The Information School of the University of Washington
Information System Design
Info-440
Autumn 2002
Session #7
The Information School of the University of Washington
Agenda
• Admin
• Last time: Reminder
• Design spaces
– Exercise
• Task analysis
– Exercise
• Break!
• Norman’s seven stage model
• Task analysis process
– Exercise
Copyright David Hendry (INFO-440
session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Admin
• Announcements
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Thanks for attending Lou Rosenfield’s talk
Jason Tabert’s note on Tablet PC event
Check out Phil’s link to persona’s (Kim Goodwin)
The non-designers design book in library reserve
• Assignment #2
– Questions about taxonomy
– Due: Wednesday
• Interactive design project
– Any questions?
– Proposal due: Oct 28
• Quizzes
– Back on Wednesday
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Process:
Where we are now?
•
•
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Week 1: Introduction
Week 2: Requirements Analysis, Part I
Week 3: Requirements Analysis, Part II
Week 4: Conceptual design
* Finish task analysis
– Mental models;
– Identifying & modeling concepts, entities, and relationships
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Week 5: Interaction design, Part I
Week 6: Interaction design, Part II
Evaluation
Information design
Process, project management
The literature, personalities, and history
Copyright David Hendry (INFO-440
session 7 - 10/21/2002)
Labs: Prototyping
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Methods (so far)
• Requirements analysis
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Affinity diagramming
Card sorting
Comics for summarizing workplace data
Conceptual models (intro only)
Contextual inquiry, concentrating on interviewing
Design-space analysis (more today)
Focus groups
Inspecting objects (Norman’s vocabulary)
Personas
Scenarios
Task analysis (more today)
Trade-offs: Representation technique
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Last time
• Reviewed
– Scenarios & Personas
• Introduced
– Design space
• Introduced task analysis
– Goals
– Tasks/sub-tasks
– Actions
highJason Hamden
Jeff
Esther Heather’
Heather
Ben
Brian
Chuck
Theo
Brianna
low
low
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
high
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Design Spaces
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Cross dimensions & plot people,
features or products
•
Steps
1. Invent two more dimensions
2. Plot items on grid (precision is not critical)
3. Go to 1 until plot seems to capture relevant
differences
–
–
Identify ‘holes’ in the design space
Tactically decide where to focus attention
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TYPE
Family Album
Journal
One splash page
Pop Culture
Small Business
School/Education
Chuck
Heather
Hamden
Jason
Esther
Hamden
Ben
Chuck
Hamden
Esther
Esther
Ben
Jason
AUDIENCE
Self
Family
Friends
Organization
Neighborhood
COMPLEXITY
Low
….
High
Copyright David Hendry (INFO-440
session 7 - 10/21/2002)
Chuck
TOOLS
Site Builder,
FreeForm/HTM
FrontPage
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Cross dimensions to plot people
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Cross dimension to plot
products
Calendar
Homepage building
Build
E-mail
Chat
Talk
Private
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
Public
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Aggregate
ACTIVITY
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Generalize dimensions
Photo Center
Purchase
Cheese shop
Build
Online Auctions
Calendar
Palm reader
Show & Talk
0
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
Public library
1
Talk radio
10 102 103
104
AUDIENCE SIZE
105
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(high)
Flow
Challenges
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Task complexity: The notion of
‘flow’
a3
a4
a1
a2
(low)
(low)
Skills
(high)
• Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1990). Flow: The psychology of optimal experience.
New York: Harper Perennial.
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Markets: Competitive Analysis
Community-oriented
Emotional/
Lifestyle
Rational
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
Individualistic-oriented
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Task spaces/design spaces
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Use to organize complex information
Use to make comparisons between items
Look for ‘holes’ and opportunities
Precision is not necessarily important
Very effective communication device
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Task Analysis
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Definitions
• Goal
– What needs to be accomplished?
• Task/sub-tasks
– A step towards completing the goal
• Action
– An atomic event
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Tasks are hierarchical
Goal
Task
Task
Sub-Task
Task
Task
Sub-Task
Sub-Task
Sub-Task
Sub-Task
Action
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Task flows: Interesting tasks are
usually procedural
Goal
start
No
Task
Decision
Yes
Task
Other path
Task
Task
end
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Symbols
• Starting point/other information
• A task
• A decision point
Yes
No
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Scenario
Joe is a hotel receptionist. He takes
reservations from the phone and in person
• Develop a task flow for his process
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Possible answer
Goal: Satisfy consumers
Make new
Reservation
Check a
Reservation
Change a
Reservation
Cancel a
Reservation
Guest contacts clerk
Repeat
No
Get info on dates,
room type,
discounts/specials,
etc.
Check
availability
Does guest want
to reserve?
Re-try
Yes
Copyright David Hendry (INFO-440
session 7 - 10/21/2002)
Book guest
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Re-try (continue)
Re-try
Does guest want
different dates?
Yes
Repeat
No
Thank guest
Reservation not made
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Book guest (cont)
Book guest
Get name,
address, etc.
Explain guarantee &
cancellation policy
Does guest want
guarantee?
No
Yes
Get credit card info
Thank guest
Copyright David Hendry (INFO-440
session 7 - 10/21/2002)
Repeat booking info &
give confirmation #
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Summary
• Task analysis is a huge topic
– Extremely detailed analysis of individuals (e.g., fighter
pilots)
– Workflow analysis of complex social situations (e.g.,
relations between doctors, patients, and insurance
companies)
• For more on tasks, see (a very good ‘how-to’
book)
Hackos, J. T. & Redish, J. C. (1998). User and task analysis
for interface design. New York: Wiley.
Copyright David Hendry (INFO-440
session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Norman’s stages of action
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*
7: Making senseI see the equation
and it looks okay. I’ll
move on
6: InterpretationI opened the
sheet and
selected the cell
with the formula in
it
Gulf of evaluation
5: Perception Pointer over icon,
icon highlighted,
etc.
Gulf of execution
1: Goal - There
is a problem with
the budget. Need
to check revenue
model
Copyright David Hendry (INFO-440
session 7 - 10/21/2002)
2: Task - Open 3: Actions plan - 4: Execution Excel
Point at the Excel Grasp mouse,
spreadsheet
icon, point at cell, etc.
click, inspect
formula
* From Rosson & Carroll
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Summary
• You’ll see this model referred to frequently
• Very detailed view of a single user
• Breakdowns can occur when moving through
each of these seven stages
– The (domain) goal may be clear, but the
(system) task unknown
– The action plan may be clear, but the icon may
be hidden
– Etc.
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Process scenario
The Information School of the University of Washington
Scenario
A company has contacted you to develop a a
task/user analysis for Seattle Guides.
Seattle Guides answer tourists’ questions and
give tourists information about Seattle.
• Develop a plan, including the steps and
expected number of hours and cost
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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Possible answer
Consulting Tasks
80hr Brainstorming on users and tasks
20 Planning site visits
20 Recruiting participants at sites
80 Conducting 10 visits (2 observers * 5 days)
80 Analysis report
--280 hr @ hourly rate ($80.00) = $22,400.00
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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The Information School of the University of Washington
Next time
• Topics
– More on task analysis
– Start into conceptual design
• One reading:
– Read: Green, T. R. G. and Benyon, D. (1996.)
The skull beneath the skin: entity-relationship
models of information artifacts. International
Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 44(6) 801828. [Note: This is a fairly difficult academic
paper. Sections 4-5 are optional.]
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session 7 - 10/21/2002)
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