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An Experimental Usability Test for different Destination Recommender Systems
Abstract
The present paper outlines the experimental evaluation of travel recommendation systems. First, theoretical concepts concentrating on the influencing factors for human-computer interaction, system usage and satisfaction are reviewed. An introduction of various methods dealing with usability evaluation is given and an overview of different "standard" survey instruments is provided. Second, a case study, the assessment of a travel recommender system currently under development, is presented. The evaluation considers aspects such as design and layout, functionality or ease of use. These measures obtained by a user questionnaire are combined with user interaction logging data. Different variants of the travel recommendation system and a baseline system were used for the assessment. This promising approach complements subjective ratings by objective tracking data to obtain a more thorough picture of the system's weaknesses. Finally, findings are presented and an explanatory model for user/system satisfaction is proposed.
... The instrument used in this evaluation was adapted from previous studies and covers five dimensions which include: Usefulness, Ease of Use, Hedonic Motivation, Satisfaction and Outcome/Future Use. Usefulness constructs the level that a person believes about using a specific application would raise up the user's performance level (Davis, 1989;Zins et al, 2004). Ease of Use is the degree of easiness for a particular application by being free of heavy effort (Zins et al, 2004;Venkatesh et al, 2012). ...
... Usefulness constructs the level that a person believes about using a specific application would raise up the user's performance level (Davis, 1989;Zins et al, 2004). Ease of Use is the degree of easiness for a particular application by being free of heavy effort (Zins et al, 2004;Venkatesh et al, 2012). Hedonic Motivation represents the way that can be followed to motivate the users to use a specific application and how this application can influence on results (Venkatesh et al, 2012). ...
... Satisfaction measures the level of satisfaction of the user with the whole application and contents (Kicken and Stoyanov, 2008). Finally, Outcome/Future Use represents the degree a person is expecting to use this application (Davis, 1989;Zins et al, 2004). A 5-point Likert scale anchored by "Strongly Disagree" (1) and Strongly Agree (5) was used (Likert, 1932). ...
Obesity among children around the world has now reached an alarming level. Obesity affects one out of every ten children or teenagers all over the world. Parents should be the one responsible for their children well-being. With the advent of mobile technology, various mobile app have been developed to help people to manage their daily lives. This paper discusses on the development and evaluation of the Body Mass Index (BMI) Percentile Monitor, a mobile app for monitoring children's obesity status by parents. The results of the evaluation indicated that the parents highly rated the application in terms of usefulness, ease of use, hedonic motivation, outcome/future Use and satisfaction.
... Furthermore, Pan and Fesenmaier (2003) investigated users' search behaviour from the viewpoint of their mental models and their semantic understanding. Similarly, Zins et al. (2004) conducted usability tests based on questionnaires to compare user satisfaction after using different destination recommender systems. In contrast, the proposed approach uses automatically collected data to derive insights into the system's performance in terms of efficiency, effectiveness and marketing intelligence, respectively. ...
... With respect to the effectiveness of a RS the achievement of its core objectives is of primary interest. These are both click-through and conversion rates, respectively, as well as the capability to retain users on the site (Fesenmaier et al., 2003; Zins et al. 2004). Accordingly, in the advisory scenario analyzed below, a user visit is successfully completed by an online reservation request. ...
... As effectiveness of a RS has been approximated by both the click-through and conversion rate, (Zins et al. 2004) a contingency analysis is proposed as it allows the detection of interrelationships between categorical variables (Giudici & Castelo, 2001; Pallis et al., 2005). In doing so, this method answers the question whether the usage frequency of the interactive travel advisory system varies depending on contextual session parameters, such as access time or cultural background (i.e. ...
Recommender systems (RS) are employed to personalize user interaction with (e.g. tourism) web-sites, supporting both navigation through large service assortments and the configuration of individual service packages. Depending on the interaction strategy, RS are either utilized to elicit users' tastes and preferences or to stimulate desire for different offerings. In addition, as a potentially rich source of digital traces, RS also act as a repository for marketing intelligence. Web-usage mining is an accepted approach to analyse web-usage behaviour based on information traces left by the web-user (Mobasher, 2007). This paper proposes an empirically tested approach which combines typical web-log data with user feedback gathered by an interactive travel advisory system developed for an Austrian spa-resort. The proposed approach focuses on evaluating the RS with respect to efficiency, effectiveness and actionable marketing intelligence.
... Usefulness is defined as the extent to which a user believes by using a specific application would raise the user's performance level (Davis, 1993). Ease of Use is defined as the degree a user believes that using a particular system would be free of effort (Davis, 1989;Zins et al., 2004). Hedonic motivation represents the way that can be followed to motivate the user to use a specific application and how this application can influence on the results (Venkatesh et al., 2012). ...
