task (Alot of choices).

11.) Style: Meaning that the design should gain the users interests, in terms of be attractive and having interesting features.

12.) Conviviality: Meaning that the interactive systems should have a jovial nature. In other words easy going and friendly.

Synthesis:

The following shows that I have described 2 design principles ,which relate to any of the usability Heuristics I have studied in Block 3, lectures 2.

Two design Heuristic chosen:
1. Error prevention - comparing with consistency and feedback
2. Visibility - comparing with consistency and feedback

Error prevention
In terms of error prevention and consistency of a website. A user can know and have a feel that they are on the same website by having the consistency in different pages of the website (Eg: Colours, buttons, navigation menu etc). Error prevention will also provide an effort in allowing the users to avoid an hugh mistakes being done.

Visibility
Visibility is one of the important Heuristic in designing, which provides the user with information on what is taking place through appropriate feedback. Therefore allowing the user to get relevant feedback when something is not done right. This heuristic evaluation goes with the design principle feedback because they both allows users to correct their mistakes therefore it wont leave users confused.

Benyon, Turner and Turners Desigining Interactive Systems: Page 51-77

Block 4, Week 1: Reading Exercise

The following exercise shows that I have:

1. Read the course text in Benyon, Turner and Turners Designing Interactive Systems: Page 51-77.

2. Skimmed read in 60 minutes, which I have also noted down all the design principles I found.

3. In my list of design principles noted. I created two 'clusters' of the principles. (Meaning: a list of two or more principles that seem to be talking about the same thing.

4. Explained each 'cluster', in terms of how the principles are similar and any ways they are different.

Design principles I have found out:

• Conviviality
• Usability
• Consistency
• Flexibility
• Accessibility
• Style
• Navigation
• Acceptability
• Constraints
• PACT
• Affordance
• Feedback

Clusters A compared to Cluster

Cluster A

Usability
Style
Navigation
Consistency
Accessibility
Flexibility

The Design Principles I have mentioned above are similar because the all include and involve the how the users needs are met in a designed system. The also include how the user interacts with the system at hand.
The only thing that makes them different is of each specific category that they have to specify in designing.

Cluster B

Conviviality
Acceptability
Constraints
PACT
Affordance
Feedback

The similarities on the above Design Principles are that they are guidelines the designers following in order to make a successful design for the user. They also a user to a form of restrictions enabling them to not to what they not supposed to do. In one way that they differ is the is the approaches that each contains.

Rapid Prototyping for Ubiquitous Computing

Excercise:

As an excercise the following shows that I have:

1. Printed off "Rapid Prototyping for Ubiquitous Computing" at
http://csdl2.computer.org/comp/mags/pc/2005/04/b4015.pdf

2. Skimed read this in 30 minutes max.

3. Taken down notes while reading, which this notes were based on approaches to prototyping.

4. Made comments on how they differe to prototyping websites.

Prototypes I have found:

The prototypes that I found out by reading the Rapid Prototyping for Ubiquitous Computing articles was each stage in prototyping. For example: low fi, mid fi and hi -fi.
For each of these I have found out useful and relevant information, which for low - fidility I found sketches, for mid fidility prototype I found out the Wizard of Oz techniques in creating the ubicomp.
The difference in prototyping websites to Ubiquitious computing is that