Chapter 13

Andrew Bates

Jay Babb

Steve Haroz

Introduction

• We want as much information on the screen as possible without too much eye-head movement

• Window Housekeeping

Tiled Windows

Window Design

• Title Bar

• Borders

• Scroll Bars– Mac OS X scroll bars

Window Design (cont.)

• Animations for open and close

• Use the previous location and size

• Limitations on window size

• “some systems now support displays of the full window as it is dragged”

• Window activation

Multiple Window Design

• Multiple monitors

• Virtual desktops

• Split Displays

• Tiling and Cascading

• Window Zooming

• Arbitrary Overlaps

Coordination by Tightly-Coupled Windows

•Coordination: Task concept describes how info objects change based on user action•Tight Coupling: Interface concept that supports coordination•Generic Coordinations:

–Synchronized Scrolling: Multiple scroll bars associated with each other (i.e. – compare documents, 2 windows/1 bar, ect…)–Hierarchical Browsing: If one window contains TOC, then other will show actually contents (i.e. – File Managers, Help Documentation, ect…)–Direct Selection: Selecting a icon, word selection, ect would allow another window to show options (i.e. – view options, dictionary, ect…)–Two-Dimensional Browsing: Cousin to hierarchical, shows overview of a map, graphic, or photograph (i.e. – image maps, ect…)

Coordination by Tightly-Coupled Windows Continued

• Generic Coordinations:– Dependent-Windows Opening: Open dependent windows nearby

– Dependent-Windows Closing: Close all open dependent messages.

– Save or Open Window State: Save current state of the windows (i.e.- History folder in IE)

Image Browsing by Tightly-Coupled Windows

• Overview/Detail View maps• Zoom Factor: Between 5 and 30 is ok, beyond needs more• Side-by-side and single• Users’ tasks:

– Image Generation: Construct large image

– Open-ended Exploration: Gain understanding of map

– Diagnostic: Scan for flaws

– Navigation: Pursue details on specific route

– Monitoring: Watch overview…then zoom in.

Personal Role Management

• Role-centered design is docucentric, it emphasizes the user’s task rather than the documents.

• A PRM coordinates several breaking a task into “roles”.

• Each role has its own vision statement that describes the responsibilities of each person.

Personal Role Management

• All roles should be visible to the user.

• Important information about the user’s role should be readily available.

• The user’s role should be the center of their attention.

Task Objects

• Each role should have a Vision Statement.

• Keep the people relevant to a role visible and available.– The author recommends using photos.

• Organize and group roles into a Task Hierarchy.

• Each role should have its own schedule.

PRM Requirements

• Unified Framework for information organization.

• Visual, spatial layout to group tasks and allow fast switching and resumption of roles.

• Multi-window actions for better arrangement• Information access?? p. 470• Remove non-task-dominant actions to free a

user’s cognitive resources.

Layout of a PRM• Studies show that a multi-window layout increases productivity by

allowing one action to control several windows (p. 471).

• Elastic Windows group related windows into a larger space.– The author recommends nesting and tiling.

• Each container window contains only the member windows related to the task.

• Provide smooth transition between roles.• Container windows should provide common actions such as open or

save can be applied to an entire group.• Allow users to move, resize and collapse container windows easily• See figure 13.18 on p. 471

Summary and New Ideas

• Users expect to be able to perform typical actions easily and conveniently.

• Overlapping windows can look nice but can clutter the screen.

• Keep related windows together• Automate multiple window actions to increase

productivity.• Eye tracking studies have been used to study new

window layouts and analyze the sequence of actions when performing a task.

• New High-resolution displays are allowing new window designs to be studied.