Linked by Mayuresh Walke on Thu 21st Apr 2005 08:01 UTC
What's the best way to: a. Improve usability in software applications? b. Review usability of existing software? c. Generate, encourage and review new ideas on software UI design? d. Make all this research work freely available to everyone (open source, proprietary, etc.)? e. Connect with all developer groups and individuals out there to share this work with them? Read more to find out.
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From the article:
"The only place where this goes on in a structured manner is in companies with big R and D budgets, e.g. Apple, Microsoft, Macromedia (now Adobe), etc."
Try academia (this is where bunches of industry UI specialists jump out to insist that they are the only ones to do things). Trust me - whether you like it or not, the zooming user interface came from academia (Ken Perlin and Ben Bederson - not Jef Raskin) and the Web (Berners-Lee) among others. Industry may have taken the ideas and made them "glossy", but the idea came from academia.
I also have doubts about a forum being the right place for effective usability design. In my industrial experience, UI people rarely play well with each other. Often there is a maximum number of people that can participate before it all breaks down into pointless arguments. Placing the thing on the web would probably increase this.
I wonder sometimes if people are aware that HCI is an empirical pursuit - conditions can be tested against each other according to criteria to see which solution is best. I recommend "The Psychology of Human-Computer Interaction" by Card, Moran and Newell. Those interested in HCI and usability should read this: it's good (though old).