El.pub Analytic Issue
Number 4El.pub Analytic Issue
Number 4
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Contents: The problem with WAP is... | Does usability testing hold the answers? | The mobile network - revising the promises | Mobile information services can succeed | Wireless solutions are being adopted | Powerful mobile computing devices hold the key | WAP viability hindered by lack of usability
In the meantime WAP looks as though it has permanently missed the bus. It is a pity that usability testing and user centred design are not more widely used. Perhaps some investors and telcos would be in better financial shape, if they had put a little more effort into seeing that their designers tested the product concept and carried out task analysis with real users before entering the market.
Similar problems are exhibited in other emerging "content delivery markets" - such as DVD. Having bought a DVD player recently I am appalled at the interface design. It is not only the WAP designers who have learnt nothing about usability. The DVD designer has essentially the same palette of functions as the CD-ROM designer.
Why do we have exactly the same sort of dreadful interactive navigation that we had with early CD-ROM? Menus where the order of icons-as-buttons is unrelated to the content order. Icons that are unrelated to their function - for example, a picture of the world that indicates 'go back to the start menu'. I guess the answer is that the DVD designers are film hacks who have never used a PC - just like the publishers were in the early days of CD-ROM. Oh well, here we go again.
For more information on usability and user centred design visit our pages on the subject at: http:/www.elpub.org/use-bck.htm
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© 2024 Copyright and disclaimer El.pub and www.elpub.org are brand names owned by Logical Events Limited - no unauthorised use of them or the contents of this website is permitted without prior permission.