IRL - UX work design espoused by the ‘standard’ textbooks often assume perfection in the process. They assume that there are no limitations on the time required for the work to occur; they assume that there are no limitations on the skills required for the work to occur; and they assume that there are no limitations on the instruments required for the work to occur – to name but three.

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The User Experience
from 30,000ft
COMP33512
Week 09 – Lectures 17/18
Simon Harper
University of Manchester
Semester 2 – 2013/14
last update: March 19, 2014
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Discussion Topics Coursework # 3
‘Voice Loops as Cooperative Aids in Space Shuttle Mission
Control’ [Watts et al., 1996] (10 Marks) this paper shows just
how far UX and the techniques which it inherits from human
computer interaction can go. We are mainly concerned with
systems and objects which are purely commercial, however, in this
case failures in the human interface can have serious
consequences for a real-time mission, including the loss of the
vehicle. Further, these kind of UX techniques can also be found in
other critical interface components such as those controlling
nuclear power stations or fly-by-wire aircraft.
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UX Pop Quiz
1. What are qualitative methods and how do they differ from
quantitative ones?
2. What are the key problems with laboratory based work?
3. What problems may exist when undertaking single method
evaluation?
4. Why is co-operative evaluation different from other methods?
5. What tools are at the disposal of the ‘poor’ UXer?
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In Real Life
As Thoughtworks tells us:
Realistic;
Practical;
Pragmatic; and
Sloppy!
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Expectation Reality - Even in Ethnography
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Commissioning Constraints
Constraints:
Just–In–Time;
Too–Little–Time;
Non–Specialist;
Inadequately Funded;
Pre–Supposed Outcome;
Implicit Overrun;
Due Diligence; and
UnConstrained Experiment!
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Expand on These
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Information Requirements
Requirements:
Flavour Elicitation;
Ideas Elicitation;
Informal Elicitation;
Formal Elicitation;
Pre–Supposed Outcome; and
Laboratory Elicitation.
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Expand on These
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Limitations
Limits:
Time;
Participants;
Resources; and
Skills.
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Expand on These
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Available Skills
UXer Skill Sets:
Instrumentation;
Data Collection; and
Data Analysis.
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Let’s Have a Break!
Back in 10 Minutes!
Come see me now if you have
Questions Regarding this Lecture!
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Optimism
We are Optimistic - we think we can create software that will
help users / make their lives better / make us money (?-yuck!).
We think we will bash every bug, satisfy every requirement,
develop elegant and beautiful code.
This Optimism can be our downfall!
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Brooks
Managing the development of IBM’s System/360 family of
computers and the OS/360 software support package, then
later writing candidly about the process;
The mythical man-month : essays on software engineering.
Addison-Wesley Pub. Co., Reading, Mass., 1995;
Winner of the National Medal of Technology in 1985 and the
Turing Award in 1999.
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Optimism – Lessons from Brooks
Adding People - Perfectly Partitionable Task
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Optimism – Lessons from Brooks
Adding People
‘Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later’
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Optimism – Lessons from Brooks
Adding People - Unpartitionable Task
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Optimism – Lessons from Brooks
Second System Effect
‘When it comes to creating the second version the developers are
buoyed by their expertise and mastery of the first system and try
to cram in as many of the flourishes and embellishments from the
first system as is possible’
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Optimism – Lessons from Brooks
Prediction Inaccuracy
‘What seems like short delays or inconsistencies in the work can
expand into very major delays’
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Optimism – Lessons from Brooks
Prediction Inaccuracy - Programming Rates
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Optimism – Lessons from Brooks
Prediction Inaccuracy - Debugging Rates
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Optimism – Lessons from Brooks
Throwaway Project
‘You should plan to throw away the first version of anything that
you create, be it a user interface design or an engineered
interaction. The first version often enables an understanding of
the system and aspects of the system development but it should
not be confused with a real live deployable user experience.’
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Optimism – Lessons from Brooks
Throwaway Project
‘Agile methods, and to some degree the iterative design cycle,
makes accommodation for these constantly changing factors. But
you should also realise that even though the project planner or
manager may have agreed a specification, that specification is
unlikely to be the one delivered.’
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Optimism – Lessons from David Parnas
Changes Happen
‘One thing that has come out of the work of David Parnas, and in
some cases may be transferred back, is the ability to think of a
software project as a family of related products; Parnas suggests
this method anticipates enhanced sideways extensions and
versioning.’
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Optimism – Lessons from David Parnas
Changes Happen
‘applications become highly partitioned enabling user experience
people to work on different interfaces for each member of this
family of related projects.’
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Silver Bullets – Lessons from Brooks
There is no single development, in either technology or
management technique, which by itself promises even a
tenfold improvement within a decade in productivity, in
reliability, in simplicity; and
We cannot expect ever to see two-fold gains every two years.
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Silver Bullets – Conclusions
‘While there might be no silver bullet (indeed the silver bullet may
take away some of the challenge, and therefore our fun), the best
advice I have is to always keep in mind the pessimistic view of an
optimistic visionary ‘most people are fools, most authority is
malignant, God does not exist, and everything is wrong.’.’
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Pop Quiz for next week...
1. You are suffering from the ‘Too–Little–Time’ constraint and
need to get a formative evaluation with 20 people
(employees of the factory commissioning your new
production line software) underway very quickly. At this
stage you only need qualitative results – how would you go
about getting this information in the fastest time possible,
and why would you be cautious?
2. What are commissioning constraints?
3. What is real world work limited by?
4. Why is optimism often a bad mindset to have when it comes
to planning UX work?
5. Describe the ‘Second System Effect’?
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To Do for next week...
1. Revision Questions;
2. Pop Quiz, Discuss Next Week; and
3. Read your notes.
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Any Questions?
Simon Harper 2.44 Kilburn Building
0161 275 0599 (OR x50599)
simon.harper@manchester.ac.uk
Office Hours: Friday 14:00–18:00
Figure: ‘Still Here!’
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