... Satisfaction is defined as the level of satisfaction of the user with the whole application and contents (Lewis, 1995). Finally, Outcome/Future Use is defined as the degree a user is expecting to use the application (Davis, 1989;Zins et al., 2004). A Likert scale (5-point) from "Strongly Disagree" to "Strongly Agree" was used (Likert, 1932). ...
Childhood obesity has now reached an alarming level among children. It affects one out of every ten children all over the world. While in Malaysia, overweight child is 38 percent of the child population. If it is not effectively curbed, childhood obesity will cause many problems. Previous studies have shown that parents are responsible for their children's well-being and their involvement is the most influential treatment to childhood obesity. With the advent of mobile technology, various mobile apps have been developed to manage people's daily lives. This paper elaborates on the development of the BMI monitor app, a mobile application which is intended to be used by parents to monitor their children's Body Mass Index (BMI). It uses the BMI Percentile method which is recommended by pediatricians worldwide. This app enables parents to store all the BMI records of the children and also provides advices to help parents to deal with the childhood obesity problems. This paper also discusses on the outcome of an evaluation that has been conducted among a sample of parents towards the use of the app. It is hoped that the use of the app will ease the parents in monitoring their children's BMI status and eventually formed them to be more responsible parents.
... Perceived Usefulness is defined as the extent to which a user believes by using a specific application would raise the user's performance level [14]. Perceived Ease of Use is defined as the degree a user believes that using a particular system would be free of effort [15], and [16]. Effects on Motivation is defined as the influence of an individual's needs and desires both have a strong impact on the direction of their behavior [17]. ...
... Effects on Motivation is defined as the influence of an individual's needs and desires both have a strong impact on the direction of their behavior [17]. Outcome/Future Use is defined as the degree a user is expecting to use the application [15], and [16]. Finally, Satisfaction is defined as the level of satisfaction of the user with the whole application and contents [18]. ...
One of the most preventable sources of morbidity and premature death worldwide is cigarette smoking. It contributes immensely to the loss of lives, economic growth, human capacity development, mental effects and attitude modification. At least one person dies every six and a half seconds from cigarette smoking. The need to expose the negative and adverse effect of smoking is of essence especially to the younger generations. Mobile phone which is considered as one’s closest companion can be utilized through specially designed app that promotes the awareness of the hazards of smoking. This paper discusses the design and development of the Hazards of Smoking, an app which is intended for young generations to be aware of the danger and side effects of cigarette smoking. It also presents the outcome of a user evaluation that has been conducted among youngsters pertaining to the use of the app. Through the use of the app, it is hoped that enough information about the hazards of smoking will be disseminated among the youngsters and eventually persuade them to lead a healthy lifestyle without smoking.
... Post Study Satisfaction User Questionnaire PSSUQ was used to obtain the subjective data from users. The PSSUQ used in this evaluation was introduced by [9] and modified by [10] and is shown in Table 1. Design / Layout I liked using the interface of the module. ...
... Both validity and reliability were addressed for the usability evaluation questionnaire. The questionnaire used in this study was adapted from questionnaire developed by [9] and used by several researchers such as [10], [17], [16]. The Cronbach alpha values were calculated to determine the inter-item reliability which assesses the degree of internal consistency between multiple measurements of a dimension. ...
... Usefulness is defined as the extent to which a user believes by using a specific application would raise the user's performance level (Davis, 1993). Ease of Use is defined as the degree a user believes that using a particular system would be free of effort (Davis, 1989;Zins et al., 2004). Hedonic motivation represents the way that can be followed to motivate the user to use a specific application and how this application can influence on results (Venkatesh et al., 2012). ...
... Satisfaction is defined as the level of satisfaction of the user with the whole application and contents (Lewis, 1995). Finally, Outcome/Future Use is defined as the degree a user is expecting to use the application (Davis, 1989;Zins et al., 2004). A 5-point Likert scale anchored with 1 = Strongly Disagree and 5 = Strongly Agree was used (Likert, 1932). ...
Childhood obesity has now reached an alarming level among children around the world. It affects one out of every ten children all over the world. While in Malaysia, overweight child is 38 percent of the child population. If it is not effectively curbed, childhood obesity will cause many problems. Previous studies have shown that parents are responsible for their children’s well-being and their involvement is the most influential treatment of childhood obesity. With the advent of mobile technology, various mobile apps have been developed to manage people's daily lives. This paper elaborates on the development of the BMI monitor app, a mobile application which is intended to be used by parents to monitor their children's Body Mass Index (BMI). It uses the BMI Percentile method which is recommended by pediatricians worldwide. This app enables parents to store all the BMI records of the children and also provides advices to help parents to deal with the childhood obesity problems. This paper also discusses on the outcome of an evaluation that has been conducted among a sample of parents towards the use of the app. It is hoped that the use of the app will ease the parents in monitoring their children's BMI status and eventually formed them to be more responsible parents.
