Conference tnpubs::ipa_registry

ACTION PLAN
for
User Interfaces Task Force

Issued by:  	Date

Denny Dixon     23 April 93

Task Force Members:

Simon Belenky

Sue Bedenham 

Marge Silverman

Denny Dixon, Chairman

Joan Goldstein, Core Group Rep

1 
INTRODUCTION

The user interfaces task force will look for ways to make it easier for writers
and editors to contribute to their projects' user interface development. We
will identify currently available resources and apply them in evaluating the
interfaces of one or more products. 

We would also like to create or provide guidelines for  permanent  usability
evaluation groups in  T&N Publications.   This would enhance our skills on an
ongoing basis and keep a focus on user interface development. 

2 
SPECIFIC GOALS

The goals for the task force are ....

o Organize a semi-permanent T+N Publications usability review groups, which
would evaluate the user interfaces of Networks Engineering products.   There
would be a group in LKG and REO. 

o Establish and keep current a clearinghouse of guidelines and standards about
developing effective user interfaces.  Also,  we will recommend a process for
updating this "library" on an ongoing basis. 

o Evaluate the usability a product  with one of the following types of user
interfaces. 

  - Forms/menu

  - Command line

  - Graphic (windows)

3 
NON-GOALS 

The non-goals for the <name>task force include:

o We will not take part in the actual development (coding) of the user
interface of a product. 

4 
DELIVERABLES/IMPLEMENTATION

Deliverables include:

o A detailed  document that identifies resources for  user interface
development. 


o The basis of permanent T&N Pubs usability review groups in LKG and REO  -
staffing,  scope, goals,  funding. 

o Reports on our task force evaluation of forms/menu, command line, and windows
interfaces for  existing Networks Engineering (or other) products. 

o A demonstration of an existing interface  (one of the above)  and how it can
be improved. 

Implementation is:

o Members search for user interface material online, in books, in periodicals,
and in unpublished sources. 

o The task force uses the resources it identifies to evaluate existing user
interfaces.  This would be done at  task force meetings.  Formal reports will
be generated from meeting minutes. 

o The task force will use one of its interface evaluations in a presentation to
demonstrate how an existing interface can be improved. 

o The task force generates a proposal for usability review groups. This will
happen later in the year; after we identify resources and gain experience in
interface evaluation.  After approval of a proposal,  staffing and an action
plan will be generated. 

5 
SCHEDULE

Milestone 				Start Date	   End Date

Submit Action Plan to Core Team		April 23, 1993     April 23, 1993

Quarterly Status Report         	April 23, 1993     April 30, 1993

Quarterly Status Report       		July 16, 1993      July 23, 1993

Quarterly Status Report       		October 15, 1993   October 22, 1993

Present Taskforce Results 		December 10, 1993  December 17, 1993

MINUTES; IPA INTERFACES TASK FORCE; 07 May 93

ATTENDEES: Sue Bedenham (Reading), Simon Belenky, Joan Goldstein, Denny
Dixon (LKG)

EVALUATING THE SITE ROOM SCHEDULING SYSTEM (SRS) INTERFACE
DECwindows Interface for SRS...
Just after this meeting I received a note from a group at Merrimack that 
is developing the new SRS DECwindows/Motif interface - a different group
than I'd contacted before.  SRS is a "background" project for this VMS
utilities group.  It won't be an external product , but they are
making steady progress in generating a GUI interface for the internal SRS
utility. "Field test" will start this summer sometime. No timetable is
available yet. I will request that we be a "field test" site.

Forms/Menus Interface for SRS...
Great progress in this area. Sue volunteered to set up an evaluation of
the current SRS forms/menu interface. She will use the T+N Pubs human
factors lab in Reading.  ACTIONS: Sue will send out a plan during the week
of 10 May, and Denny will notify the people who own SRS (see above).  

