Usability analysis of design guideline database in human-computer interface design

Human-computer interface design guidelines are useful for developing well designed interfaces but the designer must be able to access the guideline appropriate to the application. Research is conducted to understand how designers access design guideline databases and then methods are tested to improve the usability of the databases. A design guideline database of approximately 300 guidelines is developed using a hypermedia approach. The system employs a book metaphor interface to characters and graphics in a Japanese environment. The subjects of the usability analysis are software designers who did not have any background in human factors. They were provided with the representation of a bad interface design on a piece of paper, and were instructed to improve the design through the use of the guideline database. Two common strategies were identified by observing the designers' actions: a hypothesis strategy and a checklist strategy. These strategies were analyzed using the quantities and quality of improvements recommended. The optimum database usage checks interface violations by employing the browsing function of the database; sometimes key word searches are used.