1. Message Design and Content Creation: Tasks and Design 30 January 2007 Kathy E. Gill

2. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Agenda Lecture – Tasks and Design Discussion Leaders – Design and Conversation Team/Project

3. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Task Analysis (1/3) Know who is going to use the system ID tasks that they now perform ID tasks that they’d like to perform Where are tasks performed? How do users communicate with each other? Or do they?

4. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Task Analysis (2/3) How are tasks learned? What other tools might be used? How often are tasks performed? Are there time constraints? What happens when things go wrong?

5. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Task Analysis (3/3) These are the types of questions that your tasks should identify – whether we’re talking about the media ownership web site (group project) or the design analysis (individual project) where you reverse engineer websites. It helps us identify what a user is required to do – both physically and mentally – to complete a task. We deconstruct the “big task” (send an e- mail) into its component tasks.

6. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Task Exercise Most day-to-day behaviors are done without our having to expend a lot of thought. Our job as designers is to determine the “parts” that make the “whole.” Jot down the tasks associated with brushing your teeth! brushing your teeth

7. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Task research - overview (1/3) Please try to recall a recent instance where you found important information on the World Wide Web, information that led to a significant action or decision. Morrison, J.B., Pirolli, P., and Card, S.K. (2001): "A Taxonomic Analysis of What World Wide Web Activities Significantly Impact People's Decisions and Actions." Interactive poster, presented at the Association for Computing Machinery's Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, Seattle, March 31 - April 5 2001. (pdf)A Taxonomic Analysis of What World Wide Web Activities Significantly Impact People's Decisions and Actions

8. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Task research - methods (2/3) Collect: 71%. Search for multiple pieces of information. Goal is specific, but not looking for one particular answer. Find: 25%. Search for something specific. Explore: 2%. No specific goal (surfing). Monitor: 2%. Visit the same site for updated information. Visits triggered by routine behavior, not specific goal.

9. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Task research – reasons (3/3) Compare/choose: 51%. Evaluate multiple products or answers to make a decision. Find/acquire: 25%. Get a fact, get a document, find out about a product, download something; specific. Understand: 24%. Seek understanding of some topic; usually includes locating facts or documents.

10. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Task list for e-mail program (1/2) Write a message  Edit, format, spell-check, etc Send a message  Now or later Receive a message  Filter, other auto-actions Read a message that you have rec’d  Filter after reading, mark messages “read”, delete Identify and ignore spam

11. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Task list for e-mail program (2/2) Save a message to read later Forward a message to someone else  Or many people, with or w/out comment Send a formatted file with the message Send the same message to several people  To, CC, BCC Keep an address book  Nicknames (aliases), other data

12. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Flow Chart Tasks are combined to make a flow chart Usually there are “branches” (decision points) that affect the flow The most common flow chart is procedural

13. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Procedural Task Analysis: new e-mail

14. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org E-commerce Task Buy Pink Floyd CD, “The Wall”  Find The Album Go to favorite commerce site (bookmarked, type URL, search) Search For Band (only option?)  Type “Pink Floyd" in Search box  Read results, make additional choices Browse Online Music Store  View webpage with album details  Purchase The Album Many additional steps in this process Ship or download? (Depends on vendor)

15. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org One design goal : flow The process of an optimal experience The activity feels seamless It is intrinsically enjoyable Individual loses self-consciousness

16. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org The Humane Interface “An interface is humane if it is responsive to human needs and considerate of human frailties.”  Raskin, The Humane Interface (6) Requires knowledge of how humans and machines operate

17. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Norman’s seven-stage model Execution Action Specification IntentionEvaluation Interpretation Perception Mental activity expectation Goals Physical activity

18. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Simplified to a four-stage model Intention Selection Execution Evaluation

19. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org 1. Forming an intention “What we want to happen” Internal mental characterization of a goal May comprise goals and sub-goals (but rarely are they well planned) Similar to task semantics  e.g. “send a letter to Aunt Dot”  e.g. “record episode of Lost”

20. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org 2. Selecting an action  Review possible actions and select the most appropriate e.g. “use the word processor to create a file called aunt_dot_letter” e.g. “use the Replay to record this season’s Lost broadcasts”

21. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org 3. Executing the action:  Carry out the action using the computer  Almost all consumer actions are now executed with a graphical interface, not computer syntax: e.g. type “emacs –nw aunt_dot_letter”

22. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org 4. Evaluate the outcome  Check the results after executing the action and compare it with the expectations e.g. see if word processor is active and verify that file name is “aunt_dot_letter” e.g. see if Replay is active and verify that Lost has been recorded Requires perception, interpretation, and incremental evaluation

23. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Goals Physical System gulf of execution The four stages model reveals The “Gulf of Execution”  Do actions provided by system correspond to user intentions?  Gulf: amount of effort exerted to transform intentions into selected and executed actions

24. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Design rule: A good system … … has direct mapping between intention and selections! Which method of printing a letter has the most direct mapping?  Drag document onto printer icon  Select print from menu  Type “aunt_dot_letter; lpr -Palw3 latex.dvi”

25. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Goals Physical System gulf of evaluation Gulf of Evaluation Can system feedback be interpreted in terms of user intentions and expectations? Gulf: amount of effort exerted to interpret feedback

26. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Key to a good system Feedback easily interpreted as task expectations e.g. graphical simulation of text page being printed Alternative: no feedback or difficult to interpret feedback e.g. Unix: “$”, “bus error”, “command not found”, “403 error”, BSD!

27. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Design questions How easily can a user  Determine the function of the system?  Tell what actions are possible?  Determine mapping from intention to selection?  Perform the action?  Tell what state the system is in?  Determine mapping from system state to interpretation?  Tell if system is in the desired state?

28. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Norman on Design Visibility  Can I see the state of application and my alternatives for actions Good conceptual model  Does the system have consistent presentations of operations and results

29. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Norman on Design Good mappings  What are the relations between Actions and results Controls and their effects System state and what is visible Feedback  Full and continuous feedback about results of actions

30. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Principle of transparency “The user is able to apply intellect directly to the task; the tool itself seems to disappear.”

31. Kathy E. Gill, uwdigitalmedia.org Next Week: Structuring Information