... The purpose of this study is to present some first findings of the usability of JUSUR LMS for a selected group of students with an advanced computer competency. The study took place in the first semester of theZins et al., 2004) and the Web-based Learning Environment Instrument (WLEI) (Chang, 1999). The newly created questionnaire LMS Usability Questionnaire (LMSUQ) consisted of 31 question items selected from both questionnaires (18 from Usability and User Satisfaction Questionnaire and 13 from WLEI). ...
... List of question items selected from Usability and User Satisfaction Questionnaire (adapted from PSSUQ) (Zins et al., 2004) and the Web-based Learning Environment Instrument (WLEI) (Chang, 199912 I had no difficulty using the technology. 13 I am confident in using the technology. ...
Usability evaluation is considered one approach to assess the effectiveness of e-Learning systems. It is used to evaluate how well technology and tools are working for users. Learning Management Systems (LMS), as one type of e-Learning systems, can benefit from usability research to evaluate the LMS ease of use and satisfaction of its users. It is well-known that LMSs are complex environments that use a variety of technologies and tools. Different academic institutions worldwide prefer to use their own custom made LMS; this is the case with JUSUR, an LMS designed and operated by the National Center for E-learning and Distance Learning (NCeDL)in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. In this paper we will give an overview of JUSUR LMS, and evaluate its usability using pre-defined usability standards. Then we will present the evaluation results and discuss their implications.
... Aims to score the overall satisfaction of the Blackboard system users who use it specifically for the distance learning process. Studies by Zins et al (2004) and Tella (2011) were studied while forming these questions. ...
This research explores the role of Knowledge Management within the education field with a specific focus on the use of Learning Management Systems in the Distance Learning (eLearning) process. The aim of this study is to thoroughly examine how teachers and students perceive the utility of the Blackboard system as a distance learning platform. To achieve this, the study conducted qualitative interviews and quantitative questionnaire surveys with the teachers and students of Taibah University, Saudi Arabia. Questions in both data collection tools were geared towards gaining insight about how these two groups of Blackboard users view its usefulness as a distance learning tool. The results of the research revealed that Blackboard is viewed as a positive influence on distance learning, and that students view this application as an opportunity to avoid traditional, classroom learning activities. Also, the research discovered that teachers generally have a positive viewpoint about Blackboard, and believe it makes teaching a lot easier.
Nevertheless, few issues were also mentioned by both groups of users, particularly the challenge of slow internet connections and difficulty of creating exams (teachers) or accessing and completing exams in a time-effective manner (students). To address these challenges, and any other as well, this research recommended that universities or learning institutions that decide to adopt LMS systems such as Blackboard for distance learning have to conduct a thorough analysis of their current structure, and determine how this new method of teaching/learning can be integrated into existing learning activities in a seamless manner. A thorough investigation will aid in forestalling any future challenges such as poor internet connections, as the school would have implemented measures to ensure this does not occur.
... Therefore, in this paper, we developed evaluation constructs suitable for the computerized cognitive training system based on the frequently used questionnaire. In addition, we set up evaluation factors to measure the evaluation scale by referring to existing studies [8]. ...
Background: To check in advance whether there are any problems in use and to address these in the process of designing a medical device, it is necessary to evaluate user suitability. Yet currently, there are a few user suitability evaluation constructs established for unique technologies. Therefore, the development of user suitability evaluation constructs for the user suitability evaluation of self-developed computerized cognitive rehabilitation applications should be prioritized.
Method: To evaluate the user suitability of the computerized cognitive rehabilitation application developed in this paper, we derived the user suitability evaluation constructs of user satisfaction, time satisfaction, difficulty, comprehension, effectiveness, efficiency, and error, and after clinical trials for user suitability evaluation, we analyzed the results and tried to identify and address the problems of the developed evaluation constructs. Twenty-four senior citizens over 55 years of age participated in the clinical trial, and performed cognitive rehabilitation training once a week for 3 weeks using our self-developed cognitive rehabilitation application.
Result: As the weeks progressed, satisfaction increased in orientation training and concentration training. User suitability evaluation constructs for effectiveness, efficiency, and error were appropriate, but there were insufficient aspects in the evaluation scales for user satisfaction, time satisfaction, difficulty, and understanding; Conclusion: we were able to derive an improvement plan by extracting the established user suitability evaluation scale.
Trial registration: Ethics approval and consent to participate. The evaluation was conducted after obtaining Institutional Review Board approval from Dongguk University Ilsan Hospital (DUIH2020-07-001-001).
... The usability test analyses six critical elements related to a recommender system's quality: Design, functionality, ease of use, learning capacity, user satisfaction, and result and potential future use. The designed usability evaluation questions and structure are based on the models presented by Lewis and Zins et al.'s works [57,58]. This test uses a score between 0 and 10 as a measure, where 0 means complete disagreement and 10 means complete agreement. ...
