Services: Interface & Interaction design
Interaction Design
- We focus on high-level aspects of interface design -- sometimes called interaction design, conceptual design or navigation flow -- rather than designing a detailed, final interface.
"Interaction design refers to the selection of behavior, function and information and their presentation to users. . . Interactive products need to be designed by interaction designers instead of by software engineers." (Cooper, The Inmates Are Running the Asylum)
Rapid Prototyping
- However, we flesh out these high-level interaction designs using a variety of concrete prototypes, including:
- storyboards and paper prototypes, and
- computer-based prototypes using
HTML and PowerPoint.
- These prototype designs can be completed quickly, which allows them to be evaluated quickly via a design review or a usability test.
Integrating interaction design with other usability techniques
- From task analysis to interaction design: Task analysis identifies the sequence of goals and sub-goals, and procedures and sub-procedures users follow in completing tasks -- what could be called the task flow. The goal of interaction design is to translate this task flow into how information will flow in the interface, and into the navigation flow of the interface.
- From interaction design & prototyping to evaluation: Once an interaction design has been implemented as a prototype, it should be tested via a design review and/or a usability test
- From design review and usability testing to interaction design: When we identify usability problems in a product by doing a design review or usability test, we recommend specific design changes (i.e., interaction designs) that will fix each problem.
Deliverables
- Since interaction design is integrated with other usability techniques, we usually do not offer this as a separate service (although we could do this if needed).
- If we do a design review, usability test, or task analysis for you, you will receive interaction designs as a part of these usability services.
- Some simple interaction designs can be described in text
- However, many of our interaction design ideas will be presented as a computer prototype.
Copyright © 2005-2008 Gugerty Usability Services. All Rights Reserved
|