THE HUMAN FACTORS LAB AT REO
Sue explained that there would be no costs for our using the lab for
usability/interface testing. T+N Pubs now owns the lab.  An issue could be
schedule conflicts between third party (e.g., Microsoft) testing and any
testing by T+N Pubs people. 

GUIDELINES LIBRARY
We decided to investigate using the IPA_REGISTRY notes conference to store
guidelines/pointers.  This may not be a  good way to go, however, unless we
can have a "dedicated" note with replies dealing exclusively with this
guideline information. As of now we have only a single note for
minutes, action plans. proposals. To add the guidelines info to that note
probably wouldn't work well.  And we need to sort out placing "registry"
vs "resource" info in this rather strictly moderated conference.
ACTION: Joan will check on the latter. For now, please send pointers about
any guidelines/standards to Simon.  

T+N PUBS QUASI-PERMANENT USABILITY GROUP(S)
We will spend most of the next meeting brainstorming ways to establish a
usability review group in T+N Pubs.  Joan mentioned that our human
factors lab at REO is a great asset and that we could evaluate several
LKG-developed products at once to save travel $$$$. 

ACTION PLAN
Denny had planned to represent the task force at the IPA Core meeting on
May 13. However, because of a project commitment, Denny will  do so at
the May 27 meeting.

OUR NEXT MEETING
May 21 at 10:30 US time, 3.30 UK time.

Sorry to run on so... Better next time.

MINUTES; IPA INTERFACES TASK FORCE; 28 May 93

ATTENDEES: Sue Bedenham (Reading), Denny Dixon (LKG)

EVALUATING THE SITE ROOM SCHEDULING SYSTEM (SRS) INTERFACE
Forms/Menus Interface for SRS...

This was the sole item of discussion with only Sue and I attending.

Sue distributed an evaluation plan for SRS on 13 May. Her plan calls for
testing the SRS interface with naive users and with experienced SRS users.
Sue and Marge Silverman will recruit inexperienced users at REO; probably
secretaries or other people likely to use such an application.

Since we have experienced users at LKG only (SRS isn't routinely
available in REO), we will recruit people and carry out the
experienced-user testing here.  The LKG testing will be done after the
REO part. Since we have no human factors lab at LKG, we will not do video
recording, but will do the post-test interview and questionnaire as
outlined in Sue's plan.

Issues for the SRS testing are outlined in Sue's evaluation plan. The
issues will be addressed by the task force.

ACTION: Denny will send Sue any information required to expedite running
SRS at Reading.

ACTION: Sue will send Denny the pre-test background questionnaire that
participants will complete. 

NEXT MEETING
mid-June 93

MINUTES; IPA INTERFACES TASK FORCE; 22 July 93 

ATTENDEES: Sue Bedenham (Reading), Simon Belenky, Denny Dixon (LKG)

EVALUATING THE SITE ROOM SCHEDULING SYSTEM (SRS) INTERFACE

We've more or less abandoned the idea of evaluating the SRS forms/menus
interface in favor or testing the SRS OSF/Windows interface.  The SRS
developers encouraged this because there is virtually no way
that they can fund redesign of the form/menus interface.  And since the
Windows interface is currently under development, our input would be
timely and valuable.

We decided to test SRS for Windows in parallel at LKG and in REO; assuming
we can get access. There may not be kits yet. We will monitor use of SRS
and take notes. LKG will use experienced SRS users: REO inexperienced users.

Also, the Reading human factors lab is set up at present only for
character-cell interfaces. So it appears that we will not be able to use
the video recording facilities to test a Windows interface.

ACTION: Denny will check on the Windows support for character-cell
terminals.

ACTION: Sue will contact the SRS developer to explain what we're now planning.

TESTING THE DECTRANSPORTER INTERFACE

Rikk Hallowell is working on DECtransporter.  This product allows TCP/IP
applications running on PCs or laptops to communicate with servers running
on VMS - all over dial-in or wireless LANs. On the PC, the MS-DOS or MS-Windows 
interface lets you install and configure the product. Rikk suggests that we
evaluate this interface. 

