Communication Design & Usability

Great Talk on Triumphs and Tensions of Technological Innovation (by Andrew McAfee at EMTech MIT talk session), October 2011

2011-12-21T17:17:00.001+01:00

Fluid Gesture Interface Demo (from EMTech MIT sessions) October 2011

2011-12-21T17:14:00.001+01:00

http://www.technologyreview.com/emtech/11/video/#!/tab/highlights/

Our paper on the Aural Web accepted at ACM SIG CHI 2012!

2011-12-15T16:31:00.004+01:00

Our paper titled "Aural Browsing On-The-Go: Listening-based Back Navigation in Large Web Architectures" by Tao Yang, Mexhid Ferati, Yikun Liu, Romisa Rohani and Davide Bolchini has been accepted as refereed full paper at CHI 2012 [23% acceptance rate].
More info on our NSF project "Navigating the Aural Web".

Amazon Fire announced

2011-10-03T21:01:00.001+02:00

the new $199 tablet from Amazon just announced. Watch on >>>

Our design-oriented usability evaluation paper appeared on the Int. Journal of HCI

2011-05-17T21:20:00.007+02:00

Finally our paper on a design-oriented approach to perceived usability has been made available on the International Journal of HCI in its accepted, unedited version. Final version of archive on the printed journal issue will be published soon.

Access paper (with subscription here)>>>>

DEEP - Design-oriented Evaluation of Perceived usability
International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction
Volume 99999, Issue 1, 2011, Page 1
Authors: Tao Yang; Jared Linder; Davide Bolchini
DOI: 10.1080/10447318.2011.586320

Abstract:

Existing perceived usability questionnaires detect the appearance of usability issues rather than the underlying design generating those issues. This limits the capability of existing instruments to directly inform design recommendations.

To address this problem, we created and validated a usability questionnaire structured around the analytical composition of the design. A four-stage process was followed. First, 3 usability experts refined 54 questions from highly-cited usability questionnaires and structured them around 6 design dimensions. Second, 12 raters scored the questions by their relevance to assess usability. Third, questions and dimensions were then improved through exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis (N=196), and fourth, further enhanced through confirmatory factor analysis (N=362).

The result is DEEP, a 19-question usability questionnaire based on 5 main design dimensions (content, information architecture, navigation, layout, and visual guidance). DEEP can be used to capture detailed usability feedback that more directly relates to specific aspects of design requirements.

Designs with a Deeper Purpose (from Technology Review)

2011-04-25T19:20:00.001+02:00

>> interesting article on HCI design and Bill Buxton. Read on >>>

Our paper on UX Architectures just published on ACM Interactions

2011-01-10T17:38:00.001+01:00

Bolchini, D., Neddo, A., Beyond Interfaces and Flows: Abstractions for Mapping Organic Architectures, ACM interactions, 18 (1) January-February 2011, 56-61. DOI: http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1897239.1897252

My paper on "Client Scenarios" just published on IEEE Proceedings

2010-11-29T23:06:00.003+01:00

My recently accepted and presented short paper on
"Exploring the Tension between User’s and Main Stakeholder’s Goals: The Role of Client Scenarios" has been just published on the IEEE Proceedings of the 1st Workshop on The Web and Requirements Engineering (WeRE'10), held within the 18th IEEE International Requirements Engineering Conference 2010 in Sydney, Australia.

Full PDF paper available from my research site:
http://mypage.iu.edu/~dbolchin/public/Bolchini_IEEE_WeRe_Workshop_2010.pdf

paper page on IEEE Proceedings Digital Library:
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpls/abs_all.jsp?arnumber=5623994&tag=1.

Paper abstract:
This paper introduces the notion of Client Scenario as a conceptual tool to characterize and address the tension between user and main stakeholder's goals in web requirements analysis. As complementary to traditional user scenarios, Client Scenarios assume the perspective of the main stakeholders of an interactive application in projecting stakeholder-desired behaviors on the user experience. Client scenarios are an important variation over a commonly used technique in requirements engineering (scenarios in general) and can facilitate web designers, requirements analysts and project managers to elicit and model a comprehensive set of requirements from different viewpoints, as they complement the considerations of the user's needs with the communication and business goals of large web applications.

IEEE Web Systems Evolution Symposium 2011 - Call for Papers

2010-11-16T18:15:00.003+01:00

As Program Co-Chair of the 2011 IEEE Web Systems Evolution Symposium, I am happy to invite all interested scholars and practitioners to submit high-quality paper proposals concerning a broad variety of exciting topics in web application design, evaluation and evolution.