The decision-making process can be complex and underestimated, where mismanagement could lead to poor results and excessive spending. This situation appears in highly complex multi-criteria problems such as the project portfolio selection (PPS) problem. Therefore, a recommender system becomes crucial to guide the solution search process. To our knowledge, most recommender systems that use argumentation theory are not proposed for multi-criteria optimization problems. Besides, most of the current recommender systems focused on PPS problems do not attempt to justify their recommendations. This work studies the characterization of cognitive tasks involved in the decision-aiding process to propose a framework for the Decision Aid Interactive Recommender System (DAIRS). The proposed system focuses on a user-system interaction that guides the search towards the best solution considering a decision-maker’s preferences. The developed framework uses argumentation theory supported by argumentation schemes, dialogue games, proof standards, and two state transition diagrams (STD) to generate and explain its recommendations to the user. This work presents a prototype of DAIRS to evaluate the user experience on multiple real-life case simulations through a usability measurement. The prototype and both STDs received a satisfying score and mostly overall acceptance by the test users.
... Some studies establish functionality as a determinant of the correct functioning of the website; the relevant attributes include multiple functions and their specified properties [3], [13], [83], [147] that satisfy some stated or implied needs [23]. Kaplanidou, Vogt and Morris [76] argue that functionality is not a direct predictor of intentions to travel, but they find an indirect influence through the perceived usefulness of the website. ...
The continuous growth of e-commerce, combined with new trends in the tourism sector, creates an imperative to conduct analyses and establish suitable models for improving the experience of users who seek tourism products online, using search and metasearch engines. However, few studies analyze web design variables and their impacts on the user experience. Therefore, the present study aims to investigate the influence of content, usability, functionality, and branding for determining user experiences with search engines and metasearch engines dedicated to tourism. The methodology used in this research followed a mixed approach to fulfill the proposed dual perspective, that is, to collect data from websites and evaluate the user experience. To determine the variables to be modeled, the authors use a General Additive Model. Main results reveal two determinant factors that enhance the user experience: usability and branding. With this foundation, this study proposes basic premises of the digital strategy that tourism platforms should follow. As implications for the tourism sector, suggest that e-commerce search and metasearch engines in the tourism industry should devote substantial efforts to implementing interactivity, memorability, personalization, privacy, and security.
... Variabel yang akan dipakai untuk mengukur tingkat kepuasan user terhadap aplikasi AR ini meliputi kemudahan, efektifitas, kepuasan, dan outcome. Aspek kemudahan akan mengukur seberapa besar kemudahan pengguna menggunakan aplikasi AR [29], aspek efektifitas akan mengukur bagaimana persepsi user terhadap informasi yang disediakan [30], aspek kepuasan mengukur tingkat kepuasan pengguna setelah menggunakan aplikasi AR ini [31] dan outcome adalah aspek yang digunakan untuk mengukur harapan user terhadap aplikasi ini [32]. Skala pengukuran respon user ini menggunakan skala likert dari sangat tidak setuju hingga sangat setuju sebagai berikut [33]. ...
Science & Technopark (STP) was built to accelerate the process of transfer technology of research findings that have been discovered by LIPI. The research findings not only in the form of patents or products but also in the form of tools and buildings. To facilitate the understanding of stakeholders in the research findings an innovative media for the promotion of LIPI research findings was made using Augmented Reality (AR) media. This study uses a linear strategy method that combines text, posters, and videos into AR media. The AR application was tested on 25 LIPI stakeholders by distributing questionnaires using a Likert measurement scale. The results obtained are that AR not only effective in promoting commercial products but also very effective in promoting research products that have been found by LIPI at STP and making promotional activities more interesting and interactive.
... Following app use, the study administrators facilitated a semistructured focus group interview. The focus group participants (both children and caregivers) were first asked usability questions concerning the app's design and layout, functionality, ease of use, learnability, satisfaction, future use, and system reliability [28]. Usability questions were followed by questions intended to help understand the caregiver-child relationship with technology and use (eg, What technologies do you use at home? ...
Background:
Children with hearing loss, even those identified early and who are using hearing aids or cochlear implants, may face challenges in developing spoken language and literacy. This can lead to academic, behavioral, and social difficulties. There are apps for healthy children to improve their spoken language and literacy and apps that focus on sign language proficiency for children with hearing loss, but these apps are limited for children with hearing loss. We have therefore developed an app called Hear Me Read (HMR) which uses enhanced digital stories as therapy tools for speech, language, and literacy for children with hearing loss. The platform has therapist and parent/child modes that allows 1) selection of high quality, illustrated digital stories by a speech-language pathologist (SLP), parent, or child 2) modification of digital stories for a multitude of speech and language targets, and 3) assignment of stories by therapist to facilitate individualized speech and language goals. Additionally, HMR makes the caregiver a core partner in engagement through functionality whereby the caregiver can record video and audio of themselves to be played back by the child.
