TECHNOLOGY AREAS: Information Systems, Human Systems

ACQUISITION PROGRAM: PMS450

OBJECTIVE: The objective of this work is to reduce the time to develop user interfaces and increase the cross-system consistency.

DESCRIPTION: There are many choices in how to develop user interfaces. Guidance is usually general, and still leaves many choices to the developer. In most cases user interfaces are developed, not by Human Systems experts, but by engineers, without extensive knowledge of user needs or characteristics. Tools to not only support, but also enforce, good interface design are lacking. Software engineers have testing and debugging tools. Similar tools are needed for designing user interfaces.

There are many choices in the design space and, with technology constantly changing, the design space is constantly expanding. Any configuration management tool must be able to likewise expand with the changing technology. We want to encourage use of good new user interface products so that the user is not left with VT100 technology in an Iphone world.

The development of Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) in which components will reside independent of the tight constraints of a single system and used in many different contexts further complicates the problem. Interface configuration for such systems should be invisible to the user, and the same for each tool, whether embedded within a traditional system or an independent component in an SOA. There are, of course, programmatic reasons why this is difficult, but, more importantly, there are serious, difficult, and sometimes conflicting technical requirements for differences in user interfaces. For example, interaction with three dimensional information may require a different metaphor (gesture, perhaps) than interaction with a table of values. These conflicting requirements must be resolved in a consistent way if the user is note to become lost in the frey.

A mechanism is needed to employ the software concept of "configuration management" to user interfaces. This could be either a configuration management system or a system that supports the actual coding of user interfaces, automating all shared elements such as color scheme, font, icon usage, menu/functionality placement, etc. It must be expandable to accommodate new interface technology and new knowledge of where interface technology is and is not used appropriately. It must include a testing capability to assure the design is appropriate to the intended purpose.

PHASE I: Examine literature for both User Interface guidelines and software configuration management and develop a plan for an automated user interface configuration management/generation system.

PHASE II: Develop automated user interface configuration management/generation system. Assure that it generates consistent and usable interfaces for at least one military system.

PHASE III: Test the system to show that it can control configuration and automated generation of user interfaces for at least two related systems. Show that the systems created conform to the relevant guidelines. Show that the system reduces the time to generate user interfaces and the resultant interfaces are at least as good as conventionally developed interfaces. Provide for adaptive changes to system to accommodate different hardware such as touch screens, etc.

PRIVATE SECTOR COMMERCIAL POTENTIAL/DUAL-USE APPLICATIONS: Any system that is created for users of multiple systems/tools will benefit from having a consistent and automated way to control and generate user interfaces, including but not limited to medical systems, transportation systems, educational systems, and military systems.

REFERENCES:
1. Byrne, M. D., Wood, S. D., Sukaviriya, P. N., Foley, J. D., & Kieras, D. (1994). Automating interface evaluation. In B. Adelson, S. Dumais & J. Olson (Eds.), Acm chi''''94 conference on human factors in computing systems (Vol. 1, pp. 232-237). New York: ACM Press.

2. Gillan, D. J., Holden, K., Adam, S., Rudisill, M., & Magee, L. (1990). How does fitts' law fit pointing and dragging? In J. C. Chew & J. Whiteside (Eds.), Acm chi''''90 conference on human factors in computing systems (pp. 227-234). New York: ACM Press.

3. Hartson, H. R., & Boehm-Davis, D. (1993). User interface development processes and methodologies. Behaviour and Information Technology, 12(2), 98-114.

4. Hollnagel, E. (1995). The art of efficient man-machine interaction: Improving the coupling between man and machine. In J.-M. Hoc, P. C. Cacciabue & E. Hollnagel (Eds.), Expertise and technology: Cognition & human-computer cooperation (pp. 229-241). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

5. Newell, A., & Card, S. K. (1985). The prospects for psychological science in human-computer interaction. Human-Computer Interaction, 1(3), 209-242.

KEYWORDS: User interface development; configuration management; automatic code generation; usability; user interface measurement

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