#125245 - keldon - Thu Apr 12, 2007 9:20 am
I am thinking about a method of teaching a UI by creating lessons that reduce the choice of the user to enable them to only carry out small tasks. Look at all the modern music sequencing programs, hundreds of possible functions yet a learner only wants to see one or two of them at a time.
In fact I think you could almost teach them entirely with just the reduced UI's and not even have to create any text to help them, which could be another area of research.
Any thoughts / suggestions?
#125257 - sgeos - Thu Apr 12, 2007 11:43 am
Depends on the scope and treatment- what else you compare it to, etc.
-Brendan
#125260 - keldon - Thu Apr 12, 2007 12:33 pm
Well typical teaching/learning methods tend to be heavily based around this sort of order:
- introduction of complete problem domain
- single lesson on area of problem domain
- - introduction to practicality of lesson
- - theory involved in lesson
- - lesson activity
- - reflection of activity with reference to theory
- ^^ continue to next lesson until the domain is believed to have been covered sufficiently
This method is flawed as it does not cater for many different types of user well. You will find many people only gaining an understanding upon reflection, whilst others during the theory. I have seen some tutors teach mostly through the activity and allowing the user to explore the application themselves, only teaching them when the user wants to do something new.
This can be put into various contexts, not just UI. You can use this to teach many aspects of development; for example with every Win32API exercise you will find yourself rewriting the same calls. It may be better to restrict their time to code directly related to the topic/lesson; but then maybe not. But long story it should be easier to learn a gui with reduced functionality. If you have only one menu option to create a song and two (non modal) action buttons then less thought is required to figure out what to do.
This topic is a bit of a backup to another more complex concept that may be more PhD / R&D material.
#125267 - ScottLininger - Thu Apr 12, 2007 2:20 pm
I think it's a fascinating idea. Context-intelligent UIs are the "next big thing" in commercial UI design, and your approach seems like a parallel path: present the user with what they need, when they need it, and don't bother them with stuff that's irrelevant. Learning a foreign UI can be an extremely challenging thing.
There's been much talk about MS Office 2007 and its new UI. The story I heard is that Microsoft polled its users for improvements they'd like to see in MS Word, and 85% of the suggestions where things that Word ALREADY DID. People had the power, but they never learned the UI "deeply" enough to use that power. So Microsoft implemented a more context-aware approach, and people seem to like it.
-Scott
#125723 - MrD - Mon Apr 16, 2007 9:48 am
| Quote: |
| a learner only wants to see one or two of them at a time. |
<Phoenix Wright>ASSUMPTION!</Phoenix Wright>
Everybody that I've known who's ever used Newtek Lightwave has had absolutely no problem with the insane amount of options at their disposal.
_________________
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#125725 - keldon - Mon Apr 16, 2007 10:11 am
Completely different demographic of people who already know what they are looking for and aren't learning as such. Pick a beginner and see how quick they sift through the insane amount of options. People like us may be a completely different story, it didn't take me long to make a walking robot in Truespace, or my aeroplane in Realsoft; but I'm sure that wouldn't be expected from the 'casual user' in such a short space of time.