Crowdsourcing user interface adaptations for minimizing the bloat in enterprise applications

Bloated software systems encompass a large number of features resulting in an increase in visual complexity. Enterprise applications are a common example of such types of systems. Since many users only use a distinct subset of the available features, providing a mechanism to tailor user interfaces according to each user’s needs helps in decreasing the bloat thereby reducing the visual complexity. Crowdsourcing can be a means for speeding up the adaptation process by engaging and leveraging the enterprise application communities. This paper presents a tool supported model-driven mechanism for crowdsourcing user interface adaptations. We evaluate our proposed mechanism and tool through a basic preliminary user study

The mundane experience of everyday calorie trackers: Beyond the metaphor of Quantified Self

In this article, we build on the work of Ruckenstein and Pantzar (2015), who have demonstrated how our understanding of self-tracking has been influenced by the metaphor of the Quantified Self (QS). To complicate this very selective picture of self-tracking, we shift the focus in understanding self-tracking from members of the QS community to the experiences of ‘ordinary man and woman’ (Bakardjieva and Smith, 2001). We, therefore, interviewed ‘everyday calorie trackers’, people who had themselves started using MyFitnessPal calorie counting app but were not part of any tracking community. Our analysis identifies three main themes – goals, use and effect – which highlight the mundane side of self-tracking, where people pursuing everyday, limited goals engage in basic self-tracking and achieve temporary changes. These experiences contrast with the account of self-tracking in terms of long-term, experimental analysis of data on the self or ‘biohacking,’ which dominates the QS metaphor in the academic literature

Designing a user configurable online community framework

Content Management Systems (CMSs) are widely used to create online communities supporting organizations, classes, and groups. These communities provide various functionalities, e.g. discussion forums, shared repositories for documents and links, collaborative spaces, and different communication channels, like chat or instant messaging. Often the range of functionalities offered is unnecessarily rich, and some remain unused, leading to cluttered users’ workspaces and difficulties in finding information. Currently, communities that are developed with CMS do not allow user customization. Even for the community owner (e.g. a teacher, a group manager), it is hard to customize the functionality and interface of a community, because this requires some programming skills. I have designed new CMS allowing users of an online community (both owners and regular users) to design and configure their personal view of the community’s dashboard by adding the functionalities that are present in the community’s homepage and arranging them on the screen according to their preferences

Improving expertise-sensitive help systems

Given the complexity and functionality of today’s software, task-specific, system-suggested help could be beneficial for users. Although system-suggested help assists users in completing their tasks quickly, user response to unsolicited advice from their applications has been lukewarm. One such problem is lack of knowledge of system-suggested help about the user’s expertise with the task they are currently doing. This thesis examines the possibility of improving system-suggested help by adding knowledge about user expertise into the help system and eventually designing an expertise-sensitive help system. An expertise-sensitive help system would detect user expertise dynamically and regularly so that systems could recommend help overtly to novices, subtly to average and poor users, and not at all to experts. This thesis makes several advances in this area through a series of four experiments. In the first experiment, we show that users respond differently to help interruptions depending on their expertise with a task. Having established that user response to helpful interruptions varies with expertise level, in the second experiment we create a four-level classifier of task expertise with an accuracy of 90%. To present helpful interruptions differently to novice, poor, and average users, we need to design three interrupting notifications that vary in their attentional draw. In experiment three, we investigate a number of options and choose three icons. Finally, in experiment four, we integrate the expertise model and three interrupting notifications into an expertise-sensitive system-suggested help program, and investigate the user response. Together, these four experiments show that users value helpful interruptions when their expertise with a task is low, and that an expertise-sensitive help system that presents helpful interruptions with attentional draw that matches user expertise is effective and valuable.&#8195

Keinoja verkkokauppojen käytettävyyden parantamiseen. Tarkastelussa kolme sivustouudistusta.

