Auditing spreadsheets: With or without a tool?

Spreadsheets are known to be error-prone. Over the last decade, research has been done to determine the causes of the high rate of errors in spreadsheets. This paper examines the added value of a spreadsheet tool (PerfectXL) that visualizes spreadsheet dependencies and determines possible errors in spreadsheets by defining risk areas based on previous work. This paper will firstly discuss the most common mistakes in spreadsheets. Then we will summarize research on spreadsheet tools, focussing on the PerfectXL tool. To determine the perceptions of the usefulness of a spreadsheet tool in general and the PerfectXL tool in particular, we have shown the functionality of PerfectXL to several auditors and have also interviewed them. The results of these interviews indicate that spreadsheet tools support a more effective and efficient audit of spreadsheets; the visualization feature in particular is mentioned by the auditors as being highly supportive for their audit task, whereas the risk feature was deemed of lesser value.Comment: 15 Pages, 2 Tables, 8 Colour Figure

An ethnographic study of distributed problem solving in spreadsheet development

In contrast to the common view of spreadsheets as “single-user ” programs, we have found that spreadsheets offer surprisingly strong support for cooperative development of a wide variety of applications. Ethnographic interviews with spreadsheet users showed that nearly all of the spreadsheets used in the work environments studied were the result of collaborative work by people with different levels of programming and domain expertise. Cooperation among spreadsheet users was spontaneous and casual; users activated existing informal social networks to initiate collaboration

Prediction of menu selection times parked and while driving using the SAE J2365 method

Nissan Motor Company, Ltd., Technical Center North America, Farmington Hills, Mich.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/1346/2/94536.0001.001.pd

Factors Which Influence Key Entry Speed On Hard and Soft Keyboards: Experience, Eye Behaviors and Finger Movements

Soft keyboards have become ubiquitous, especially with the introduction of the iPad. This study aims to determine for experienced touch typists whether there are characteristics of soft QWERTY keyboards that can make them easier to use and why those characteristics provide an advantage. Two characteristics would appear to be of central importance. First, hard keyboards provide home row positioning information that is not as easily provided by soft keyboards. Second, hard keyboards also provide auditory and tactile feedback when a key is depressed, something not generally provided with soft keyboards. In order to test the hypothesis that the absence of home row positioning and key strike feedback information can reduce expert touch typists’ speeds on soft keyboards, expert touch typists were run in two experiments. In Experiment 1, soft and hard keyboards in landscape and portrait mode were evaluated. The hard keyboards had the standard home row positioning and key strike feedback whereas the soft keyboards had neither. If these are important elements in typing speed, then experienced hard keyboard typists should type less quickly when using soft keyboards than when using hard keyboards. Moreover, if reducing the footprint of the keyboard, from landscape to portrait, requires more eye movements, then typists using both hard and soft keyboards should be slower when using the portrait size keyboard than when using the landscape size keyboard. Perhaps not surprisingly, experienced hard keyboard touch typists do less well when entering information on soft keyboards without home row positioning information or auditory feedback. Moreover, both groups appear to type more slowly in keyboards laid out in a portrait format than they do in keyboards laid out in a landscape format. In summary, the results from Experiment 1 suggest that both home row positioning information and auditory key strike feedback should speed performance. In Experiment 2, an attempt was made to determine just how much of a gain can be made in the typing speed of more experienced soft keyboard users if home row positioning information (tactile feedback), auditory feedback, or both are added. Participants were run in four conditions: auditory key strike feedback (with and without) was crossed with tactile home row positioning information (with and without). Participants included expert level hard keypad QWERTY touch typists who have had at least five hours’ typing experience with an iPad. Participants were given four passages to type, all of equal length and all balanced for letter frequency. Participants typed one passage in each of the four conditions. The passage sequence was counterbalanced across participants. Typing speeds for each of the passages was measured and averaged across participants within conditions. A repeated measures analysis of variance was used to determine whether there was a main effect of position or feedback. In order to determine why it is that home row positioning and key strike feedback alters performance, eye behaviors, movement times and task completion times are calculated. If home row position information is important, soft keyboards without this information may have a larger number of glances that a typist directs at the keyboard. These glances will help the typist determine either whether a finger is positioned over the correct home key (the launch key) or whether the location of the key to be typed next (the target key) is in the expected position. If key strike feedback is important, soft keyboards without this information should have longer movement times where the typists do not need to glance at the keyboard. This follows since the typist will process less quickly the fact that a finger has landed on a key. Key press and key release times will be included each time a character, number or spacebar is depressed or releases. The finger movement time between any pair of keys i and j will be derived from the key press and key release times. This time will be measured from the moment the finger leaves the launch key i until the moment that the finger arrives at the target key j. Task completion times were defined as the difference between the first key press in a passage and the last key release. Finger movement times, inter-keystroke intervals and task completion times were recorded using a program developed in JAVA 2SE. Eye movements are recorded with aid of an ASL Mobile EYE tracker. Analyses of the finger movement times and task completions times in Experiment 2 indicated that participants were fastest when both position information and auditory feedback were included. When just finger movement times are considered, there was a significant effect of auditory feedback but not of positioning information. This was what was expected given that the speed of finger movement times is arguably largely a function of how quickly a typist perceives that a movement has been completed, something that auditory feedback, but not positioning information provides. When just the task completion times were analyzed, position information had a significant effect. The effect of auditory feedback was only marginally significant. It was expected that both factors would be significant. Perhaps the power was too small. Finally, when the eye movements were analyzed, the total scanning time was shortest when both position information and auditory feedback were available. The effects of both were statistically significant. In summary, on the basis of the results from Experiment 1 it appeared likely that auditory feedback and positioning information accounted in part for the faster typing times of touch typists on hard keyboards as opposed to soft keyboards. In Experiment 2, this hypothesis was evaluated. Finger movement and task completion times were fastest when both auditory feedback and positioning information were present. The effect of auditory feedback appeared to impact only the finger movement times. The effect of both auditory feedback and positioning information appeared to impact the task completion times. However, the effect of auditory feedback on task completion times was only marginal. Finally, it was clear that much of the reduction in task completion times occurred because the time that the touch typists spent scanning the keyboard was smaller when both auditory feedback and positioning information was available. It is recommended in the future that soft keyboards have both sets of feedback available, auditory (through simulated key clicks) and tactile (through home row positioning information). The gains in typing speed with these additions were models (about 10%), considered over the entire population of users the impact could be considerable

