Activity Theory for Design From Checklist to Interview - From Checklist to Interview

Cultural historical activity theory has shown much promise as a framework for Human Computer Interaction, particularly for analysing complex activity and its context. However, it provides little practical methodological support tbr user intert~ace designers. This paper presents an activity interview resource which can be used by interface designers when developing new tools to support creative activity. The new activity interview is based on the excellent foundation of the activity checklist, but resolves a number of its deficiencies. In particular it provides concrete questions to fuel an activity theory analysis, rather than the more abstract and less accessible checklist. We describe how we have dealt with these problems, and reflect on our experience applying the activity interview in the domain of computer mediated music production.