An Integrated Environment for Testing and Assessing the Usability of Information Appliances Using Digital and Physical Mock-Ups

Executing user-test of information appliances costs much due to fabrication of physical functional mockups, the securing of human subjects for the test, and preparation of testing facilities. Results of the user test have to be manually analyzed by usability engineers, and the analysis takes a couple of weeks. In this paper, we propose an integrated software and hardware environment for prototyping and assessing usability of information appliances where the users can operate a user-interface either of a 2D digital mockup or 3D digital mockup or a physical-mockup of the appliance under the test. This function enables engineers to test and evaluate the usability of the appliances both from the cognitive aspect and from the physical aspects.