INF3720 notes (Contains Definitions and Lists).
[5] Design Principles
1. Visibility - The more visible functions are, the more likely it is that users will be able to know
what to do next
2. Feedback - Sending feedback about actions
3. Constraints - Ways of restricting user interactions
4. Consistency
5. Affordances - An attribute of an object that allows people to know how to use it
McCarthy and Wright - [4] Core Threads
1. Sensual Thread - Concerned with our sensory engagement with a situation
2. Compositional Thread - The internal thinking we do during experiences
3. Emotional Thread - How emotions are intertwined within the situations in which they arise
4. Spartoi-temporal thread - The space and time in which our experience takes place, and their
effect upon those experiences
Core components of a conceptual model [4]
1. Metaphors and analogies
Convey to people how to understand what a product is for and how to use it for an activity
2. The concepts that people are exposed to through the product, including the task-domain
objects they create and manipulate, their attributes, and the operations that can be performed
on them
3. The relationships between those concepts
4. The mappings between the concept sand the user experience the product is designed to
support or invoke
[3] Ways in which metaphors and analogies can be applied in conceptual design
, -A way of conceptualizing what we are doing
-As a conceptual model instantiated at the interface
-As a way of visualizing an operation
Advantages of metaphors [5]
-Interface metaphors are based on conceptual models that combine familiar knowledge with
new concepts, hence, helps users to easily understand the underlying model
-Exploits users’ familiar knowledge, making learning new systems easier
-Easier to learn and talk about what you are doing on a computer interface in terms of what you
are familiar with in your daily life
-Enables a greater diversity of users to understand computer functionality
-Improves user confidence
Disadvantages of metaphors [7]
-Designers sometimes have a misconception; they try to design an interface metaphor to look
and behave like the physical entity it is compared with.
-Breaks conventional and cultural rules.
-Constrains designers in the way they conceptualize the problem space.
-Conflict with design principles.
-Not being able to understand the system functionality beyond the metaphor.
-Designers can base their designs on existing objects that were badly designed
-The imagination of designers to come up with new conceptual models is limited
[4] Types of interaction
1. Instructing
-User tells the system what to do
[5] Design Principles
1. Visibility - The more visible functions are, the more likely it is that users will be able to know
what to do next
2. Feedback - Sending feedback about actions
3. Constraints - Ways of restricting user interactions
4. Consistency
5. Affordances - An attribute of an object that allows people to know how to use it
McCarthy and Wright - [4] Core Threads
1. Sensual Thread - Concerned with our sensory engagement with a situation
2. Compositional Thread - The internal thinking we do during experiences
3. Emotional Thread - How emotions are intertwined within the situations in which they arise
4. Spartoi-temporal thread - The space and time in which our experience takes place, and their
effect upon those experiences
Core components of a conceptual model [4]
1. Metaphors and analogies
Convey to people how to understand what a product is for and how to use it for an activity
2. The concepts that people are exposed to through the product, including the task-domain
objects they create and manipulate, their attributes, and the operations that can be performed
on them
3. The relationships between those concepts
4. The mappings between the concept sand the user experience the product is designed to
support or invoke
[3] Ways in which metaphors and analogies can be applied in conceptual design
, -A way of conceptualizing what we are doing
-As a conceptual model instantiated at the interface
-As a way of visualizing an operation
Advantages of metaphors [5]
-Interface metaphors are based on conceptual models that combine familiar knowledge with
new concepts, hence, helps users to easily understand the underlying model
-Exploits users’ familiar knowledge, making learning new systems easier
-Easier to learn and talk about what you are doing on a computer interface in terms of what you
are familiar with in your daily life
-Enables a greater diversity of users to understand computer functionality
-Improves user confidence
Disadvantages of metaphors [7]
-Designers sometimes have a misconception; they try to design an interface metaphor to look
and behave like the physical entity it is compared with.
-Breaks conventional and cultural rules.
-Constrains designers in the way they conceptualize the problem space.
-Conflict with design principles.
-Not being able to understand the system functionality beyond the metaphor.
-Designers can base their designs on existing objects that were badly designed
-The imagination of designers to come up with new conceptual models is limited
[4] Types of interaction
1. Instructing
-User tells the system what to do
