Beginners Performance with MessagEase and QWERTY

With the increased use of mobile phones, interest in text entry with them has also amplified. Many new mobile phones are equipped with a QWERTY keypad; new methods to surpass the QWERTY performance are also being developed. This thesis compares user performance of virtual QWERTY keypad to MessagEase. MessagEase uses 9 keys and can therefore be used even on very small touch displays. 9 characters are entered with tapping and the rest with a tap-and-slide gesture. An experiment was conducted with 10 participants transcribing text with both text entry techniques. The experiment consisted of three sessions. In each session, the participants transcribed 30 phrases in total - 15 phrases using each text entry technique. Responses to the System Usability Scale (SUS) for each text entry technique and informal interview data were also collected. From a Repeated-measures analysis of variance a significant effect of the text entry method on text entry rate was seen (F1,19= 47.140, p < 0.0001). The effect of the session (i.e. learning) was also statistically significant (F2,18= 3.631, p = 0.047).The interaction of the session and method was also statistically significant (F2,18= 10.286, p = 0.001) indicating different learning rates. Average text entry speed with MessagEase was 7.43 words per minute (wpm) in the first session and 10.96 wpm in the third session. Likewise, text entry speed with the QWERTY soft keyboard was 17.75 wpm in the first session and 17.16 wpm in the third session. No significant difference was found in the error rates. Keywords: text entry method, MessagEase, QWERT

The Effect of Mobile phone’s User Interface Configurations on User Comfort

Mobile phone consists of some input elements as its user interfaces for example keypad and navigator. Shape, layout, and dimension of the input elements determine the user interface configuration of mobile phone. The configuration of user interface may influence user comfort in using mobile phone. For that reason, it is important to understand the effect of various mobile phone’s user interface configurations to user comfort. This research investigates the effect of mobile phone’s user interface configurations on user comfort. First, this research collects some data related to shape, layout, and dimension of keypad and navigator of available mobile phones. Then, the data are synthesized to develop various alternatives of user interface configurations. Finally, a survey is conducted to investigate the effect of the developed configurations on user comfort. A questionnaire is spread among the user of QWERTY mobile phone as a survey. The result of the survey shows that some configurations are not preferred by the users because it is not comfortable according to them. However, the configurations that accommodate tight distance and square keypad with trackpad navigator provide the highest level of user comfort

User interface design guidelines for digital television virtual remote controls

The remote control is a pivotal component in households worldwide. It helps users enjoy leisurely television (TV) viewing. The remote control has various user interfaces that people interact with. For example, the physical user interface includes the shape of the remote and the physical buttons; the logical user interface refers to how the information is laid out; and the graphical user interface refers to the colours and aesthetic features of the remote control. All of the user interfaces together with the context of use, cultural factors, social factors, and prior experiences of the user influences the ways people interact with their remote control and ultimately has an effect on their user experiences. Advances in the broadcasting sector and transformations of the TV physical remote control have compounded the simple remote control into a multifaceted, indispensable device, overcrowded with buttons. The usability and ultimately the user experience of physical remote controls (PRCs) have been affected by the overloaded functionality and small button sizes. The usability issues with current PRCs, the evolution of mobile phones into touchscreen smartphones, and the trend of global companies moving towards virtual remote controls (VRCs) have prompted this research to discover what user interface design features will contribute towards an enhanced user experience for digital TV VRCs. This research used the design science research process model (DSRP), which comprised six steps, to investigate this topic area further. A review of the domain literature pertaining to mobile user experiences (MUX) and all the encompassing factors, mobile human computer interaction (MHCI) and the physical, logical, graphical and natural user interfaces was completed, as well as a review of the literature regarding the usability issues of PRCs and VRCs. A contextual task analysis (CTA) of a single South African digital TV PRC was used to identify how users utilise PRCs to perform tasks, and the usability issues they encountered during the tasks. Brainstorming focus groups were used to understand how to represent certain user interface elements and attempted to source ideas from users about what potential functionality digital TV VRCs should contain. Together with all the other results gathered from the previous chapters amalgamated into a set of user interface design guidelines for digital TV VRCs. The proposed user interface guidelines were used to instantiate a digital TV VRC prototype that underwent usability testing in order to validate the proposed user interface design guidelines. The results of the usability testing revealed that the user interface design guidelines for digital TV VRCs were successful, with the addition of one guideline that was discovered during the usability testing

