Systematic Creativity in Software User Interface Design

The rate of emerging technological innovations has exceeded the rate at which individuals can assimilate new technologies into their lives. Yet, businesses continue a breakneck pace for the development of new technologies resulting in the creation of products based on a particular type of technology, i.e., technocentric product development, rather than on its utility and usability, i.e., user centric product development. One reason for this misplaced focus on technology rather than on the intended users, may be that few methodologies exist to genuinely incorporate the user in the product development cycle, which would otherwise more tightly link users’ requirements to product design and usability testing. This is especially the case for software user interface development. This paper identifies a framework of a discrete number of specific data classes fundamental to incorporating the user into product development. These data classes not only represent the user, but also foster a rational decision making process for product definition, design and usability testing. This framework can be used independently of the requirements techniques used for acquiring the data from users and independently of the software development methodology used in the product development process, which implies that these general data class types are applicable to nearly all software development projects. The framework guides requirements data acquisition and facilitates requirements evaluation for systematically exploring alternative designs and testing those designs. The framework also provides necessary systematic guidance to the design process, while retaining the necessary creativity to design a novel product and marketable user interface. Finally, the simplicity and practicality of the framework makes it attractive for use in real product development. An actual example is included to illustrate the main points of the paper.