CS459/559 Human-Computer Interaction

CS459/559 

Human-Computer Interaction 

Fall 2011 

Prof. Searleman 

jets@clarkson.edu

Outline 

� Course objectives 

� Administrivia 

� Introduction to Interaction Design 

� Motivating Examples 

� Good & Bad Designs

Course Objectives 

� This course is an introduction to the field of 

Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) 

� Students will learn how to design, evaluate and 

implement interactive systems from the user’s 

perspective

Administrivia 

� course webpage: 

http://www.clarkson.edu/~jets/cs459 

� contact info: 

office: SC375 & Applied CS Labs:VR (SC364) 

phone: 268-2377, 

email: jets@clarkson.edu,

Textbook 

� Designing the User Interface, 5 th Edition, by 

Shneiderman & Plaisant, Addison Wesley, 

2010, 

ISBN-10 0-321-53735-1 

ISBN-13 9780321537355 

(referred to as DTUI 

throughout the course) 

� Companion website to DTUI

Other References 

� Interaction Design: beyond human-computer interaction, 

2 nd edition, Preece, Rogers & Sharp, Addison-Wesley, 

2005, ISBN 0-321-19786-0 (called the ID2 book) 

� User Interface Design and Evaluation, by Stone, Jarrett, 

Woodroffe & Minocha, Morgan Kaufmann, 2005, ISBN 0- 

12-088436-4 

� About Face 3: The Essentials of Interaction Design, 

Cooper, Reimann & Cronin, Wiley, 2007, 

ISBN 0470084111 

also see the “on-line resources” on the course webpage

Grading Scheme 

CS459 CS559 

� Assignments* 20% 15% 

� Presentation(s) 20% 25% 

� Project* 40% 40% 

� Midterm Exams 15% 15% 

� Class participation 5% 5% 

Attendance: Participation in class discussions are an 

essential part of this course, so attendance is required 

and you must be prepared for class (i.e. have done the 

reading in advance). 

*We will be using Clarkson’s Usability Lab (in CEC)

Presentations… 

� Each student in CS459 and CS559 will deliver a 

presentation based on an area of human-computer 

interaction (a list of suggested topics and 

references will be posted on the course webpage). 

� In addition to this, each student in CS559 will also 

present a research-level paper to the class. All 

students will write a reaction paper to it (details to 

follow later). 

� The presentation evaluation sheet is online here; it 

may be useful when you plan your talk.

Project 

� The goal of the course project is to give you 

experience with designing and evaluating an 

interactive product. 

� The focus of the project is on the interaction 

design and evaluation, so the actual 

application can be a simple (but working) 

prototype 

� This can be integrated with another software 

project you are working on (for example, for 

CS350), as approved by both instructors.

Policies… 

� Late submission policy: 

� Maximum 2 late days per assignment/project deliverable 

� Each late day penalized with 10% 

� No late days for presentations and test 

� Example: a 90/100 worth assignment gets 81/100 if one 

day late (90*0.9 = 81) or 72/100 if two days late (90*0.8 

= 72) 

� Legal notices on the world-wide web: Read 

and comply with accompanying legal notices of 

downloadable material 

� Specify all references used 

� Plagiarism and cheating: will not be tolerated

Motivating examples 

Why study Human-Computer Interaction?

American Airlines Flight 965 

� Crashed near Cali, Colombia in 1995 

� Official cause: “pilot error” 

� Real cause: poor design


� Boeing 757 cockpit


� Pilots manually navigate only during takeoff, 

landing, inclement weather, emergencies. 

� Navigate by traveling between beacons 

� Flight management system


� Most common way to navigate to next beacon 

� Enter first letter of beacon 

� To navigate to “Rozo” beacon 

� Pilots enter “R” on flight management system 

� Plane navigates towards “Romeo” beacon 

� Flight management system does not provide 

feedback on chosen beacon


� Plane headed in the wrong direction, 

eventually crashing on a mountain 

� Speed brakes not disengaged when trying to 

accelerate 

http://sunnyday.mit.edu/accidents/calirep.html


� Lessons 

� Expert users make mistakes 

� Feedback 

� Consistency 

� System state needs to match state expected 

by users

Mizuho Securities Stock Sale 

� Software used to trade in Tokyo Stock 

Exchange 

� Trader for Mizuho tried to sell 

� 1 share of J-Com for 610,000 yen 

� Instead he sold 

� 610,000 shares of J-Com for 1 yen each 

� Software warned him, but he ignored warning 

� Attempted to undo, but it was not possible


� Confidence in Tokyo Stock Exchange 

damaged 

� Shares in NTT, rival of software maker, 

jumped 11% 

� $331,000,000 loss from trade for Mizuho 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4512962.stm


� Lessons 

� Busy people in a hurry more likely to make 

mistakes 

� Users rarely read warning messages because 

they rarely matter 

� Good designs expect mistakes to happen 

� Provide “undo” capabilities

IT Stress Driving UK to Drink 

� Poll by UK charity found a third of men and a 

quarter of women drink to cope with stress 

� Almost one third said IT problems were a major 

cause of stress 

� Top cause of stress cited, followed by finances 

and commuting 

� Not as severe in effect as other issues (e.g. 

death, divorce), but much more common

IT Stress Driving UK to Drink 

� Lessons 

� Widespread use of technology means 

stressful interactions can have negative 

impact on society 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4602872.stm

Success Stories: WWW and Google

Success of the World Wide Web 

� Technology available 10 years before WWW 

appeared 

� Graphical user interfaces 

� Modems 

� Internet 

� Hypertext

World Wide Web (cont.) 

