Tailoring Usability into Agile Software Development Projects

Multimodal interfaces are becoming more common, even in the field of safety critical interactive software, mainly due to the naturalness of the interaction that increases the bandwidth between the user and the system they are interacting with. However, the specificities of multimodal interactive systems make it difficult to gather information from the use of modalities and to extract from this information recommendations for improving the multimodal user interfaces. This chapter aims at presenting how abstract information described in models can be fruitfully exploited to improve the quality of evaluations of multimodal interfaces. The approach presented in this chapter combines model-based verification (based on simulation scenario extraction generated from models) and empirical methods for usability evaluation. Our aim is to try to bring together two separated (and often opposite) issues, such as usability and reliability, into the development of safety critical systems. This approach is illustrated via a Space Ground System of a satellite control room, whose multimodal interaction technique is fully described by the means of formal models.

[1]  Daniela Gorski Trevisan,et al.  Modeling interaction for image-guided procedures , 2003, SPIE Medical Imaging.

[2]  Alexander H. Waibel,et al.  Model-based and empirical evaluation of multimodal interactive error correction , 1999, CHI '99.

[3]  Philippe A. Palanque,et al.  An approach integrating two complementary model-based environments for the construction of multimodal interactive applications , 2006, Interact. Comput..

[4]  Marco Winckler,et al.  A Formal Description of Multimodal Interaction Techniques for Immersive Virtual Reality Applications , 2005, INTERACT.

[5]  Sharon L. Oviatt,et al.  Ten myths of multimodal interaction , 1999, Commun. ACM.

[6]  Shumin Zhai,et al.  Improving Browsing Performance: A study of four input devices for scrolling and pointing tasks , 1997, INTERACT.

[7]  Luciana Porcher Nedel,et al.  Testing the Use of Egocentric Interactive Techniques in Immersive Virtual Environments , 2003, INTERACT.

[8]  Jo W. Tombaugh,et al.  Measuring the true cost of command selection: techniques and results , 1990, CHI '90.

[9]  Philippe Palanque,et al.  Multimodal and 3D Graphic Man Machine Interfaces to Improve Operations , 2004 .

[10]  Richard A. Bolt,et al.  Two-handed gesture in multi-modal natural dialog , 1992, UIST '92.

[11]  T. Ichikawa,et al.  Egocentric Object Manipulation in Virtual Environments: Empirical Evaluation of Interaction Techniques , 1998, Comput. Graph. Forum.

[12]  James Reason,et al.  Human Error , 1990 .

[13]  Ann Blandford,et al.  People and Computers XV - Interaction without Frontiers : Joint Proceedings of HCI 2001 and IHM 2001 , 2001 .

[14]  Niels Ole Bernsen,et al.  New challenges in usability evaluation - beyond task-oriented spoken dialogue systems , 2004, INTERSPEECH.

[15]  Ann Blandford,et al.  Four easy pieces for assessing the usability of multimodal interaction: the CARE properties , 1995, INTERACT.

[16]  Cathleen Wharton,et al.  Testing a walkthrough methodology for theory-based design of walk-up-and-use interfaces , 1990, CHI '90.

[17]  Jan Stage,et al.  New techniques for usability evaluation of mobile systems , 2004, Int. J. Hum. Comput. Stud..

[18]  Christian Bauckhage,et al.  Combining speech and haptics for intuitive and efficient navigation through image databases , 2003, ICMI '03.

[19]  Mary Lou Soffa,et al.  Automated test oracles for GUIs , 2000, SIGSOFT '00/FSE-8.

[20]  Dominique L. Scapin,et al.  Ergonomic criteria adapted to human virtual environment interaction , 2003, IHM '03.

[21]  Philippe A. Palanque,et al.  Very-High-Fidelity Prototyping for Both Presentation and Dialogue Parts of Multimodal Interactive Systems , 2004, EHCI/DS-VIS.

[22]  Deborah Hix,et al.  Usability Evaluation in Virtual Environments: Classification and Comparison of Methods , 2001 .

[23]  Fabio Paternò,et al.  Designing And Developing Multi-User, Multi-Device Web Interfaces , 2006, CADUI.

[24]  Lynne Baillie,et al.  Exploring multimodality in the laboratory and the field , 2005, ICMI '05.

[25]  Dennis Proffitt,et al.  Two-handed virtual manipulation , 1998, TCHI.

[26]  Philippe A. Palanque,et al.  Formal Specification as a Tool for Objective Assessment of Safety-Critical Interactive Systems , 1997, INTERACT.

[27]  W. Buxton,et al.  A study in two-handed input , 1986, CHI '86.

[28]  Pierre Dragicevic,et al.  Input Device Selection and Interaction Configuration with ICON , 2001, BCS HCI/IHM.

[29]  Abigail Sellen,et al.  Two-handed input in a compound task , 1994, CHI 1994.

[30]  Richard A. Bolt,et al.  “Put-that-there”: Voice and gesture at the graphics interface , 1980, SIGGRAPH '80.

[31]  Rainer Stiefelhagen,et al.  Implementation and evaluation of a constraint-based multimodal fusion system for speech and 3D pointing gestures , 2004, ICMI '04.

[32]  Rainer Malaka,et al.  Multimodal interaction for pedestrians: an evaluation study , 2005, IUI '05.

[33]  Jean Vanderdonckt,et al.  Detecting Interaction Variables in a Mixed Reality System for Maxillofacial-guided Surgery , 2006 .

[34]  Cathleen Wharton,et al.  Cognitive Walkthroughs: A Method for Theory-Based Evaluation of User Interfaces , 1992, Int. J. Man Mach. Stud..

[35]  Joëlle Coutaz,et al.  Towards automatic evaluation of multimodal user interfaces , 1993, Knowl. Based Syst..

[36]  Philippe A. Palanque,et al.  A model-based approach for real-time embedded multimodal systems in military aircrafts , 2004, ICMI '04.