HCI Assignment Report 1 CO2702
Group Members;
Guy Baxter
Daniel Dunn
Darren Bircher
William Man
Date – 24/11/2006
The
system we are redesigning is a PDA based nutritional/exercise program that is
used to improve the physical fitness and well being of people by providing them
with information regarding current health and exercise strategies. The system
is used to provide nutritional and dietary information for people who have a
wide range of reasons for using the device. This could vary from being overweight
to staying physically fit. This system will provide an active exercise diary as
recommended by a qualified physician and will also provide medical information
to the physician for purposes of monitoring the health of the patient and the
effects, such a programme would have on an individual. Extra functions on the
hand held device will allow for the user to see how many calories they have
burned, a step-o-meter which allows the user to record how many steps they have
taken, how long they have exercised for and an heart rate monitor. The reason
for creating this system is so that users will be able to use a simple, easy to
navigate, user’s language, consistent, providing feedback and help, shortcuts
and clearly marked exited device.
With
any new system users have to be considered because they will be the end users,
so it is important to understand and identify important characteristics of the
users of that particular type of system. For the new system the users
characteristics will be analysed this can be done by a user needs analysis. A
user needs analysis questions the motives of the user, their environment, age,
educational level, experience and goals. Other ways of analysing the end user
will to have regular meetings with them and questionnaires. Any proposal for
the implementation of a system will require the following qualities:-
·
Age Range - People of any age may wish to improve their physical
fitness, however, survey results show that the majority of people who will use
this device are teenagers and young adults. As the age of people get older
their physical and mental functioning begin to slowly deteriorate, as visual
and auditory acuity begin to decline.
·
Experience, familiarity with technology – users will have to have
basic knowledge of how to use a PDA but when navigating through the system this
is not a necessity as help features will guide the user when having
difficulties.
·
Knowledge of tasks and jargon – does the user know where to
navigate next? Are there any exit, undo or redo features?
It
is expected that a portion of the users will have some form of disability (e.g.
blind, deaf). The list below displays some user characteristics that may mean
that the user could encounter problems with the system if their needs aren’t
catered for.
·
Deafness/ Partial Deafness
·
Blind
·
Auditory/Speech Disabilities
·
Recognition Disabilities (e.g. images, colours, functional areas)
·
Inability to move properly (e.g. Cerebral Palsy)
The
system will be designed so that it’ll be fully functional both indoors and
outdoors, although indoors will be the most likely scenario as the user will
have access to peripheral devices such as a keyboard, if required. In general,
the environment could be relatively noisy. For example, if the user was at
university using this device and had auditory disabilities then the sounds of
students talking, lecturers etc would be very distracting and make it much
harder for the user to hear the screen reader.
For
outdoor usage it would mean that the user wouldn’t be close to a connection
device, such as a USB port in order to charge the device if the battery power
significantly reduced. This means that the battery used for this device will
have to have a relatively long life span (like that of a mobile phone) so that
the user can continue to use the device efficiently.
Some
possible goals for the user are;
·
To access dietary information
·
To access information relating to muscle groups
·
To access exercise information (both static and cardio vascular
exercises)
·
To clearly view the display
·
To clearly hear the screen reader
·
To be able to plug device into other peripherals using the USB
port
·
To use the device at their own leisure
·
To be able to save information, pages and instructions etc for
future use
·
To be able to change settings such as text size to view display
more efficiently
As
stated above in the user characteristics, some users will have visual and
auditory disabilities. Some possible options to cater for the user’s needs are;
·
Deaf/Partial Deaf users: Clear display and visual outputs for the
user
·
Blind users: Enable screen readers and have a port to allow for
the use of headphones
As
the system is based on a wholly portable medium, many different users will need
to access the system. The main barriers to accessing the system are;
·
Motor difficulties - allow for tolerances for those with reduced
motor skills, allow large icons with large “clickable” areas to be embedded
into the software and voice recognition could be used as an input/output stream
for those with visual difficulties.
