The Wizard of Oz: a tool for rapid development of user interfaces. Final report

The Wizard of Oz technique is an efficient way to examine user interaction with computers and facilitate rapid iterative development of dialog wording and logic. The technique requires two machines linked together, one for the user and one for the experimenter. The experimenter (the "wizard"), pretending to be a computer, responds to user queries either directly or by pressing function keys to which common messages have been assigned. The software automatically records the dialog and its timing. This report provides a detailed description of the initial implementation of the Oz paradigm using microcompu~ers, and a summary of previous applications on other machines. Implementation guidelines, emphasizing potential pitfalls and enhancements not currently included in the literature, are also presented.