Objective:
The objective of this study was to evaluate the user experience of the HMR app through a focus group study with caregivers and their children.
Methods:
We recruited 16 participants (8 children with and without hearing loss and 8 caregivers) to participate in one-hour focus groups. Caregivers and children interacted with the app and discussed their experience through a semi-structured group interview. We employed thematic analysis methods and analyzed the data. We used feedback from the focus group to improve elements of the app for a larger clinical trial assessing the impact of the app on outcomes.
Results:
We identified 3 themes: default needs, specific needs and family needs. Participants found the app to be aesthetically pleasing and easy to use. Findings helped us to identify usability attributes and to amend app functionalities to best fit user needs. Caregivers and children appreciated the enhancements, such as parts of speech highlighting and video playback of caregivers reading, that were made possible by the digital format. Participants expressed that the app could be used to enhance family reading sessions and family interaction.
Conclusions:
The findings from this focus group study are promising for the use of educational apps designed specifically for those with hearing loss who are pursuing listening and spoken language as a communication outcome. Further investigation is needed with larger sample sizes in order to understand the clinical impact on relevant language and literacy outcomes in this population.
... | NOT PEER-REVIEWED | Posted: 2 January 2020 doi:10.20944/preprints202001.0015.v1 measure customer satisfaction with the recommendation system [67,68]. In this study, we measured disconfirmation-based customer satisfaction through a series of experiments. ...
With the development of information technology and the popularization of mobile devices, collecting various types of customer data such as purchase history or behavior patterns became possible. As the customer data being accumulated, there is a growing demand for personalized recommendation services that provide customized services to customers. Currently, global e-commerce companies offer personalized recommendation services to gain a sustainable competitive advantage. However, previous research on recommendation systems has consistently raised the issue that the accuracy of recommendation algorithms does not necessarily lead to the satisfaction of recommended service users. It also claims that customers are highly satisfied when the recommendation system recommends diverse items to them. In this study, we want to identify the factors that determine customer satisfaction when using the recommendation system which provides personalized services. To this end, we developed a recommendation system based on Deep Neural Networks (DNN) and measured the accuracy of recommendation service, the diversity of recommended items and customer satisfaction with the recommendation service. The experimental results of is the study showed that both recommendation system accuracy and diversity would have a positive effect on customer satisfaction. These results can further improve customer satisfaction with the recommendation system and promote the sustainable development of e-commerce.
... To test the usability [24] of CareD among the targeted age group, an experimental study [25] was designed and carried out using the direct observation of user in addition to the questionnaire provided to them. The experimental study is aimed at testing the usability and effectiveness of an application. ...
BACKGROUND: Dementia is a common form of Alzheimer disease which is affecting the quality of older adults’ life. Non-drug treatment such as cognitive therapies are more beneficial for such patients. These days, mobile applications are providing tremendous opportunities for aiding the medicinal treatment.OBJECTIVES: This paper presents CareD – a mobile application based solution for dementia patients and their caregivers. Unlike, other available mobile applications, CareD provide a single resolution for maximum dementia related complications. The main objective of this application is to improve the quality of life of dementia patients and facilitate their caregivers. CareD also aims at providing native language support i.e. Urdu to the people of Pakistan. METHODS: CareD comprises of various modules including cognitive therapy sessions, patient tracking, reminders, healthy living to aid dementia patients in their everyday activities. Experimental study involving dementia patients and their caregivers has been carried out to evaluate the usability and effectiveness of this application. RESULTS: Twenty patients were included in the study. Results showed that CareD is very effective and helpful in decreasing the disease progression as well as in relieving the burden of caregivers. CONCLUSION: CareD has been found to be a useful and efficient solution for dementia patients. It was observed that utilization of mobile application was progressively successful in reducing the stress of both; patients and their caregivers. The use of native language Urdu made the application more learnable for older adults and improved its acceptance.
... Studies conducted to determine the barriers to the accessibility and usability of LMS Blackboard show self-efficacy to be one of the serious limitations. Self-efficacy is a reflection of what the teacher and the faculty staff belief they are able to achieve based on the skills they possess that can contribute to the successful interactive use of the application (Zins, Bauernfeind, Del Missier, Venturini, & Rumetshofer, 2004). In addition, environmental issues such the learning environment that includes the interaction styles and features of the e-learning software limit the usability of the software for faculty members of staff studying in KSU. ...