Tutkimuksen tavoitteena oli selvittää, millä keinoin verkkokaupat voivat parantaa käytettävyyttään sivustouudistuksissa. Käytettävyyttä ja verkkokauppoja käsittelevien tutkimuksien perusteella luotiin tutkimukseen soveltuva käytettävyyden arviointimenetelmä, jota sovellettiin aineistoon tehdyissä käytettävyysarvioinneissa. Tutkimuksen aineistona käytettiin kolmea eri verkkokauppaa, jotka olivat Barnes & Noble, Musikhaus Thomann ja Verkkokauppa.com. Jokaisesta verkkokaupasta tutkittiin uusinta sivustouudistusta tekemällä käytettävyysarvioinnit ennen sivustouudistusta ja sivustouudistuksen jälkeen. Verkkokauppojen vanhoihin sivustoihin päästin käsiksi Wayback Machine -arkistointisivuston kautta. Wayback Machinen rajoitukset huomioitiin arviointimenetelmässä ja keskityttiin verkkokauppojen etusivuihin, tuoteluetteloihin ja tuotetietoihin. Käytettävyysarviointien avulla verkkokaupoista kartoitettiin käytettävyysongelmia ennen sivustouudistuksia ja sivustouudistusten jälkeen. Havaitut käytettävyysongelmat luokiteltiin niiden vakavuusasteen perusteella. Ongelmia ennen sivustouudistuksia löytyi yhteensä 26 ja sivustouudistusten jälkeen 14. Käytettävyysongelmien analysoinnilla selvitettiin, miten verkkokaupat ovat parantaneet käytettävyyttään ja miten korjaamattomat ja sivustouudistusten jälkeiset uudet ongelmat voitaisiin korjata. Vastauksena tavoitteeseen tutkimuksesta nousi esiin 19 erilaista keinoa parantaa verkkokauppojen käytettävyyttä sivustouudistuksissa. Keinojen tehokkuutta tarkasteltiin sen mukaan, kuinka vakavia käytettävyysongelmia ne korjasivat. Tehokkaimmat keinot liittyivät verkkokauppojen tuoteluetteloihin ja navigointipolkuun, josta käyttäjä näkee missä hän on verkkokaupassa. Tutkimuksen perusteella navigointipolun lisääminen korjaa vakavia käytettävyysongelmia ja tuoteluetteloihin tulisi olla pääsy jokaiselta sivulta. Tuoteluetteloiden tulisi olla järjestettävissä sekä rajattavissa ja ne tulisi sovittaa muiden sivujen taittoon ja ulkoasuun. Muita tehokkaita keinoja olivat asiakastuen tietoihin vievän linkin lisääminen jokaiselle sivulle, sivujen taiton jäsentäminen väliviivoilla ja värityksillä sekä pitkien tuoteryhmälistojen muuttaminen kaksiportaisiksi.fi=Opinnäytetyö kokotekstinä PDF-muodossa.|en=Thesis fulltext in PDF format.|sv=Lärdomsprov tillgängligt som fulltext i PDF-format

Positive expressive technologies for social wellness

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.Drawing on research from the fields of HCI, social and positive psychology, this thesis investigates the design of technologies that encourage the expression of positive emotions. In parallel, it details the deployment of effective design steps to guide, frame and eventually support understandings of positive mental and social usage effects of technology. Different artefacts termed PosiPost have been iteratively developed as exemplars for the discussion and exploration of the ways in which technologies can support positive communication and social sharing. Studies with these technologies have been conducted to explore how these can encourage positive communication and understand how they contribute to social wellness. Specifically, the studies undertaken validate the hypothesis that the sharing of positive emotions as mediated by technology has beneficial social and mental effects. The first stage of the research examined whether and how social technology can be designed for positive affect. A theoretical framework, named THE Medium model was developed to support the design process. Furthermore, design considerations were produced for technologies that encourage the sharing of positive emotions. This latter involved two studies, paper-based and online, which showed the potential for a prefixbased elicitation of positive emotions and drove the design and development of a mobile tool called PosiPost Me (Mobile edition). The second stage of the design process focused on how positive emotions can be mediated by technology in a mobile context and how such tools were used and understood. The iterative design study process continued, resulting in PosiPost Be, a Bluetooth edition, which allows sharing of positive messages with people in close proximity to explore the social and potential positive effects of contextualizing posiposting by adding location as a factor. Results suggest that by using a prefix-strategy, messages of a positive and mundane nature can be shared and mediated by mobile technology. Analysis of the shared messages provides insights into people’s pleasant moments in daily life. A questionnaire instrument named SPOT was developed and used for the measurement of the effects of sharing pleasant moments with the developed mobile expressive technologies in further detail. The results suggest that lightweight positive expressive technologies can have beneficial social wellness effects. In particular, the study showed significant beneficial effects in reducing depressed feelings and increasing social interest in others. Participants also believed that the mobile PosiPost applications supported social connectedness, socio-pleasure, social and positive awareness, and positive thinking

The Usability and Learnability of Pen/Tablet Mode Inferencing

The inferred mode protocol uses contextual reasoning and local mediators to eliminate the need to access specic modes to perform draw, select, move and delete operations in a sketch interface. This thesis describe an observational experiment to understand the learn- ability, user preference and frequency of use of mode inferencing in a sketch appli- cation. Novel methodology is presented to study both quantitative and long term qualitative facets of mode inferencing. The experiment demonstrated that participants instructed in the in- terface features enjoyed fluid transitions between modes. As well, interaction techniques were not self-revealing: Participants who were not instructed in interaction techniques took longer to learn about inferred mode features and were more negative about the interaction techniques. Over multiple sketching sessions, as users develop expertise with the system, they combine inferred mode techniques to speed interaction, and frequently make use of scratch space on the display to retrain themselves and to tune their behaviors. Lastly, post- task interviews outline impediments to discoverability and how performance is affected by negative perceptions around computational intelligence. The results of this work inform the design of sketch interface techniques that incorporate noncommand features