From Hands-on Sessions to User Insights on Designing an Interactive System for Data Science

Our design research goal is to improve the user experience and effectiveness of an integrated IT solution for supporting the creative and collaborative Data Science (DS) life-cycle process. The work is being done as a Design Science Research (DSR) project, in real-life context. Within a fast-pace development environment, with scarce access to end-users, we combined hands-on sessions and semi-structured user interviews into a fast-forward design insights technique ([aka insightz]) to capture: i) people interests and expectations about the tool (leading to design improvements) and ii) stakeholders’ insights about the DS process itself (leading to process and business innovation). We propose these insightz workshops and the user research approach as a design technique to define and to communicate design principles and guidelines between different stakeholders, namely, UI/UX and engineering teams

Design rules and guidelines for generic condition-based maintenance software's Graphic User Interface

The task of selecting and developing a method of Human Computer Interaction (HCI) for a Condition Based Maintenance (CBM) system, is investigated in this thesis. Efficiently and accurately communicating machinery health information extracted from Condition Monitoring (CM) equipment, to aid and assist plant and machinery maintenance decisions, is the crux of the problem being researched. Challenges facing this research include: the multitude of different CM techniques, developed for measuring different component and machinery condition parameters; the multitude of different methods of HCI; and the multitude of different ways of communicating machinery health conditions to CBM practitioners. Each challenge will be considered whilst pursuing the objective of identifying a generic set of design and development principles, applicable to the design and development of a CBM system's Human Machine Interface (HMI). [Continues.

Enriching Requirements Analysis with the Personas Technique

A thorough understanding of the users that interact with the system is necessary to develop usable systems. The Personas technique developed by the human-computer interaction (HCI) discipline gathers data about users, gains an understanding of their characteristics, defines fictitious personas based on this understanding and focuses on these personas throughout the software development process. The aim of our research is to build Personas into systems development following software engineering (SE) guidelines. The benefits to be gained are an understanding of the user which is not traditionally taken into account in SE. To do this, we had to undertake two types of tasks. First, we modified the Personas technique to conform to the levels of systematization common in SE. We have called the modified technique PersonaSE. Second, we incorporated the proposed technique into the software requirements analysis proces

Design as conversation with digital materials

This paper explores Donald Schön's concept of design as a conversation with materials, in the context of designing digital systems. It proposes material utterance as a central event in designing. A material utterance is a situated communication act that depends on the particularities of speaker, audience, material and genre. The paper argues that, if digital designing differs from other forms of designing, then accounts for such differences must be sought by understanding the material properties of digital systems and the genres of practice that surround their use. Perspectives from human-computer interaction (HCI) and the psychology of programming are used to examine how such an understanding might be constructed.</p

Towards an activity-oriented design method for HCI research and practice

During the last two decades, designing for usability has been the focus of attention when developing computer systems. However, the dynamic nature of human use of computer systems has meant that designing for 'usefulness' or 'fitness for purpose' is increasingly becoming the primary concern for systems developers. Central to this concern are issues underpinned by the social context in which a computer user operates.Within the field of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), this situation led to a search for appropriate theories for conceptualising these design concerns. Whilst Activity Theory has been identified as a suitable framework for conceptualising these user perspectives, the lack of a standard methodology for applying it to HCI research and practice has meant that many systems developers have failed to benefit from the richness of this framework. The objective of this thesis was therefore to develop an Activity Theory based methodology for HCI research and practice. This thesis, contributes the `Activity-Oriented Design Methodology' (AODM) both as a practical and analytical methodology for using Activity Theory within HCI design. AODM incorporates four methodological tools namely:- The `Eight-Step-Model'- The `Activity Notation'- The technique of `Generating Research Questions'- The technique of `Mapping AODM Operational Processes'AODM tools were constructed from empirical work carried out as part of this research. Empirical analysis of work practices in two organisations was conducted for a period of two years using Activity Theory. This empirical work formed the basis for validating AODM. AODM tools support the systems design processes of gathering, analysing and communicating (through modelling) research and design insights from an Activity Theory perspective. It is argued that AODM provides a valuable practical and analytical methodology for operationalising Activity Theory within HCI so as to support early phases of systems design: namely, requirements capture and evaluation

Foregrounding accessibility for user experience design

textI am interested in creating generative tools and techniques for designing accessible user experiences for end users. As a user experience designer, I am working on embracing the web accessibility standards and guidelines and including them from the beginning of the User Experience (UX) design process. My projects are directed at facilitating design students and professionals to understand two things: that the broad concept of web accessibility is important, and how they can embed web accessibility into the UX design process at a very early stage. To do this, I used different media (website, posters and videos etc.) to create awareness and educate designers in an interesting, simple and engaging way. In this report, I will discuss the definition and role of accessible design, identify limitations in existing tools and methods, and demonstrate how future designers might research, prototype, analyze, and implement their designs for all users.Desig

User data spectrum theory: Collecting, interpreting, and implementing user data in organizations

Organizations interested in increasing their user experience (UX) capacity lack the tools they need to know how to do so. This dissertation addresses this challenge via three major research efforts: 1) the creation of User Data Spectrum theory and a User Data Spectrum survey for helping organizations better invest resources to grow their UX capacity, 2) a new UX method and model for organizations that want to capitalize on spoken words from end users called Rapid Meaningful Scenarios (RMS), and 3) a recommendation for UX education in response to the current ACM SIGCHI education Living Curriculum initiative. The User Data Spectrum work is based on 30 interviews and 110 survey responses from UX stakeholders across 120 companies. These data informed the theory as well as a factor analysis performed to identify the most relevant items in the User Data Spectrum survey. The Rapid Meaningful Scenarios methodology was developed based on iterative UX experience with a real-world organization and refined to aid UX professionals in creating structured results based on end users\u27 words. The UX education recommendation integrates experience with the HCI curriculum at Iowa State University and curriculum discussions within the SIGCHI community over the past 5 years. The overall contribution of this research is a set of tools that will enable UX professionals and organizations to better strategize how to increase their UX capacity