King Saud University is in the process of adopting and implementing the interactive Blackboard Learning Management Systems (LMSs) with features that allow members of staff and teachers from different faculties to access, upload assignments, send quizzes, download content, and evaluate the academic progress of the members of faculty. However, many faculty members complain about the accessibility and usability of the e-learning software because of the perceptions that the interactive features are not user friendly. Little research has been done to evaluate the accessibility and usability of the e-learning software. The current study was conducted to answer the research questions on the accessibility and usability of the blackboard vista e-learning software and the barriers of user experience when interacting with blackboard. The study was based on the hypothesis that Blackboard LMS is highly accessible and usable by teachers in the King Saud University and a hypothesis that stated otherwise. The elements that were evaluated using questionnaires include the design user interface, navigational features, and ease of use to answer the research questions. The results proved the hypothesis that ‘Blackboard LMS is accessible and usable by the teachers from different faculties for the delivery of content in the King Saud University. However, the study recommends that university should customize the e-learning software to the needs of the teachers to offer courses in English and in Arabic to increase and enhance the accessibility and usability of the software.
... Website usability is strongly related to user satisfaction. Therefore, users' opinions can directly affect their satisfaction with system usability [8]. In order to ensure that their website is pleasant and entertaining, web designers should carry out usability inspections to identify usability problems and use those recommendations improve the design. ...
Websites are now generally considered the most effective and efficient marketing channel. With more customers buying products online, creating a commercially successful websites is any web master's main goal. Website evaluation can help web designers identify websites' weaknesses and limitations. However, that process can break down because individual preferences are different. Existing website evaluations can produce neutral scores when two groups hold extreme opinion, meaning that the final score does not faithfully represent any group of respondents. In order to correct for this shortcoming, this paper introduces an instrument that incorporates human personality to measure website usability and aesthetics.
... Their aim is to find the factors which mostly influence the usage of the recommender systems. They consider such aspects as design and layout, functionality, or ease of use (Zins, Bauernfeind, Del Missier, Venturini, & Rumetshofer, 2004a, 2004b). ...
Electronic commerce (EC) is, at first sight, an electronic means to exchange large amounts of product information between users and sites. This information must be clearly written since any users who accesses the site must understand it. Given the large amounts of information available at the site, interaction with an e-market site becomes an effort. It is also time-consuming, and the user feels disoriented as products and clients are always on the increase. One solution to make online shopping easier is to endow the EC site with a recommender system. Recommender systems are implanted in EC sites to suggest services and provide consumers with the information they need in order to decide about possible purchases. These tools act as a specialized salesperson for the customer, and they are usually enhanced with customization capabilities; thus they adapt themselves to the users, basing themselves on the analysis of their preferences and interests. Recommenders rely mainly on user interfaces, marketing techniques, and large amounts of information about other customers and products; all this is done, of course, in an effort to propose the right item to the right customer. Besides, recommenders are fundamental elements in sustaining usability and site confidence (Egger, 2001); that’s the reason why e-market sites give them an important role in their design (Spiekermann & Paraschiv, 2002). If a recommender system is to be perceived as useful by its users, it must address several problems, such as the lack of user knowledge in a specific domain, information overload, and a minimization of the cost of interaction. EC recommenders are gradually becoming powerful tools for EC business (Gil & García, 2003) making use of complex mechanisms mainly in order to support the user’s decision process by allowing the analogical reasoning by the human being, and avoiding the disorientation process that occurs when one has large amounts of information to analyse and compare. This article describes some fundamental aspects in building real recommenders for EC. We will first set up the scenario by exposing the importance of recommender systems in EC, as well as the stages involved in a recommender-assisted purchase. Next, we will describe the main issues along three main axes: first, how recommender systems require a careful elicitation of user requirements; after that, the development and tuning of the recommendation algorithms; and, finally, the design and usability testing of the user interfaces. Lastly, we will show some future trends in recommenders and a conclusion. Purchase this chapter to continue reading all 8 pages >
... Another limitation is the rudimentary usability test of CAT-TOURS. However, we plan to set up a similar test suite as has been described by Zins et al. [15]. ...
In this paper, we present a Context Aware Thai Tourism Recommender System (CAT-TOURS) that applies a complex Naïve Bayes Model with boundary values, tourism ontology for Thailand and a temporal ontology to support decision making in tourism. Promising results are presented in the form of precision, recall and F measure for Websites related to Thailand’s tourism industry. We compare the results with those gained with Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI).
This research was guided by the following aims: (1) find a simple method to classify Thai tourism Web documents that contain information on more than one topic, and (2) take into account time constraints in the process of making recommendations.
... 4. Search wizard: The search wizard can be perceived as a direct interaction recommendation system, where search results are ordered based on the satisfaction of the user's search criteria. At the current implementation the search wizard follows a sequence of steps similar to the DTR-C prototype model ( Zins et al. 2004). The search wizard tries to simulate a human like conversation by presenting (one by one) a set of multiple-choice questions to the user, in a dialogue like format. ...
... It is concerned with making systems easy to learn and easy to use. The instrument was adapted from Rekkedal and Dye (2007); Lewis (1995); Zins et al. (2004) and Davis (1989). After the survey was developed, it was piloted and some minor changes were made. ...
