Human Computer Interaction

INTRODUCTION

COURSE OUTLINE & OVERVIEW

 Things you need to know....
Text Book:
• Human-Computer Interaction by Alan Dix (Latest
Edition) - available in Lib

Reference Books:
• Interaction Design: Beyond Human-Computer
Interaction by Preece, Jenny (Latest Edition)

• About Face 2.0: The Essentials of Interaction

Design by Alan Cooper, Robert Riemann (Latest
Edition)
 Course Description & Topics
• This course provides an introduction to the
fundamentals and dynamics of human-
computer interaction.
• Topics included are:
– HCI goals and history
– Human characteristics
– User-centered design
 Course Agenda

• Credits Hours (3+0)

 Why we are studying HCI???

 To open your EYES
 To open your MIND
 To change the way you THINK
 Course Agenda….

• What is HCI ?
“Human Computer Interaction is a discipline
concerned with the design, evaluation and
implementation of interactive computing
systems for human use and with the study of
major phenomena surrounding them.”
-ACM/IEEE
 Learning Outcomes/Goals
• Upon completion of this course, students should
be able to:
– Understand the importance and significance of
human-computer interactions
– Understand human characteristics and computer
system characteristics affecting human-computer
interaction
– Adopt suitable usability engineering lifecycle models
and methodologies for developing computer systems
– Design user-interfaces through prototyping
techniques
– Evaluate user interfaces through heuristics and
usability testing
 Contents From The Book
• Human, Computer and their Interaction
• Human Psychology and Ergonomics
• Interaction Paradigms
• Interaction design basics
• HCI in the software process
• Design rules
• Implementation support
• Evaluation techniques
• Universal Design
 Contents From The Book …..
• User Support
• Cognitive Model
• Socio-economical issues & Stakeholders
Requirements
• Communication & Collaborative Model
• Task Analysis
• Dialog Notations and Design
• Models of the System
• Modeling Rich Interaction
• Groupware
• Ubiquitous Computing & Augmented Realities
 Course Outline
• Cognitive Frameworks
• Interaction Paradigms
• User-Centered Design Approaches
• Requirements
• User Researches
• Interface Designing
• Visual Designs
• Error Messages
• Usability Testing
 Course Outline…..
• Collaborative System Design
• Multimodal Interfaces
• Ubiquitous Computing
• Haptics and Virtual Reality
• Information and Data Visualization
• Mobile Devices
• Special Needs Interfaces
• Localization
• Organizational Aspects
Where HCI falls?
 HCI
• So let us discuss briefly about the three main
components of HCI.
– The Human
– The Computer
– The Interaction
 The Human
• As a human, we have various ways of
perceiving the world around us.
 The Human
• There are a few more as well like smelling and
tasting but we will not deal with those as
much.
 The Human
• But, we have more than senses. We have
memory, skills, expertise, skills, etc.
 The Human and HCI
• In HCI, we have to take in consideration every
element of the human, from the way they
perceive and interact with the world, to their
long history of using computers and
technologies.
 The Computer
• All of these are computers.
 The Computer
• But in fact these are also computers.
The Modern Computers
Cars are nowadays COMPUTERS!!!
 Computers are everywhere
• So, now a days, nearly everyone interacts with
computers as computers are everywhere.
 Interaction
• We have humans, we have computers. We are
interested in the interaction between them.
• Interaction can take different forms.
– Humans interacting with computer
– Computers interacting with humans in response
 What’s missing?
• This is a valid view but it perhaps misses the
more interesting part of HCI.
 The Task
• We can also think of humans interacting with
the task through the computer.

• The interaction is really between the user and

the task, the computer is in the middle.
 Invisibility of Interfaces
• Ideally in this case, we are interested in
making the interface as invisible as possible.

• So that the user can spend as little time

focusing on the interface and instead focus on
the tasks they are trying to accomplish.
 Invisibility of Interfaces
• Realistically, our interfaces are not 100%
invisible.
 Goal of Invisibility
• Our interfaces are likely to stay somewhat
visible.

• But our goal is to let the user spend as much

time as possible thinking about the task,
instead of the interface.
 Conclusion
• So our goal as designers is to help the humans
feel like they are interacting directly with the
task.
• While our interface, kind of vanishes, in the
middle of that interaction.
 Self Assessment
• All of us have used computers enough to
already have some experience in this area.
• So take a moment and reflect on some of the
tasks you do each day involving some kind of
computers.
• Try to think of an example where you spend
most of the time thinking about the task and
another example where you spend most of
the time thinking about the tool or interface.
 Examples
• Video games controllers
• Remote control
• TV buttons
• Touch screen