Developing a library of display effects on pilot performance: Methods, meta-analyses, and performance estimates

The design of NextGen and current-day cockpit displays are critical for efficient pilot performance and situation awareness on the flight deck. Before deployment of a design into the cockpit the costs and benefits that a display design imposes on performance and situation awareness should be considered. In this thesis, a design tool was developed to support the design of NextGen displays for situation awareness and performance. This design tool is a library of pilot performance estimates. Through literature reviews and meta-analyses of empirical data, the library was developed to provide display designers 1) qualitative distinctions of display properties that either support or limit full situation awareness, and 2) quantitative performance time estimates until situation awareness as a function of various display formats. A systematic method was also developed for future augmentation of the library

Strategy-based instruction: Lessons Learned in Teaching the Effective and Efficient Use of Computer Applications

________________________________________________________________________ Numerous studies have shown that many users do not acquire the knowledge necessary for the effective and efficient use of computer applications such as spreadsheets and web-authoring tools. While many cognitive, cultural, and social reasons have been offered to explain this phenomenon, there have been few systematic attempts to address it. This article describes how we identified a framework to organize effective and efficient strategies to use computer applications, and used an approach called strategy-based instruction to teach those strategies over five years to almost 400 students. Controlled experiments demonstrated that the instructional approach (1) enables students to learn strategies without harming command knowledge, (2) benefits students from technical and non-technical majors, an

Strategy-based instruction: Lessons Learned in Teaching the Effective and Efficient Use of Computer Applications

________________________________________________________________________ Numerous studies have shown that many users do not acquire the knowledge necessary for the effective and efficient use of computer applications such as spreadsheets and web-authoring tools. While many cognitive, cultural, and social reasons have been offered to explain this phenomenon, there have been few systematic attempts to address it. This article describes how we identified a framework to organize effective and efficient strategies to use computer applications, and used an approach called strategy-based instruction to teach those strategies over five years to almost 400 students. Controlled experiments demonstrated that the instructional approach (1) enables students to learn strategies without harming command knowledge, (2) benefits students from technical and non-technical majors, an

Testing the reliability of predictive models on three different devices

Nowadays, the first sources of information are websites on the Internet with its categories. Some users find certain websites’ layout and design not always user friendly. This may lead to poor performance, ambiguity and loss of potential customers. Websites designs’ use the principles of user interface (UI) laws and usability guidelines to be consistent and convenient to users. Due to the evolution of technology, society now uses various devices with a wide range of features like screen size, in order to obtain their information. Examples include personal computers (PC), smartphones (SP,) and tablets (TB). Since user interface laws were founded in the 20th century and most were applicable for the PC’s websites, this thesis tests and investigates the reliability of predictive models on three devices: PC, SP and TB. User interfaces were designed with five tasks, and each task represented one of the user interface laws. Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) techniques, user interface design and evaluation methods were followed to test the reliability of predictive models on different devices.Master of Science (MSc) in Computational Scienc

Development of a construction methodology of goal directed, optimal complexity, flexible and task oriented (GOFT) training materials for novice computer users: application and evaluation in adults with mental health problems

A number of information technology schemes have been developed in order to provide people with mental health problems the opportunity to acquire skills in micro-computer technology. Even though positive results have been reported a high incidence of dropouts during the beginning of the training have been found. The research is based on the assumption that in order for a computer training method to be effective in fostering computer skills and confidence to adult novice users with mental health problems has to: (a) bridge the gap between the user's capacities, needs, and preferences and the demands of the computer interfaces and their real task applications; (b) consider the ways adult novice users prefer to learn and the skill acquisition theories; (c) facilitate a goal directed interaction with the computer system; (d) maintain an optimal complexity level across training; and (e) allow flexibility of use. Based on the relevant literature, a methodology model and a set of design propositions and construction guidelines have been derived and have been implemented for the development of Goaldirected, optimal complexity, Flexible & Task oriented (GOFT) training materials for adult, novice users with mental health problems. The GOFT training materials were based on three different models, the one for the creation of a goal directed instruction format and the other two for the organisation of the training, and the estimation of the difficulty level of each new computer operation or real task application. Evaluation of use of the GOFT Training Materials by 34 adult, novice users (aged 18-51) with mental health problems revealed positive results. More specifically, the use of the GOFT training materials as compared to traditional methods resulted in a significant increase in the number of participants at the different training stages (85.3% versus 47.2%; and 44.5% versus 22.2% at three and twelve months respectively), in perfect & regular attendance rate ( 44,12% versus 11.11% & 32.35% versus 16.67%) and in the performance level (means of 3.75 versus 2.67) of the users. The subjective evaluation by the users also revealed significant differences between the GOFT and traditional training materials. In their evaluation the GOFT materials were rated significantly higher in terms of systematic arrangement, personal affect, understandability, task relevance, fitness, sense of control, confidence in using the mastered functions and in supporting goal directed learning approach