Interface Design: An Embedded Process for Human Computer Interactivity

INTRODUCTION This chapter will address the issues of interface design and incorporation of human behavior factors into the design process. The traditional process engineering approach to software development embeds interface design as a task component. However, the interface design process has grown as a discipline and is beyond the single process within a larger scheme that may be lost on the priority list. The functionality and specifications for software developers tend to focus on the project and less on the product. In addition, bridging the gap of the design process to include global elements of the software is an issue for products that are internationally distributed. It is something that the computer industry must address and has been historically unsuccessful at doing. Incorporating human interactivity and screen design requires an understanding of the user and their behavior that is not part of the traditional tasks of most designers and programmers. This chapter presents the importance of human interactivity and interface design as an embedded process. There are major strides towards interface design in the software process. The many approaches and theories guide the practitioner down a path that is normally practiced by graphic designers, artists, writers, psychologists, or marketing personnel. In many cases, the traditional software developer wears many hats plunging into a world of creativity and human behavior. These disciplines are not a natural path for developers who may began their career being computer savvy joining the ranks of the computer experts. Their successes have moved them up the ranks of the industry to lead many projects deemed for global markets. Initially, many human factors did not play a major role in user interface design. Many of the interactive systems were products of manager decisions or it was implied for the product. Individuals involved in human behavior factors were brought into the projects in the middle or later in the project until they were no longer needed (Hix and Hartsen, 1993). Traditionally, designers have aimed at developing software products that meet the functional requirements of the application domain. We are moving into the direction of incorporating the behavioral domain of the user interaction developer that is responsible for class definitions, interaction design, and human factors engineering (Hix and Hartsen,