Supporting Design Managing complexity of designing Expressing ideas Testing ideas Quality assurance

Support Design Many kinds of support Informal to formal Pencil-and-paper vs. computer-based support environments Detailed and specific to Vague and general Rules vs. Principles

Supporting Design Design Process The production and coordination of results into a coherent whole Designers People as individuals Design Teams People as a group or organization

Supporting Design Process Models Star life cycle Waterfall Spiral Etc. Techniques and tools at each stage Transitions between stages

Supporting Designers Experience Transfer knowledge from similar problems Previous Known Solutions Store knowledge of problem for others to modify and reuse Library of cases

Supporting Designers Problem Decomposition Divide and Conquer Better definition of problem Reduce complexity of the problem Human Cognitive limitations

Supporting Designers Alternative Designs Evaluate criteria Find new perspectives on the problem Design Simulation Find external opinions Test partial results Validate partial designs

Supporting Designers Understanding the Problem Domain Difficult to identify what specific knowledge is “relevant” Reasoning Strategy Opportunistic reasoning Jumps between levels of abstraction Flexibility is required Support Creativity

Supporting Design Teams Social aspects Organization aspects Protocols Space The Design Room

Supporting Design Teams Communications Coordination Management interference Formal Communications Channels between designers and users

Kinds of Support Guidance Standards, Principles and Rules Communication and Recording Capture ideas and criteria at conceptual level before software Software Capture ideas and criteria at machine level that can be translated to code

Guidelines Based on Psychological Theory Based on Experience Depend on the Context of the Application They need to be applied very carefully There is no “CHI cookbook”

Principles vs. Rules Principles High level Wide Need Interpretation and Contextualization Rules Low level Specific Straight forward Implementation

Principles vs. Rules Principles Know User Population Allow input flexibility Rules Always display the quit button in the bottom left-hand quarter of the screen Always require and ‘end of input’ signal, such as pressing ‘enter’

Published Guidelines Standards Journals House Style guides General Handbooks

Evaluating Guidelines What is a ‘good’ guideline? Depends on how it is applied How to evaluate them? Become and expert Gain experience Test them What users and their context

Application of Guidelines Conflicts Maximize use of screen real estate vs. avoid clutter Trade-offs Use of display space vs. smoothness and predictability Exceptions “ Always require and ‘end of input’ signal, such as pressing ‘enter’ “