·
Visual difficulties - ensure that all SENDA guidelines are met,
allow users to easily change the size of any inputs/outputs for the system.
·
Range of possible input devices – for example a keyboard can be
plugged in; it is slightly laborious and can increase the physical size of the
device. However, such a device is helpful for people with gross motor skills
disorders such as Dyspraxia.
·
“Graffiti” based application - one constraint of using Graffiti is
that some people may not wish to train the application to their specific
writing style, as this is time consuming.
·
Speech input - would be a feasible input device for those with
motor and vision problems. Although, speech as a technology has a few drawbacks
in sound libraries, recognition and latency
·
Aesthetically pleasing: It will have to be visually appealing for
users, because an off balanced, hard-to-view screen using a conflicting colour
scheme will no doubt discourage the users.
·
Easy to navigate: The navigation should be kept as simple as
possible and clearly visible. This is to ensure that the user will not get
confused about which area of the site they are viewing and will not find it
difficult to return to the homepage if required.
·
Accessible: The site must conform to user standards of
accessibility (i.e. ease of use, illiterate computer users).
·
Fast-loading: Items, images and information that is not required
should not be included. This is to prevent the pages taking too long to
download onto the user’s device.
·
3 click rule: The user should be able to find what the need within
three page clicks, anything more than that and it could be too difficult and
time consuming for the user. A good site design will allow the user to find the
required information quickly and efficiently.
There
are several current systems in place that provide dietary information, these
are; websites, books and personal assistance.
The
personal assistance system is very effective in terms for giving the user
direct information about what they want to know, when they want it. However,
the user can only gain personal assistance within working hours or whenever
they’re in a one on one discussion with their trainer.
We
will be focusing on improving the website/book systems as they have the
potential to be greatly improved, as well as combined to provide a more
efficient service for the user.
The
website system provides dietary information for the user, but, in most cases
several websites are required because no one site provides information on
diets, muscle groups, types of exercises etc. This is a major deficiency due to
the users needing to know all of this information in order to have a successful
and accurate diet plan.
Every
user to visit these websites will, in general, observe the same layout
providing that the correct settings have been established – this will be
discussed below.
Settings
are the main area that causes the most problems for users; this is due to a
vast amount of information being displayed for the user in a variety of forms
(e.g. text, images, animations, colour schemes, videos, pop-ups etc). All of
these can make it a very confusing environment for the user.
Not
every user will have the same screen resolution (e.g. 800 x 600 and 1024 x 768)
this means that when the user view the website the information can either too
large or too small. In the scenario that the information is too large then the
user will be required to use the scroll bars to view all of the information;
this is inconvenient if the user is required to compare information and has to
repeatedly scroll between sections to do this. On the other, if the information
is too small, then users with reduced eye sight will find it very difficult to
read it.
The
majority of websites will not allow the users to disable their site driven
functions such as pop-ups or advertisements. This can be awkward as it can
disrupt the user can cause them to spend unnecessary time closing these
functions as they appear.
Although
the websites can meet the needs of users who do not speak the English language
the majority of them do not have the ability to meet the needs of disabled
users. A good way to find out if the site meets these specifications is to run
a client such a “Bobby” on it. This software displays all of the errors within
the chosen websites which make them unusable. The websites cannot tell if the
user is blind and doesn’t provide a screen reader to meet their needs, nor does
it allow for setting changes for users with impaired vision to change the size
of the text, images etc.
1. Power on the device
·
Switch the
power on
2. Selecting output options
·
Select
change contrast
·
Select text
size.
·
Confirm the
selection made.
3. Input of information.
·
Height
entered into software.
·
Weight
entered into software.
·
Age entered into software.
·
Confirmation of information.
4. Menu screen
·
Enter the
diet plan?
