Highly focused document retrieval in aerospace engineering : user interaction design and evaluation

Purpose – This paper seeks to describe the preliminary studies (on both users and data), the design and evaluation of the K-Search system for searching legacy documents in aerospace engineering. Real-world reports of jet engine maintenance challenge the current indexing practice, while real users’ tasks require retrieving the information in the proper context. K-Search is currently in use in Rolls-Royce plc and has evolved to include other tools for knowledge capture and management. Design/methodology/approach – Semantic Web techniques have been used to automatically extract information from the reports while maintaining the original context, allowing a more focused retrieval than with more traditional techniques. The paper combines semantic search with classical information retrieval to increase search effectiveness. An innovative user interface has been designed to take advantage of this hybrid search technique. The interface is designed to allow a flexible and personal approach to searching legacy data. Findings – The user evaluation showed that the system is effective and well received by users. It also shows that different people look at the same data in different ways and make different use of the same system depending on their individual needs, influenced by their job profile and personal attitude. Research limitations/implications – This study focuses on a specific case of an enterprise working in aerospace engineering. Although the findings are likely to be shared with other engineering domains (e.g. mechanical, electronic), the study does not expand the evaluation to different settings. Originality/value – The study shows how real context of use can provide new and unexpected challenges to researchers and how effective solutions can then be adopted and used in organizations.</p

An investigation into the application of Claims Analysis to evaluate usability of a digital library interface

There is a need for tools that help developers evaluate the usability of digital library interfaces. The potential for using Claims Analysis to help developers in this way has been investigated in three linked case studies. The first explored the design rationale of an existing design with its developers. This showed that they had considered positive consequences for novice uses but that they found it difficult to identify negative effects. The second study explored the detailed design of an add-on feature. A scenario and sample claims were introduced to evaluate exploratory use within an action cycle of planning, execution and evaluation. This framework provided an effective stimulus to enable the developers to evaluate the design and explore opportunities for redesign. Finally, some novice users explored the digital library and the findings from this were used to validate a user scenario and claims

Interoperability between Multimedia Collections for Content and Metadata-Based Searching

Artiste is a European project developing a cross-collection search system for art galleries and museums. It combines image content retrieval with text based retrieval and uses RDF mappings in order to integrate diverse databases. The test sites of the Louvre, Victoria and Albert Museum, Uffizi Gallery and National Gallery London provide their own database schema for existing metadata, avoiding the need for migration to a common schema. The system will accept a query based on one museum’s fields and convert them, through an RDF mapping into a form suitable for querying the other collections. The nature of some of the image processing algorithms means that the system can be slow for some computations, so the system is session-based to allow the user to return to the results later. The system has been built within a J2EE/EJB framework, using the Jboss Enterprise Application Server

THE ABSENCE OF IMPORTANT CAREWORDS AMONG UNIVERSITY WEBSITES: A PRELIMINARY STUDY ON WEB USABILITY

Most universities have a website with one of prevalent basic purpose is to provide an information to current and prospective students. The university web developers quite often neglect the process to incorporate customers’ voice during the development process, as suggested by the web usability, an area within humancomputer interaction (HCI) research. As many web users rely on a search engine to seek information, the inclusion of words that are most likely used by them (called carewords), in a web site are very critical. This paper aims to present a preliminary investigation of usability aspects in university websites, by focusing on the web content. This study applies Internet research methods. A simulation of a hypothetical case in which a prospective university student intends to study in Surabaya is performed. Search-words “kuliah di Surabaya”, “universitas di Surabaya”, and “kuliah teknik industri” are applied in Yahoo and Google search engines. The top 20 links obtained from each searching task are analyzed. Secondary data from EPSBED website was supplied to support the analysis. Furthermore, a content analysis using was conducted to selected websites of universities located in Surabaya. Overall, the findings emphasize that mismatch between the terms used by audiences and those presented in the web content could reduce the visibility of the website. Finally, this study suggests the university web developers to be more intensive applying usability principles to make their websites visible and accessible to potential students, as well as usable to other intended stakeholders

Access and usability issues of scholarly electronic publications

This chapter looks at the various access and usability issues related to scholarly information resources. It first looks at the various channels through which a user can get access to scholarly electronic publications. It then discusses the issues and studies surrounding usability. Some important parameters for measuring the usability of information access systems have been identified. Finally the chapter looks at the major problems facing the users in getting access to scholarly information through today's hybrid libraries, and mentions some possible measures to resolve these problems

Improving Usability of E-recruitment Website: A Preliminary Study on Sarawak Government Website

Presently, most organisations are already using e-recruitment to post jobs and accept resumes online where they also correspond with the applicants through e-mail. This paper proposes a framework for evaluating usability performance of e-recruitment websites. The evaluation mainly focuses on the Sarawak Government e-recruitment website (e-recruitment.gov.my). The usability criteria such as navigation that include hyperlinks, length of page, search engine and user location indication were assessed. Under page layout criteria, usage of colours and images, consistency and attractiveness were evaluated. The results found that these criteria are the key determinants of a successful erecruitment website. Since e-recruitment surpasses the traditional employees hiring methods, usability of the e-recruitment websites is vital to facilitate users in finding jobs effectively and efficiently