Full PDF Call for papers:
http://www.cs.wm.edu/icsm2011/wse2011/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/cfp-wse2011.pdf

Topics

WSE 2011 Special Theme is Access for All. Since WSE 2001 in Florence, over the last decade there have been numerous advances related to the accessibility of Web applications for the disabled, including multilingual Web sites, beyond-desktop (non-PC) devices for Web content, and new navigation paradigms and technologies. These advances have profound implications for the systematic evolution of modern Web applications. Starting from this special theme, WSE topics of interest include, but are not restricted to, the following aspects of Web systems design, development, maintenance and evolution:

Accessibility of Web systems
Mobile Web systems
Model-driven reengineering and re-design of Web systems
Requirements Evolution for Web Systems
Migration towards Web 2.0, SOA, and the Cloud
Web systems with self-adaptive and autonomic features
Novel Web paradigms and their impact
Traceability of Web systems
Reverse engineering and analysis of Web systems
Security and privacy in Web systems
Evaluation, testing and quality assessment of Web systems
Multilingual Web systems
Semantic Web
Empirical studies of Web systems

World Usability day in Indianapolis with Aaron Marcus

2010-10-21T22:37:00.003+02:00

Presented by: Indiana Chapter of the Usability Professionals' Association (UPA)
Sponsors: Center for Information and Communication Sciences, Ball State University
Indiana University School of Informatics at IUPUI
If you are interested in becoming a sponsor for this event contact us at indianaupa@gmail.com
What: Celebration of the sixth annual UPA World Usability Day
International UPA World Usability Day
When: November 11th, 2010 from 8:00am to 6:00pm
Program: This year we are featuring renowned UX speaker Aaron Marcus
Aaron Marcus is the founder and President of Aaron Marcus and Associates, Inc. (AM+A). A graduate in physics from Princeton University and in graphic design from Yale University, in 1967 he became the world's first graphic designer to be involved full-time in computer graphics.

Mr. Marcus has published, lectured, tutored, and consulted internationally for more than 30 years and has been an invited keynote/plenary speaker at conferences of ACM/SIGCHI, ACMSIGGRAPH, Usability Professionals Association (UPA), and the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society, as well as conferences internationally. He is a visionary thinker, designer, and writer, well-respected in international professional communities associated with Web, user interface, human factors, graphic design, publishing, and desktop software application development.
The Indiana Chapter of the UPA encourages design principles that aid in the creating, enhancing, and servicing usable products and services. Last year's World Usability Day involved more than 100 events in more than 35 countries. Be a part of the global experience this year as Indiana does its part for World Usability Day!

Location: IUPUI Campus Center
3rd floor
420 University Boulevard (southwest corner of Michigan and University Boulevard), Indianapolis, Indiana, 46062
Cost: $50 for professionals
$30 for students
Lunch is provided if you register by November 5th

To register:
http://indiana-upa.org/ind_wud2010.html

Registration: For immediate confirmation of your registration, complete the online registration form.
Online registration form

Event News: Follow us on Twitter #indwud2010

Our paper on Branding Requirements & Web Design just published at ACM NordiCHI 2010 Conference

2010-10-21T22:31:00.006+02:00

We have just published our paper on: "Empirical investigation of web design attributes affecting brand perception" on the ACM Proceedings of the NordiCHI Conference 2010.

Full paper reference:
Garzotto, F., Sorce, F., Bolchini, D., and Yang, T., Empirical investigation of web design attributes affecting brand perception, in Proceedings of the 6th Nordic Conference on Human-Computer interaction: Extending Boundaries (Reykjavik, Iceland, October 16 - 20, 2010). NordiCHI '10. ACM, New York, NY, 188-197. DOI= http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1868914.1868939

Abstract:
The web has become a mainstream communication tool used by companies, institutions, celebrities, and politicians to establish, reinforce, or repurpose their brand, almost bypassing more conventional branding media. In this scenario, understanding the effects of the different design qualities of a website on users' attitude towards the brand is of major importance. This paper contributes to the exploration of this issue by presenting a wide empirical study that investigates the degree to which users' perception of a brand is affected by different design aspects of a website, namely usability, aesthetics, and communicability. The results of this multidimensional analysis have implications on HCI research and practice, as they provide empirically founded guidelines to prioritize design choices in relationship to branding goals.