1. Start new plan?
a)
Click the option to start
(1)
Enter programme type
(2)
Enter length
(3)
Click to confirm
(4) Otherwise
click cancel
2. Continue existing plan?
a)
Click the option to start
b) Otherwise
click cancel
·
Enter the
exercise plan?
1. Start new plan?
a)
Click the option to start
(1)
Enter programme type
(2)
Enter length
(3)
Click to confirm
(4)
Otherwise click cancel
·
Look at
previous data?
1. Yes?
a)
Display data
(1)
Click the button to look at other pages.
(2)
Click “close” to cancel
2. No?
a)
Return to menu.
As
this is an ICT based solution to both a medical concern and concerns, which
affect society as a whole. There are wide ranges of social and technical
contexts inside the system, which are outlined below:
The
social contexts are;
·
Allowing people to gain quality information regarding fitness
·
Collations of data (with permission) into exercise and dietary
trends.
·
Having a reward system, this gives people a feeling of self-worth
for completing tasks.
·
Alert to show when people have lost weight.
This
system could result in users becoming more involved with program as they “warm”
to the technology involved as positive user feedback is enforced. Thus ensuring
that Nielsen’s “concept 4: is induced.
The
technical contexts are;
·
The system will allow data to be gathered and stored on a large
number of people.
·
Any data that is passed outside of the sphere of trust between
medical staff and patient would require all personally identifiable markers to
be removed.
·
Sufficient hardware should be in place to allow this, and
sufficient data security procedures should be in place to ensure that all data
is held accurately.
·
Some investment in a network infrastructure will be required to
ensure that the transmission of data from the system to an external source can
be done quickly, accurately and securely.
To
show that our device is fully functional and meets the requirements of as many
end users as possible it’ll need to primarily cater for needs of the blind, the
deaf and those that have poor physical movement level. For those users that have poor physical
movement we must ensure that the device has simple, easy to use buttons or
other peripherals. The buttons that are used should be easy to identify (e.g.
Start and Stop). For users with poor or no auditory abilities a clear visual
display is essential. The display will need to be simple and allow the user to
know what each function/area is so that they can use it to the best of their ability.
The users that have poor hearing or are blind, have the option of connecting
their hearing aids to the device/use the headphones provided so that the screen
reader will be effective for them.
Other
ways that would allow us to make the device more effective are;
·
Watching people use the site. This method will allow us to observe
exactly how people use the device. It would give us first hand information
about what the user found difficult about the device so that we could improve
upon it.
·
Using tracking software: In some cases, the above suggestion could
make the user feel uncomfortable so we could install tracking software to view
what the user is doing without physically watching over their shoulder.
·
Using pen sensory software to see where users commonly click this
would allow us to see the most commonly viewed areas of the pages are and
enable us to develop the poorer areas that the users find less informative and
useful.
·
Allowing a margin of error for input.
·
Placing first time users on the system to see how intuitive they
are. Illiterate computer users are one of our main issues so the system would
need to be as simple as possible for these first time users to be able to
access all of the information and functions successfully.
·
Questionnaires/Surveys: This would allow us to ask the users a
series of questions without pressuring them into giving biased answers.
The
major implications we discovered is that slightly modifying a commercial
product could have numerous health benefits for individuals and society. In
producing a device of this type, we would have to ensure that one device could
meet the needs of many. The use of different kinds of input/output devices
provides users with a wide range of possible solutions for interaction with the
system.
Throughout
this report our group have had many ideas, all of which are useable, but not
overly practical. At one point we decided that we could create several devices
that meet different needs of different users (e.g. a device that would be
highly beneficial for a blind user, but, would be inappropriate for a deaf
user). We decided against this idea as one user doesn’t just have one
disability so chose to implement all features that would be suitable for all
users within the device.
There
are several key features that the device must include, these are;
·
Multiple languages for users
·
Allow the users to change settings (e.g. larger text)
·
Screen readers and ports for headphones
·
Display key information, minimalist approach