Problem statement: M-learning is considered as the next form of e-learning using mobile technologies to facilitate education for teachers and learners. Students need to keep in touch with their education services anytime regardless the place. Engaging the m-learning services in the Malaysian higher education will improve the availability of education. This study discusses the development and user's evaluation of Student's Mobile Information Prototype (SMIP). The study aims to utilize mobile learning services to facilitate education for students in the higher education environment. Approach: The Design Science Research Methodology (DSRM) was adapted to develop the SMIP. The evaluation was conducted to determine users' perception on the usability aspect of the SMIP. Results: Results of user's evaluation on the SMIP indicate that most of the participants highly agreed on perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, learn ability, functionality and didactic efficiency. Moreover, the results confirm that SMIP is useful for users to make their transactions easy, direct and successful, regardless of location and time. Conclusion: It is hoped that the findings of this study will encourage students to keep in touch with their education environment anywhere and anytime.
... The post-experiment questionnaire was formulated based on the Post-Study- Satisfaction-User-Questionnaire (PSSUQ) standard (Lewis, 1995; Zins et al., 2004). ...
The tourism product has an intangible nature in that customers cannot physically evaluate the services on offer until practically
experienced. This makes having access to credible and authentic information about tourism products before the actual experience
very valuable. An Ontology being a formal, explicit specification of concepts of a domain provides a viable platform for the
development of credible knowledge-based tourism information services. In this paper, we present an approach aimed at enabling
assorted intelligent recommendations services in tourism support systems using ontologies. A suite of tourism ontologies was
developed and engaged to enable a prototypical e-tourism system with various knowledge-based recommendation capabilities.
A usability evaluation of the system yields encouraging results as a demonstration of the viability of our approach.
The proliferation of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) [1] has led to an increased interest in automated grading for programming assignments. Educational institutions now employ a variety of techniques and systems to grade programming assignments automatically, in order to make the grading process more efficient and improve students’ learning experience. This paper introduces ProGrader system, an innovative automated grading tool to evaluate student progress in programming courses. The paper presents an in-depth design and implementation of the various components and standout features that make up the ProGrader system. These features include the usability of the system, the grading criteria of students’ submission, available automated instructor’s feedbacks, supported programming languages, integration with other tools, scalability, and user-friendly interface design. Furthermore, the paper also discusses the incorporation of learning activities based on the Felder-Silverman model [2] to identify student learning styles and learning objectives. ProGrader is among the first grading tools that utilizes test-driven development methodologies and technologies. A pilot study involving 3 assignments and 45 students has been conducted to evaluate the system's usability and effectiveness. The present study was conducted with the approval of the Institutional Review Board (IRB) at Salem State University. The course activities using Java programming language were designed based on the Felder-Silverman model [2], which aimed to identify the students’ learning styles and connect them with specific learning objectives. The ProGrader tool was utilized in the study, providing students with a playground page where they could think, write and test their answers based on given instructions. The tool also provided automated feedback on how to correct mistakes and discouraged plagiarism by requiring students to write the code line by line before proceeding to the final submission. Students were unable to copy-paste of code from other sources into the ProGrader tool. Upon completion of the activities, students received a grade, feedback on areas for improvement. The results of the study, including the usability, its implications and impact on student and teacher experience, are discussed in the paper. The features and considerations presented in this paper can assist in the evaluation of grading systems and enhance the quality of education for students.The ProGrader tool incorporates the following six features that give an edge over existing solutions: (1) ProGrader uses the code correctness as the grading criteria for programming assignments; (2) Provides instant feedback provided by ProGrader; (3) Support of a wide range of programming language; (4) Produces built-in Integration of debugging tools and code profilers; (5) imparts scalability and (6) Furnishes easy to use user interface for students and instructors.KeywordsUsability EvaluationAssessmenteLearningOnline GraderOnline EducationProgramming CoursesOnline Computing Classes
Sammendrag
Automatiserte anbefalinger av nyhetsinnhold brukes i dag på nettsidene
til mange medieselskaper med hensikt å presentere leserne mer relevante
nyheter og tilby bedre brukeropplevelser. Slike anbefalingsløsninger
drar nytte av nye teknikker fra maskinlæring og stordataarkitekturer
fra informatikkfaget. I denne artikkelen diskuterer vi om personlige
nyhetsanbefalinger kan øke trafikken til nettaviser i en tid hvor
mediebransjen er under press, samt bidra til å gi medieaktørene
større brukerforståelse. I denne artikkelen belyser vi noen av utfordringene
med nyhetsanbefalinger og diskuterer spesielt teknikker som kollaborativ
filtrering og innholdsbaserte anbefalinger. Vi kommer også inn på
evalueringsmetrikker, fordi tradisjonelle mål på presisjon og recall ikke
alltid samsvarer med mediehusenes behov for å benytte løsningene
strategisk for å bedre lønnsomheten. Polaris Media har over flere
år eksperimentert med anbefalingsteknologi på sine nettaviser, og
vi presenterer i artikkelen funn og innsikter fra denne utprøvingen.
