User-Centred Engineering: Creating Products for Humans

141 Pages·2014·2.133 MB·English

by  Michael Richter, Markus Flückiger

Michael Richter
Markus Flückiger
User-Centred
Engineering
Creating Products for Humans
User-Centred Engineering
ThiSisaFMBlankPage
Michael Richter (cid:129) Markus Flu¨ckiger
User-Centred Engineering
Creating Products for Humans
MichaelRichter
MarkusFlu¨ckiger
Zu¨hlkeEngineeringAG
Schlieren
Switzerland
ISBN978-3-662-43988-3 ISBN978-3-662-43989-0(eBook)
DOI10.1007/978-3-662-43989-0
SpringerHeidelbergNewYorkDordrechtLondon
LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2014951228
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Foreword
This book is aimed first and foremost at people involved in software and product
development–productmanagers,projectmanagers,consultantsandanalysts,who
face the major challenge of developing highly useful and usable products. Our
objective is to provide you with an expert overview of the subject. You will find
answerstothefollowingquestions:
(cid:129) Whatisuser-centredengineering?
(cid:129) Howdouser-centredactivitiesfitintothedevelopmentprocess?
(cid:129) HowdoIscheduleuser-centredtechniquesandwhatistheprocessinvolved?
(cid:129) WhatresultswillIobtainandhowcanIverifythem?
(cid:129) HowcanIestablishauser-centricculturewithinmybusiness?
(cid:129) WhatrelatedfieldsarethereandwherecanIfindfurtherinformation?
However,youwon’tfindinthisbook:
(cid:129) Rules,adherencetowhichguaranteesgreatuserexperiences
(cid:129) Cookbookinstructionstoimproveusability
(cid:129) Userinterfaceguidelinesfordevelopers
(cid:129) Theorywhichhasnopracticalapplication
We hope also to provide interested lay readers with an easily comprehensible
introduction to the subject. As users of technical systems, we all have a choice –
either we accept what is put in front of us or we don’t. Of course it is not always
possibletoswitchtoadifferentproductwheneverwefeeltheneed,buteventhen
we can at least contribute to improving the existing one. The first step is to
understandhowthiscanbeachieved.
Schlieren,Switzerland MichaelRichter
MarkusFlu¨ckiger
v
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Contents
1 Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.1 WeAreAllUsers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.2 TheUserIsNotLikeMe. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
1.3 WhatIsUser-CentredEngineering?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.4 LessonsfromHistory. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
2 User-CentredEngineering. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.1 SoftwareEngineering:TheForgottenUser?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.2 Overview:User-CentredTechniquesinContext. . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
3 The7(cid:1)2MostImportantUser-CentredTechniques. . . . . . . . . . . 25
3.1 AspectsofLife:ContextualInquiry. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
3.2 ModellingReality:PersonasandScenarios. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
3.3 JustCommunicate:Storyboards. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . 39
3.4 ScribblingforIntermediates:UIPrototyping. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
3.5 TakingItForwardintoDevelopment:UseCases. . . . . . . . . . . . 51
3.6 GuidelinesandStyleGuides. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
3.7 UsabilityTesting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
3.8 NumericalData:Questionnaires. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
4 GettingaHandleonUX:Planning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
4.1 AchievingGoals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
4.2 ControllingRisk. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
4.3 Constraints. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
4.4 SomePlanningExamples. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
4.5 InvolvingUsers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
4.6 TrickySituations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
4.7 “It’sCarl’sJob”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
5 AUser-OrientedStrategy:Company-WideUX. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
5.1 User-CentredEngineeringasaFeedbackLoop. . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
5.2 BuildingaUser-CentredProcess. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
5.3 CreatingaCommonLanguage. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
5.4 EstablishingaUser-OrientedCompanyCulture. . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
5.5 SoWhat’stheStoryinYourCompany?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
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viii Contents
6 That’sLife:ExamplesfromActualPractice. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
6.1 CaseStudy1:User-CentredRequirementsCleartheAir. . . . . . . 99
6.2 CaseStudy2:User-CentredEngineeringfromAtoZ. . . . . . . . . 102
6.3 CaseStudy3:User-CentredInnovation:SimulatingReality. . . . 106
6.4 CaseStudy4:DiscountUsabilityEngineering. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
7 Flashback:PrinciplesofUser-CentredEngineering. . . . . . . . . . . . 113
7.1 IdentifyingtheQuestion:AGoal-OrientedApproach. . . . . . . . . 113
7.2 Context:DesigningforReality. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
7.3 Partnership:InvolvingUsersConstructively. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
7.4 InterpretingFactualInformation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
7.5 ModellingandCollectingFeedback. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
8 Outlook:RelatedFields. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
8.1 Accessibility. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
8.2 InteractionDesign. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
8.3 SecurityandUsability. . . .. . . . . .. . . . . . .. . . . . . .. . . . . . .. 119
8.4 WebUsability. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
8.5 MobileUserExperience. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
8.6 TheUbiquitousComputer. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Glossary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
Bibliography. . .. . . .. . . .. . .. . . .. . . .. . . .. . . .. . . .. . .. . . .. . . .. 131
Index. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
1
Introduction
Space:thefinalfrontier.Thesearethevoyagesofthe
StarshipEnterprise.Captain’slog,stardate2200.The
computerrefusestounderstandawordwesaytoit.Scotty
hasspentthelastweektryinginvaintogettogripswiththe
newtransportercontrols.Thetricordercontinuestoemitthe
sameincomprehensibleerrormessage.
1.1 We Are All Users
Have you ever noticed how people on television always manage to interact with
their technology effortlessly? We, by contrast, get tangled up in software, type in
the wrong PIN number, get lost in airports and despair at ever understanding our
latest gadget. From our day-to-day dealings with technical systems, we all have a
rough idea of what a good user experience means. So let’s start this introduction
with some classic everyday hits and misses. You will no doubt recall similar
situations,involvinghighlyorpoorlyusabletechnicalsystems:
(cid:129) Theticketmachinewhichworksperfectly,rightupuntilyoutrytobuyaticket
(andgetareceipt)fortomorrow.
(cid:129) The new digital video recorder which, at the press of a button, allows you to
recordthefootballmatchwhileyouanswerthedoortothepizzaguy.Or,hang
on,wasitashortcutkey?NowwheredidIputthoseinstructions?
(cid:129) Thesimplicitywithwhichmusiccanbedownloadedfromtheweb,sortedinto
playlistsandlistenedtoanywhereonasmartphone.
(cid:129) Your telephone bill once you finally manage to book a cinema ticket for this
evening’sfilmusingthenewautomatedbookingsystem.
Interactiveproductsareaneverydayfactoflife.Youmaybeoneofthosepeople
who have simply come to accept that many systems are almost unusable, while
#Springer-VerlagBerlinHeidelberg2014 1
M.Richter,M.Flu¨ckiger,User-CentredEngineering,
DOI10.1007/978-3-662-43989-0_1