Historical Perspective on HCI CS 4163 Don Norman’s The Invisible Computer: Why Good Products Can Fail, The Personal Computer Is So Complex, And Information Appliances Are the Solution (The MIT Press, ©1998 by the author) has a good intro that could be used to update these slides.

Technological Innovations Follow a Timeline Demand for operators Concern for usability Technology is the limiting factor Innovation Timeline for concern about usabilty (computers and other devices) 1. Innovation - no one would claim that the Wright Flyer was usable or easy to fly. The challenge was to develop the technology at all. 2. Technology is the limiting factor. Operators are still dedicated enthusiasts. In the early years of aviation, every plane was custom built, usually by the pilot. 3. Technology is still the limiting factor, but the demand for more operators means that it is less controlled by enthusiasts (eg. WW1 pilots, Red Baron...). Selection and training become critical. human factors starts to be important - ensuring that the required skills are trainable. The limiting factor is no longer what the technology can do, but what the operator can learn to do. 4. Once the human becomes a limiting factor, concern about usability often becomes a focus. The field of cockpit design and cockpit ergonomics became a serious area of study during and after WWII.

Three Trends in CS Raise Awareness of Usability Hardware environment Types/sophistication of users New applications

Hardware Changes 1950’s batch processing 1960’s time-sharing 1970’s 1990’s / forward workstations graphical displays processing power for multimedia interactive (on-line) mini/micros Historical Trends in computing that led to the emergence of the field of HCI. 1950’s Batch processing: the user interfaces were card reader, printed output 1960’s Time sharing - early 1960's Time sharing and Distribution processing (60's) remote data entry/ display: user interfaces were Teletype. 1970's/80's Two directions in Computing On-line(interactive interfaces) Minis & micros (mid 70's) (stand-alone; personal computers) Workstations -80's (Xerox Parc - star, Lisa -> Macintosh)

User Changes Computing professionals vs. Discretionary users Proportion has changed: more discretionary users Users are more sophisticated and demanding

Application Changes 1950’s batch text CAD computational s/w meteorological banks 1970’s cheaper graphics improved printers small business computing 1980’s 1990’s / forward personal computer apps (e.g. spreadsheets, word processing) bit-mapped graphics hypertext multimedia Applications that changed over time and affected hci: 1950's Graphics Batch Text Text CAD and Graphics 1970's cheap graphics 1980's bit-mapped Wysiwyg color Hypertext

How to Improve UIs? Little agreement in late 1970s and ’80s even now, many views Follow guidelines — intuitive Define & try prototypes — quasi-experiential Experiments: laboratory  observational We will look at all three approaches

Broader Issues (1) HCI is not Just a simple matter to decide whether to use a menu or a command type of interface Consider the problem broader perspective Take into account all factors that influence us and others in regard to using computers

Broader Issues (2) We are not interested in ‘user friendliness’ ‘User friendly’ is an anthropomorphic term. Do you wish to be friends with your computer? It is one-dimensional. The system is either user friendly or not Anthropomorphization: See H&H §2.3.8 (pp. 43 – 44)

Broader Issues (3) Baecker figure No silver bullet sidebar Fig. 1.2 (from Hix & Hartson) Baeker: Ronald Baecker A Vision of Education in User-Centered System and Interface Design In SIGCHI Bulletin v.20 n.3 (Jan.) 1989 Figure and comment in text about figure Point is the complexity of HCI No Silver Bullet: Challenges of HCI Design and Implementation By Brad A. Myers In interactions v.I n.1 (Jan. 1994), pp. 73 – 83. Sidebar explaining why developing UIs is so complex and difficult (p. 75) H&H: Deborah Hix and H. Rex Hartson. Developing User Interfaces: Ensuring Usability through Product & Process ©1993 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. See file h+h_1.pdf for Figures 1.1, and 1.2, and Table 1.1

Definitions of HCI & Usability Human computer interaction (HCI) Discipline concerned with: Design, evaluation and implementation of interactive computing systems for human use Study of the major phenomena surrounding interactive computing systems for human use Usability Is interface appropriate for the users for the task that they are using for? This is a working definition of usability. We'll examine some models later.

Ensuring Usability Two components: The product — the user interface itself content, human factors issues, design guidelines and interaction styles The process — how to develop the UI lifecycle, methods, techniques and tools for developing and UI

Behavioural & Constructional Domains See table 1.1 (from Hix & Hartson) Our focus is on the behavioural domain H&H: Deborah Hix and H. Rex Hartson. Developing User Interfaces: Ensuring Usability through Product & Process ©1993 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. See file h+h_1.pdf for Figures 1.1, and 1.2, and Table 1.1