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Human Computer Interaction:

Fundamental Concepts
LECTURE 1

Textbooks
1.

Interaction Design: Beyond Human Computer Interaction (Authors:


Rogers, Y., Sharp, H. and Preece, J. (2007)) 4th Edition, Wiley & Son.

2.

Designing the User Interface: strategies for effective HumanComputer Interaction (Author: Ben Shneiderman) 5th Edition

Don Norman

Good and Bad Design


It is okay if you cant use it for the first time

It is okay if you have to read a book to understand it the first


time
But it is not okay if you still have to do the same thing a
second time

Good design is when someone shows it to you and you say


Oh I see
Bad design is when you still dont understand it after it has
been shown to you

Learning outcomes
At the end of this course, you should be able to:

Critically discuss the principles of user centred design.


Apply the principles, tools and techniques of HCI to the
development of usable digital information systems,
including:

Requirements capture.
System design / application of design guidelines.
Interface evaluation.

Recognise human factors issues which impact on


system usability.

Course description
This course will change your orientation about designing
interactive products especially user interfaces. Focus will be
on learning principles that guide in designing and creating
products (interfaces) with the goal of improving usability
and user experience. Students will be exposed to the
fundamentals of human computer interaction and user
centered design thinking, through working in teams on an
interaction design project, supported by lectures, readings,
and discussions.

Course content

Fundamental concepts
Design principles
Interaction styles
User centered design
Prototyping
Evaluation
Designing for collaboration and communication
Information Search

Everyday interactive products


How many interactive products are there in everyday use?

Cell phone
Computer
Personal organizer
Remote control
ATM
Ticket machine
Photocopier

Printer
Watch
Calculator
Unilag website
SPGS website
Google
www.bbc.co.uk
Corel draw

Classify them into:


a. Easy, effortless, enjoyable to use
b. Not that easy to use but bearable
c. A right pain!

What HCI is not

Making the interface look pretty


Only about desktop computers
Something you do if you cant program
Something that would be nice to do but usually theres
no time for it

What HCI is

It has to do with quality of design from the users


perspective
The study of interaction between people and digital
systems
The field that encompasses interface design, as well as
understanding of how people interact with information
and technology (shneiderman and Plaisant, 2004)

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What HCI entails

Bringing usability in design process


Developing interactive products that are easy,
effective, and enjoyable to use
When considering the usability of a design, it is
important to take into account where it is going to be
used and who is using it
Task
Use context
users

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Relationship between ID, HCI and


other fields
Human-computer interaction is a discipline concerned with the design,
evaluation and implementation of interactive computing systems for
human use and with the study of major phenomena surrounding them
(ACM SIG HCI)
ID entails designing interactive products to support the way people
communicate and interact in their everyday and working lives (Sharp,
Rogers and Preece 2011)

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Relationship between ID, HCI and other fields

(U) the use and context of computers, (H) human characteristics,


(C) computer system and interface architecture, (D) the development process.
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Relationship between ID, HCI and other fields

Interaction
Design (ID)

Interdisciplinary fields
(e.g HCI, Human Factors,
Cognitive Engineering,
Cognitive Ergonomics,
CSCW)
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Interaction design process

Identification of needs and establishment of requirements

Development of alternative designs that meet those


requirements

Building interactive versions of the designs so that they can


be communicated and assessed

Evaluation of what is being built throughout the process

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What do professionals do in the ID


business?
interaction designers - people involved in the design of all the
interactive aspects of a product
usability engineers - people who focus on evaluating products,
using usability methods and principles
web designers - people who develop and create the visual design
of websites, such as layouts
information architects - people who come up with ideas of how
to plan and structure interactive products
user experience designers - people who do all the above but who
may also carry out field studies to inform the design of products

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User experience (1/2)

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User experience (2/2)


Usability goals

The user
experience

User experience
goals

Design principles

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User experience goals

Satisfying
Enjoyable
Fun
Entertaining
Helpful
Motivating
Aesthetically pleasing
Supportive of creativity
Rewarding
Emotionally fulfilling

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Usability goals

Efficient to use
Effective to use
Safe to use
Have good utility
Easy to learn
Easy to remember how to use

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Usability measures (shneiderman and


Plaisant, 2010; Nielsen, 2003b)
Learnability
time to learn
how easy is it for users to accomplish basic tasks the first time they
encounter the interface

Efficiency
speed of performace
how quickly can users accomplish their tasks after they learn how to
use the interface?

Memorability
retention over time
after a period of non-use, how long does it take users to re-establish
proficiency?
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Usability measures (shneiderman and


Plaisant, 2010; Nielsen, 2003b)
Errors
rate of errors by users
how many and what kind of errors do users make, how severe are
these errors, and how easy is it for users to recover from these
errors?

Satisfaction
subjective satisfaction: how much did the users like using various
aspects of the interface
how pleasant or satisfying is it to use the interface?

Every designer would like to succeed in every measure, but there


are often forced tradeoffs (shneiderman and Plaisant, 2010)

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Usability goals/user experience goals


fun

Usability goals are


central to interaction
design and are
operationalized
through specific criteria

Emotionally
fulfilling

Satisfying

Efficient to use
Enjoyable

Easy to
remember how
to use

rewarding
Effective to use

User experience
goals are less
clearly defined

Usability
goals
Entertaining

Safe to use

Easy to learn

Supportive of
creativity

Have good utility

Aesthetically
pleasing

Helpful
Motivating

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In-class activity
Identify and briefly explain the key usability issues/measures for each of
the three user interface design problems stated below:

I.

A nuclear power plants control console

II.

A web site for doing online course registration

III.

The flight controls of a passenger airliner

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