Design and semantics of form and movement (DeSForM 2006)

Design and Semantics of Form and Movement (DeSForM) grew from applied research exploring emerging design methods and practices to support new generation product and interface design. The products and interfaces are concerned with: the context of ubiquitous computing and ambient technologies and the need for greater empathy in the pre-programmed behaviour of the ‘machines’ that populate our lives. Such explorative research in the CfDR has been led by Young, supported by Kyffin, Visiting Professor from Philips Design and sponsored by Philips Design over a period of four years (research funding £87k). DeSForM1 was the first of a series of three conferences that enable the presentation and debate of international work within this field: • 1st European conference on Design and Semantics of Form and Movement (DeSForM1), Baltic, Gateshead, 2005, Feijs L., Kyffin S. & Young R.A. eds. • 2nd European conference on Design and Semantics of Form and Movement (DeSForM2), Evoluon, Eindhoven, 2006, Feijs L., Kyffin S. & Young R.A. eds. • 3rd European conference on Design and Semantics of Form and Movement (DeSForM3), New Design School Building, Newcastle, 2007, Feijs L., Kyffin S. & Young R.A. eds. Philips sponsorship of practice-based enquiry led to research by three teams of research students over three years and on-going sponsorship of research through the Northumbria University Design and Innovation Laboratory (nuDIL). Young has been invited on the steering panel of the UK Thinking Digital Conference concerning the latest developments in digital and media technologies. Informed by this research is the work of PhD student Yukie Nakano who examines new technologies in relation to eco-design textiles

User Evaluation of Mobile Browser Features Related to Information Retrieval

Technological advancements in mobile technologies, improved network coverage, and cheaper data plans have led to an increase in internet browsing via mobile phone. Improvements such as bigger screen sizes, higher resolutions, and touchscreens have led to a better browsing experience compared with when mobile browsing first emerged. Most of the research concerning mobile browsing seems to focus on website design for smaller screen displays, with very limited research done on the design and functionality of mobile web browsers themselves. Due to the physical constraints and small display screens, the user interface needs to be designed so that users can perform tasks easily and information can be accessed quickly. This thesis evaluates different features from six of the most popularly used mobile browsers (Chrome, Dolphin, Internet Explorer, Opera Mini, Safari, and the UC Browser) in order to determine which features help to improve the mobile browsing experience. Ten participants were asked to perform several tasks on two mobile browsers and evaluate the browsers based on task difficulty. After all the tasks were completed, participants were asked to evaluate the overall usability of the browser. The results showed that participants found most tasks easy to perform on all browsers. However, during the test sessions, it was observed that several participants found the tasks of adding a bookmark and locating saved bookmarks slightly difficult. This was due to each browser implementing different designs and using different icons for the bookmarking functionality. Based on interviews concerning their everyday browsing behavior, participants acknowledge that the most used feature is the combined address bar/search bar. Other features, such as bookmarking or customized on-screen keyboards, are either ignored or go unnoticed in favor of faster and more immediate interaction with their browser

Van Gogh TV's "Piazza Virtuale": The Invention of Social Media at documenta IX in 1992

'Piazza virtuale' by the group of artists known as Van Gogh TV was not only the biggest art project ever to appear on television, but from a contemporary point of view the project was also a forerunner of today's social media. The ground-breaking event that took place during the 100 days of documenta IX in 1992 was an early experiment with entirely user-created content. This is the first book-length study of this largely forgotten experiment: It documents the radicality of 'Piazza virtuale's' approach, the novel programme ideas and the technical innovations. It also allows, via QR codes, direct access to videos from the show, which until now have been inaccessible