Full PDF paper available here >>>

Paper avaialble on ACM proceedings:
http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?doid=1868914.1868939

NSF continuing research grant on "Navigating the Aural Web" just awarded!

2010-07-29T18:30:00.005+02:00

I am happy to share the good news that the NSF (www.nsf.gov) has just awarded my research project proposal on "Navigating the Aural Web", as a continuing grant of the CISE/IIS Human-Centered Computing Program. I am excited to have the opportunity to direct this exciting project as Principal Investigator.

More info about the grant on my web page:
http://mypage.iu.edu/~dbolchin/Navigating_aural_web.htm

Official award abstract on NSF website:
http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=1018054

Beyond Findability - Our Article just published on the Journal of Information Architecture

2010-07-03T23:17:00.002+02:00

Our paper "Beyond Findability" (by Luigi Spagnolo, Davide Bolchini, Paolo Paolini and Nicoletta di Blas) has just appeared on the new issue of the Journal of Information Architecture.

Full citation:

Spagnolo, L., Bolchini, D., Paolini, P., & Di Blas, N. (2010). Beyond Findability. Journal of Information Architecture. Vol. 2, No. 1.

The journal is open access, so peer-reviewed articles can be read in full for free.

Full PDF here:
http://journalofia.org/volume2/issue1/03-spagnolo/jofia-0201-03-spagnolo.pdf

HTML version:
http://journalofia.org/volume2/issue1/03-spagnolo/.

Beyond Findability - Search-Enhanced Information Architecture for Content-Intensive Rich Internet Applications

Abstract
This paper details a way to extend classic information architecture for web-based applications. The goal is to enhance traditional user experiences, mainly based on navigation or search, to new ones (also relevant for stakeholders’ requirements). Examples are sense making, at a glance understanding, playful exploration, serendipitous browsing, and brand communication. These new experiences are often unmet by current information architecture solutions, which may be stiff and difficult to scale, especially in the case of large or very large websites. A heavy reliance upon search engines seems not to offer a viable solution: it supports, in fact, a limited range of user experiences. We propose to transform (parts of) websites into Rich Internet Applications (RIAs), based, beside other features, upon interaction-rich interfaces and semantic browsing across content. We introduce SEE-IA (SEarch-Enhanced Information Architecture), a coherent set of information architecture design strategies, which innovatively blend and extend IA and search paradigms. The key ingredients of SEE-IA are a seamless combination of structured hypertext-based information architectures, faceted search paradigms, and RIA-enabled visualization techniques. The paper elucidates and codifies these design strategies and their underlying principles, identifying also how they support a set of requirements which are often neglected by most current design approaches. A real case study of a complex RIA designed for a major institutional client in Italy is used to vividly showcase the design strategies and to provide ready-to-use examples that can be transferred to other IA contexts and domains.

Nielsen's word on iPad Usability - the first Report

2010-06-04T21:02:00.004+02:00

Usability and the iPad - the battle between "defending usability conventions" and "promoting cutting-edge design innovation" had begun.

Nielsen Norman Group has recently released
a free-to-download report on the usability of iPad applications.
http://www.nngroup.com/reports/mobile/ipad/

A brief observation: most of the usability findings reported seem reasonable, but they also appear at times too focussed on minor (wrong?) issues of the user experience, which is actually enhanced and driven by cutting-edge design innovation unleashed by the iPad (i.e. in the iPhone paradigm).
The iPad is targeted to users who are willing and/or experienced to explore, learn new interaction paradigms, and greatly adapt to innovative interfaces. Pushing too much on the infringment of the "traditional" usability conventions (which are contingent, and always changing) does not provide much insight at this point and risks just to hinder the power of design innovation.

Important Insights from Design Synthesis (Jon Kolko)

2010-04-16T22:06:00.002+02:00

Jon Kolko illustrates insights about the abductive processes typical of design synthesis and innovation.
http://designmind.frogdesign.com/videos/misc/design-synthesis.html

IDEO Design Thinking Talk at MIT Sloan School of Management

2010-03-26T14:42:00.001+01:00

“Insights are about getting out into the world, connecting with new things. Designers see the world as a source of innovation, not just validation. ”
Tim Brown

Search, Keeping Found Things and Personal Information Management

2010-03-26T14:40:00.002+01:00

1st International Workshop on Interactive Storytelling for Children

2010-03-11T15:57:00.002+01:00

Workshop on Interactive Storytelling for Children,
to be held within the 9th ACM International Conference on Interaction Design for Children.

