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Message Text For: Cherri M. Pancake on Usability Engineering Navigation: Select Threads Forums

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Date Posted: Tuesday June 04, 2002 01:03:37 PM How we perceive, interpret and use information; applying human factors research to product design Reply Top Bottom Next Previous

vaneyken

Date Posted: Tuesday June 04, 2002 11:39:00 PM As a volunteer with Dr. Doug Engelbart's Bootstrap Institute (www.bootstrap.org), I am somewhat concerned about the terms "usability" and "ease of use." We are aware that the WYSIWYG syndrome is anathema to the kind of high-performance computing Doug Engelbart perceives as needed for enhancing individual and collective intelligence. Usability here is permitting high-performance work, and the software is usable only by those who have climbed the required learning curve. Einstein once said that a theory should be as simple as possible, but not simpler. Similarly, we might say that softwares should be as easy to use as possible, but not at the expense of the usability aimed for. More thought might be given to ease the learning curve by ensuring that relevant instructional materials are well prepared, which means with intended users and the cost of their time in mind. The Ubiquity interview with Prof. Cherri Pancake brought out the need for cooperatively bridging the gap between the culture of software engineers and the cultures of various professions. The same lesson might be applied toward bridging the gap between writers and (various kinds of) readers of the instructional materials that accompany softwares. Henry K van Eyken ------------------------- Henry K van Eyken Reply Top Bottom Next Previous

jwpurple

Date Posted: Wednesday June 05, 2002 10:43:34 PM It is an undocumented fact in our organization that many users memorize often-used employee numbers. This results in a symbiotic effect which increases the combined human-computer effectiveness many fold. We recently decided to increase employee id numbers from 5 to 7 digits which approaches a well-known usability limit. A seemingly innocuous change like this is likely to have several negative consequences, including: 1) A request for a name-number lookup utility. 2) Lower user performance levels. 3) Increased user frustration level. 4) increased errors. As a developer, I sincerely appreciate any effort to codify and expose the importance of this subject. Reply Top Bottom Next Previous

CHSUAPUKAO

Date Posted: Thursday June 06, 2002 12:20:25 AM Since I lost this thread while signing in , I put a comment on "Cherri Pancake and Genre" in the General forum instead on some epistemological/philosophical implications gleamed from lingistics! Steve Torok ------------------------- negotiate123 Reply Top Bottom Next Previous

epepke

Date Posted: Wednesday July 03, 2002 02:25:01 PM This is an excellent example of the gulf between academia and industry. I spent 13 years in academie doing research, some of it on user interfaces. About four years ago, I made the switch to industry. Usability is primarily bad not because it is hard to do but because it is harder to pay for and even harder to sell. In practice, it is only possible to make usable software in an academic or in-house setting or for certain industrial control uses. In the shrink-wrapped world, usability is actually a bad thing. Business purchasers of software do not optimize their purchases to make the jobs of their subordinates as easy as possible. Quit the opposite--a highly usable piece of software will often be thought of as a "toy" or "fine for my grandmother, but not for Real Professionals." There is a mystique of difficult software; it feeds into both the pride and sadism of managers and the self-preservation instincts of subordinates. This would not be so bad except that the shrink-wrapped industry, which employs only a small minority of software developers, sets the fashion and the standard. Customers want anything new to be like something they already have, for obvious reasons. By this process, poorly usable software wins over time. Reply Top Bottom Next Previous

nrjhaye

Date Posted: Monday August 19, 2002 02:12:53 AM Agreed. For example, usability, from a standard front-end point of view, is best served either by a mouseless-only control scheme, or by a complete properly-designed mouseless control scheme, supplemented by a mouse control scheme (for users low on the curve). The point is that the mouseless scheme should have the main design focus. As users progress and "learn the interface" they will automatically seek shortcuts, and if the mouseless input scheme is well-designed, they will rapidly drop the mouse in favour of the keyboard. My experience is that users at the top of the curve then seek and use scripting control, so if it makes sense for the application, scripting control takes us another step towards the ultimate shortcuts and thus the ultimate efficiency. Input control schemes with mouse-only operation, or incomplete or ill-thought-out mouseless operation, perhaps as an afterthought, are one of the biggest barriers to user efficiency. Recently I have seen an application which required more than 1000 mouse clicks/keyboard entries to complete a batch of operation as the scripting interface was not functional. Michael Hayes. Reply Top Bottom Next Previous

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