ACTION: Denny has the floppies and will try to get a PC to install them.
Also, if possible, he will send copies to Sue for parallel testing.

For testing both the SRS and DECtransporter interfaces, we will meet
(remotely) to work out a testing plan. 

COLLECTING GUIDELINES

Simon will search a variety of notes files and elsewhere online for
DECwindows or MS-Windows interface guidelines. Denny will check for hardcopy
guidelines.

INFORMAL OR FORMAL TASK FORCE?

Simon opened a discussion of our possibly becoming an informal task force.
The reason: we probably will not have a "formal" how-to document as a
deliverable.  We will discuss this further at the next meeting.

NEXT MEETING

Thursday, July 29, 10:30 US, 3:30 UK.

Denny

MINUTES; IPA INTERFACES TASK FORCE; 29 July 93 

ATTENDEES: Sue Bedenham (Reading), Simon Belenky, Joan Goldstein,
Denny Dixon (LKG)

EVALUATING THE SITE ROOM SCHEDULING SYSTEM (SRS) INTERFACE

Denny was in touch with our SRS development contact (Ira Lustman). He
(and possibly Simon) will visit MKO on Aug 6 for a demo of their new DECwindows
interface. There is no kit that we can install on our own systems and an
issue here is how we evaluate the GUI in a demo context.
We will review the DECwindows Style Guide prior to the demo and also
evaluate the GUI from a seat-of-the-pants usability perspective. We
will probably give our feedback on the spot on an informal basis.


TESTING THE DECTRANSPORTER INTERFACE

Denny and Simon will install and evaluate the DECtransporter DECwindows
interface prior to the next meeting.  Denny sent copies of the
DECtransporter discs to Sue.

As a basis for evaluation, we will be using the DECwindows Companion to the
OSF/Motif Style Guide.

COLLECTING GUIDELINES

Simon has compiled a list of Notes conferences in which we can look for
practical guidelines for evaluating interfaces. ACTION: Simon will send the
list of conferences to the task force and begin searching for guidelines.

OUR GOALS AND OBJECTIVES 

We discussed the testing we're doing/planning in light of the goals and
deliverables that we've committed to. One thought is that we carry on
with what testing we can and assign what what we learn to our
goals/deliverables.  ACTION: Denny will bring a list of our objectives to
the next meeting for discussion.  

INFORMAL OR FORMAL TASK FORCE?

We talked about possibly changing from a formal to informal task force. We
will attempt to decide at the next meeting.

NEXT MEETING

Thursday, August 12; 10AM US, 3PM UK 

MINUTES; IPA INTERFACES TASK FORCE; 06 Dec 93

ATTENDEES: Sue Bedenham (Reading); Simon Belenky,
Denny Dixon (LKG)

OUR DELIVERABLES

We need to complete two deliverables during December: 

. An "informal: report about what we've done and possible future directions

. A one-slide presentation for a core team meeting

REPORT

Here's the outline we decided upon:

. Work completed -  an informal evaluation of the existing SRS conference room
  reservation utility; a collection of guidelines for generating user
  interfaces; a test plan for a formal evaluation the SRS utility.

. Work in progress - evaluation of the RoamAbout (formerly DECtransporter)
  interface. 

. Future directions - RoamAbout usability; integration with the IDC
  usability expertise center

We discussed at length who will do what for the report (via VAX DOCUMENT).
These are ACTION items for each of us: 

Simon: compilation of guidelines

Sue: usability test plan for SRS, some comments on RoamAbout interface.

Denny: SRS interface evaluation, status of RoamAbout evaluation,
       future directions, generation of the report.

SLIDE PRESENTATION

Denny will check with Joan on the date and format for the slide
presentation.  Denny will present.

SCHEDULE

Report sections sent to Denny by Monday, December 13.

Full report sent out for review on Friday, December 17.