� Interface made difference 

� Not geared towards experts 

� Tim Berners-Lee worked at CERN 

� Web browser 

� Simplicity 

� Consistency 

� Easy to recuperate from errors 

� Easy to learn and remember

Success of Google 

� Simple interface to access very powerful 

technology 

� Helps you notice and remediate typos

Chapter 1: 

What is interaction design?

We live with the technology 

iPod 

Auto Mobile 

Smart 

Fridge 

iTV 

SMS 

3G Mobile Phones 

Cooking Arrangement

Interaction Design goes beyond 

Desktop Computing 

- Ubiquitous Computing 

- Pervasive Systems 

- Tangible Interfaces 

- Ambient Intelligence 

- Context-aware Systems 

- Augmented Reality 

Increasing influence of these technologies on our 

day-to-day lives has fuelled a shift to usercentric 

design

What is Interaction Design (ID)? 

� Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) is: “concerned with 

the design, evaluation and implementation of interactive 

computing systems for human use and with the study of 

major phenomena surrounding them” (ACM SIGCHI) 

� Interaction Design (ID) is: Designing interactive products 

to support people in their everyday and working lives. 

(Sharp, Rogers and Preece 2007) 

We will concentrate on the design of computer technologies 

“The old computing is about what computers can do; the new 

computing is about what people can do” - Ben Shneiderman

What it isn’t 

� Classic Software engineering 

� How to build functional, efficient, robust software on 

time given specifications 

� Usually not concerned with how users will interact 

with software 

� GUI design (Graphical User Interfaces) 

� Implies that you put something between people and 

code 

� Code developed independently from interface 

� Process does not start with users’ goals in mind

Evolution of HCI ‘interfaces’ 

� 50s - Interface at the hardware level for engineers - 

switch panels 

� 60-70s - interface at the programming level - COBOL, 

FORTRAN 

� 70-90s - Interface at the terminal level - command 

languages 

� 80s - Interface at the interaction dialogue level - GUIs, 

multimedia 

� 90s - Interface at the work setting - networked systems, 

groupware 

� 00s - Interface becomes pervasive 

� RF tags, Bluetooth technology, mobile devices, 

consumer electronics, interactive screens, embedded 

technology

HCI and interaction design

Relationship between ID, HCI 

and other fields 

• Academic disciplines contributing 

to ID: 

– Psychology 

– Social Sciences 

– Computing Sciences 

– Engineering 

– Ergonomics 

– Informatics



• Design practices contributing to ID: 

– Graphic design 

– Product design 

– Artist-design 

– Industrial design 

– Film industry



• Interdisciplinary fields that „do‟ 

interaction design: 

– HCI 

– Human Factors 

– Cognitive Engineering 

– Cognitive Ergonomics 

– Computer Supported Co-operative Work 

– Information Systems

Working in multidisciplinary teams 

• Many people from different 

backgrounds involved 

• Different perspectives 

and ways of seeing 

and talking about things 

• Benefits 

– more ideas and designs 

generated 

• Disadvantages 

– difficult to communicate and 

progress forward the designs being create

Interaction design in business 

• Increasing number of ID consultancies, 

examples of well known ones include: 

– Nielsen Norman Group: “help companies enter 

the age of the consumer, designing humancentered 

products and services” 

– Cooper: ”From research and product to goalrelated 

design” 

– Swim: “provides a wide range of design services, 

in each case targeted to address the product 

development needs at hand” 

– IDEO: “creates products, services and 

environments for companies pioneering new ways 

to provide value to their customers”

What do professionals do in the 

ID business? 

• interaction designers - people involved in the 

design of all the interactive aspects of a product 

• usability engineers - people who focus on 

evaluating products, using usability methods and 

principles 

• web designers - people who develop and create 

the visual design of websites, such as layouts 

• information architects - people who come up 

with ideas of how to plan and structure interactive 

products 

• user experience designers (UX) - people who 

do all the above but who may also carry out field 

studies to inform the design of products

Assignment 

� Start reading Chapter 1 in the DTUI book, and 

browse through the companion website 

(introduction, starters & Chapter 1). 

� Activity#1 (to prepare for class on Wednesday): 

(1) Find out more about at least 4 of the terms on 

Slide 29. 

(2) Take a critical look at Peoplesoft from an HCI 

point of view and list three good points and three 

bad points. 

Type your answers and pass in a printout on 

Thursday’s class.

CS459/559 Human-Computer Interaction

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