Usability engineering and user interface management

Development environments for planning, designing, implementing, and testing user interfaces from a usability point of view become of growing importance. This paper outlines some anticipated cornerstones of a user interface development environment incorporating cognitive aspects. An estimate of realistic progress in the near future is given on the basis of a sample current software development process. One significant problem area deals with elaborating usability test methods and related tools for current user interface technology, focusing on direct-manipulation interfaces. As an example, the aims and present status of the Software Ergonomics project at IBM Germany’s Heidelberg Scientific Center are presented.

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