The goal of this full-day workshop is to bring together researchers from a wide spectrum of disciplines who share a common interest in understanding the challenges of interactive storytelling for children. Storytelling, meant as the process of creating narrative structures or of engaging with them, is pervasive in many aspects of children’s life. This topic has received increasing interest by the Human Computer Interaction and Interaction Design and Children communities DC fields, where a variety of technologies and design approaches have been explored to foster new forms of children’s creativity and to increase, through interactivity, engagement, enjoyment, fun, as well as the achievement of educational, cognitive, or interpersonal benefits.

This workshop will explore the design, development, and evaluation of interactive storytelling for this target group from different perspectives: i) the different technologies and interaction paradigms; ii) the different profile of children (e.g., age, needs) and the different contexts of use (e.g., school, home, museums, therapeutic settings; iii) the different roles of children in relationships to interactive stories (authors, consumers, or technology designers).

We aim at bringing together researchers from a wide spectrum of disciplines - technologists, empirical researchers, HCI designers, educators, pedagogy specialists, psychologists, artists - who work in interactive storytelling for children or are interested in exploring the challenges of this domain. Our purpose is to collect participation that integrates different views and ideas, findings and experiences, and to promote an interdisciplinary exchange.

A selection of the best position papers will appear in the conference proceedings and in the ACM Digital Library, and will be considered for participating in a Journal Special Issue on Interactive Storytelling for Children.

For a detailed description of the workshop scope and goals:
http://hoc.elet.polimi.it/idc/2010/assets/doc/STORYTELLING_Extended_Abstract.pdf

The so much rumored iPad - - - finally coming soon

2010-01-27T21:56:00.001+01:00

http://www.apple.com/ipad/features/

2010-01-27T21:11:00.001+01:00

http://www.iua.upf.es/idc2010/
International Conference on Interaction Design for Children 2010, Barcellona, Spain, June 2010.

10th International Conference on Web Engineering (ICWE 2010)

2009-12-12T19:55:00.002+01:00

Call for papers >>>

The Tenth International Conference on Web Engineering (ICWE 2010) will be held July 5 - 9, 2010 in Vienna, Austria. ICWE 2010 aims at promoting research and scientific excellence on Web Engineering and at bringing together scientists and practitioners interested in technologies, methodologies, tools, and techniques used to develop and maintain Web-based applications and to enable and improve the dissemination and use of Web-related content.

ICWE 2010 invites original submissions in any of the following categories: research papers, industrial experience papers, workshop papers, demonstrations, posters, and tutorials. The submissions may cover new approaches in Web Engineering, novel viewpoints, challenges, and visions on any aspect of Web Engineering, as well as reports on the implementation and deployment of advanced Web projects in an industrial or application scenario.
>>>>>> http://icwe2010.webengineering.org/ >>>>>

Sound Design, Cognition and Behavior

2009-11-05T22:00:00.001+01:00

10th Annual IA Summit Plenary Speech – Jesse James Garrett

2009-10-19T19:30:00.000+02:00

10th Annual IA Summit Plenary Speech – Jesse James Garrett

Paper-in-screen, a video introduction

2009-10-12T16:18:00.000+02:00

Quick Video made with Stupeflix (no software required) from Diego Pulido on Vimeo.

World Usability Day 2009 coming to Indianapolis

2009-10-06T03:47:00.001+02:00

As part of World Usability Day, the Indiana Chapter of the Usability Professionals' Association is hosting an event to promote the exchange of ideas on sustainability as it relates to usability and product development. The IU School of Informatics, Human-Computer Interaction Program is co-sponsoring the event.

Everyone with an interest in usability is invited! The conference will be held Thursday, November 12, 9:00AM-4:00PM at the IUPUI Campus Center. Additional sponsors include The Center for Information and Communication Sciences at Ball State University, Pearson Publishing, and Creative Street Media Group.

Posters are welcome. Please indicate that you will be bringing a poster when you register. The registration fee for professionals is $35. This special package includes the conference fee (lunch, handouts and prizes) and a one year membership to the Indiana Usability Professionals’ Association.

Normally, the Indy UPA membership is $20. If you prefer not include the Indy UPA membership, the registration fee is $30. Students pay $10 to attend the conference.

http://newsroom.informatics.iupui.edu/4293/IUPUI-HumanComputer-Interaction-Program-sponsors-World-Usability-Day-conference