History & Frameworks of HCI Key people, events and ideas in HCI Course Project introduction

CS / Psych Agenda  Review HCI’s history  Key people and events  Frameworks  Ways of thinking about systems

CS / Psych History of HCI  Digital computer grounded in ideas from 1700’s & 1800’s  Technology became available in the 1940’s and 1950’s  The “user” concept is relatively new

CS / Psych History of HCI  Mechanical Computers  1623 Schickard makes "Calculating Clock". 6-digit machine can add, subtract, bell indicates overflow.  1674 Leibniz designs his "Stepped Reckoner” Can multiply, with operands of up to 5 and 12 digits. User turns a crank for each unit in each digit  1820 de Colmar makes "Arithmometer” First mass-produced calculator. Does multiplication & division. It is also the most reliable calculator yet. Continue to be sold for about 90 years.  1889 Felt invents the first printing desk calculator.  1935 IBM introduces "IBM 601", punch card machine capable of 1 multiplication /second are made.  1945 Mauchly & Eckert "ENIAC” for ballistics. 30 tons, 1000 ft 2 of floor, 140 kilowatts of electricity, 17,468 vacuum tubes

CS / Psych Batch Processing  Computer had one task, performed sequentially  No “interaction” between operator and computer after starting the run  Punch cards, tapes for input  Serial operations

CS / Psych Paradigm Shifter: Vannevar Bush  “As We May Think” Atlantic Monthly “…publication has been extended far beyond our present ability to make real use of the record.”  Postulated Memex device  Stores all records/articles/communications  Items retrieved by indexing, keywords, cross references (now called hyperlinks)  (Envisioned as microfilm, not computer)  Interactive and nonlinear components are key

CS / Psych Mid 1960’s  Timesharing mode of computing  Computers too expensive for individuals timesharing increased accessibility  interactive systems, not jobs  text processing, editing  , shared file system Need for HCI

CS / Psych Paradigm Shifter: J.R. Licklider  Postulated “man-computer symbiosis”  Couple human brains and computing machines tightly to revolutionize information handling

CS / Psych Video Display Units  More suitable medium than paper  Sutherland’s Sketchpad as landmark system  Computers used for visualizing and manipulating data

CS / Psych Paradigm Shifter: Ivan Sutherland  SketchPad - ‘63 PhD thesis at MIT  Hierarchy - pictures & subpictures  Master picture with instances (ie, OOP)  Constraints  Icons  Copying  Light pen for input  Recursive operations

CS / Psych Computers as Toolkits  Multipurpose toolkits  Abstracting out common tasks (tools)  Reusable elements  At the disposal of humans

CS / Psych Paradigm Shifter: Douglas Engelbart  Landmark system/demo:  Mouse, windows  Hypertext  Multimedia  High-res display,  Shared files, CSCW,  Electronic messaging, teleconferencing,...  Inventor of mouse

CS / Psych Paradigm Shifter: Alan Kay  “Personal Computing”  Dynabook: Notebook sized computer loaded with multimedia and can store everything  Desktop interface metaphor

CS / Psych Paradigm Shifter: Ted Nelson  Computers can help people, not just business  Coined term “hypertext”

CS / Psych Personal Computers  1974 IBM 5100  1981 Datamaster  1981 IBM XT/AT  Text and command-based  Sold lots  Performed lots of tasks the general public wanted done  A good basic toolkit  1978 VisiCalc

CS / Psych Personal Computing  System is more powerful if it’s easier to use  Small, powerful machines dedicated to individual  Importance of networks and time-sharing  Kay’s Dynabook, IBM PC  Time names “The Computer” Man of the Year, 1982 (

CS / Psych WIMP  Windows, Icons, Menus, Pointers  Timesharing=multiusers; now we need multitasking  WIMP interface allows you to do several things simultaneously  Has become the familiar GUI interface  Xerox Alto, Star; early Apples

CS / Psych PCs with GUIs  Xerox PARC - mid 1970’s  Alto  local processor, bitmap display, mouse  Precursor to modern GUI, windows, menus, scrollbars  LAN - ethernet

CS / Psych Xerox Star - ‘81  First commercial PC designed for “business professionals”  desktop metaphor, pointing, WYSIWYG, consistency and simplicity  First system based on usability  Paper prototyping and analysis  Usability testing & iterative refinement  Commercial flop  $15k cost  closed architecture  lacking key functionality (spreadsheet)

CS / Psych Apple Lisa - ‘82  Based on ideas of Star  More personal rather than office tool  Still $$$  Failure (why?)

CS / Psych Apple Macintosh - ‘84  Aggressive pricing - $2500  Not trailblazer, smart copier  Good interface guidelines  3 rd party applications  High quality graphics and laser printer

CS / Psych Direct Manipulation  ‘82 Shneiderman describes appeal of graphically-based interaction  object visibility  incremental action and rapid feedback  reversibility encourages exploration  replace language with action  syntactic correctness of all actions  WYSIWYG, Apple Mac

CS / Psych Metaphor  All use is problem-solving or learning to some extent  Relating computing to real-world activity is effective learning mechanism  File management on office desktop  Financial analysis as spreadsheets  The dreaded dead metaphor  Examples?…

CS / Psych Speech, Language?  Actions do not always speak louder than words  Interface as mediator or agent  Language paradigm  How good does it need to be?  “Tricks”, vocabulary, domains  How “human” do we want it to be?  (HAL, Bob, PaperClip)

CS / Psych Multimodality  Mode is a human communication channel  Not just the senses e.g., speech and non-speech audio are two modes  Emphasis on simultaneous use of multiple channels for I/O

CS / Psych Hypertext  Think of information not as linear flow but as interconnected nodes  Nelson’s hypertext  Bush’s MEMEX  Non-linear browsing  WWW ‘93  Hypermedia

CS / Psych The Interconnected Web  The Network is the Computer e.g.

CS / Psych CSCW  Computer-Supported Cooperative Work  No longer single user/single system  Micro-social aspects are crucial  as prominent success but other groupware still not widely used

CS / Psych Ubiquity  Person is no longer user of virtual device but occupant of virtual, computationally-rich environment  Can no longer neglect macro-social aspects  Late ‘90s - PDAs, VEs,...  Now?…

HCI Frameworks How we can conceptualize humans who use computing systems

CS / Psych Human Role  How is human viewed in HCI  What is human role?  Different roles engender different frameworks

CS / Psych Human Roles Human as…  1. Sensory processor  Experimental psych, sensory psych  e.g. Model-Human Processor (Card, Moran & Newell)  2. Interpreter/Predictor  Cognitive psych, AI  e.g. Distributed cognition (Hutchins)  3. Actor in environment  Activity theory, ethnography, ecol psych  e.g. Situated action (Suchman)  e.g. Activity theory (Vygotsky, Nardi)

CS / Psych What Makes a System Usable Usability results when the system… 1. Sensory processor - Fits within human limits 2. Interpreter/Predictor - Fits with knowledge 3. Actor in environment - Fits with task and social context

CS / Psych Evaluation Methods Evaluation methods… 1. Sensory processor - Quantitative experiments 2. Interpreter/Predictor - Task analysis, cognitive walkthrough 3. Actor in environment - Ethnographic field work, participatory design

CS / Psych Two Views of Interaction  Interaction with  Software system is a tool or machine  Interface is a usability-engineered membrane  Human-as-processor & -interpreter models  Interaction through  Software is a medium used to interact with task objects or other people  Interface plays a role in social context  Human-as-interpreter & -actor models

CS / Psych Upcoming  Usability Principles  Bad Designs, and the Design Process  Human capabilities  Project teams and ideas