4. Digression: Design Standards and Guidelines

Question 1

What are the 3 types of design rules ?

Answer 1

• Principles: independent of tech
• Guidelines: tech oriented
• Standards: authoritative

Question 2

What are the 3 categories of Principles to Support Usability ?

Answer 2

• Learnability
• Flexibility
• Robustness: level of support

Question 3

When is a system easy to learn?

Answer 3

When it is:

• Predictable
• Synthesisable
• Familiar
• Generalisable

Question 4

When is a system flexible?

Answer 4

When it:

• allows freedom from artificial constraints
• user to do many tasks at a time
• tasks can migrate from user to system
• is customisable

Question 5

When is a system robust ?

Answer 5

When:

• users can evaluate state of the system of observation
• users can recover from errors
• when responses from system are prompt and stable

Question 6

What are the 8 Golden Rules of Interface Design by Schneiderman?

Answer 6

1. Strive for consistency
2. Cater to universal usability
3. Offer Informative Feedback
4. Design Dialog to Yield Closure
5. Prevent Error
6. Permit Easy Reversal of Actions
7. Support Internal Locus of Control
8. Reduce Short Term Memory Load