Noen hovedfunn er at anbefalingsløsninger kan øke klikkraten og
lesetiden betydelig, revitalisere eldre nyhetsstoff slik at innhold
får lengre levetid samt bidra til å forstå brukersegmentene bedre. Artikkelen
posisjonerer seg innenfor en design science research-tilnærming,
hvor målsetningen er å forstå industriens behov og utvikle og prøve
ut artefakter som møter disse behovene.
Models are key artifacts in model driven software engineering, similar to source code in traditional software engineering. Integrated development environments help users while writing source code, e.g. with typed auto completions, quick fixes, or automatic refactorings. Similar integrated features are rare for modeling IDEs. The above source code IDE features can be seen as a recommender system.
A recommender system for model driven software engineering can combine data from different sources in order to infer a list of relevant and actionable model changes in real time. These recommendations can speed up working on models by automating repetitive tasks and preventing errors when the changes are atypical for the changed models.
Recommendations can be based on common model transformations that are taken from the literature or learned from models in version control systems. Further information can be taken from instance- to meta-model relationships, modeling related artifacts (e.g. correctness constraints), and versions histories of models under version control.
We created a prototype recommender that analyses the change history of a single model. We computed its accuracy via cross-validation and found that it was between 0.43 and 0.82 for models from an open source project.
In order to have a bigger data set for the evaluation and the learning of model transformation, we also mined repositories from Eclipse projects for Ecore meta models and their versions. We found 4374 meta models with 17249 versions. 244 of these meta models were changed at least ten times and are candidates for learning common model transformations.
We plan to evaluate our recommender system in two ways: (1) In off-line evaluations with data sets of models from the literature, created by us, or taken from industry partners. (2) In on-line user studies with participants from academia and industry, performed as case studies and controlled experiments.
The main work of ergonomics experiment is to collect demic physiological parameter with experimental apparatus and verify physiological feedback, all the results will be used for reference to man-machine interactive design. There are many ergonomics experimental apparatus including single apparatus to measure the basic dimension and some complex apparatus for electromyography signal. The operation experience will be needed in the process of operation for most of the apparatus. This paper will discuss the improvement of operation method and process of the ergonomics experimental apparatus and modify experimental reference book via usability evaluation. The experimental process will be established in order to make the ergonomics experiment more effective and dependable.
As far as Learning Management System is concerned, it offers an integrated platform for educational materials, distribution and management of learning as well as accessibility by a range of users including teachers, learners and content makers especially for distance learning. Usability evaluation is considered as one approach to assess the efficiency of e-Learning systems. It is used to evaluate how well technology and tools are working for users. There are some factors contributing as major reasons why the LMS is not used effectively and regularly. Learning Management Systems, as major part of e-Learning systems, can benefit from usability research to evaluate the LMS ease of use and satisfaction among its handlers. Many academic institutions worldwide prefer using their own customized Learning Management Systems; this is the case with Moodle, an open source LMS platform designed and operated by most of the universities in Sri Lanka. This paper gives an overview of Learning Management Systems used in Sri Lankan universities, and evaluates its usability using some pre-defined usability standards. In addition it measures the effectiveness of LMS by testing the Learning Management Systems. The findings and result of this study as well as the testing are discussed and presented.
Recently, due to the proliferation of smartphones, users of mobile multimedia services which are based on wireless internet without constraint of the time and places are significantly increased. In this study, considering the characteristics of mobile multimedia and the user behavior, we analyse the factors which have an effect on the behavioral intention to use the mobile multimedia services. For this purpose, we use the model which is based on Technology Accepted Model (TAM) and add two constructs; the perceived enjoyment and the perceived risk. A survey data for 280 students at the K cyber university is used for statistical analysis As a result, the perceived ease of use affects the perceived usefulness and the perceived enjoyment, and the perceived ease of use. And the perceived usefulness and perceived enjoyment affect continuous intention to use. On the other hand, the hypothesis which the perceived risk would affect adversely the continuous intention to use is rejected. Through this study, we expect to provide the useful implications for the mobile multimedia services and contribute to the development of strategy for them.
Destination marketing organizations invest considerable amounts of money in the development of Web sites as part of their overall promotion efforts. With increasing pressure on their budgets, it becomes ever more important for these organizations to assess the effectiveness of their Web sites, evaluate the return on their investments, and derive feedback on necessary improvements. Web site evaluation measures have been proposed in many ways and various contexts over the past decade. The study presented in this article used a qualitative meta-analysis methodology to synthesize the diverse findings. A unified framework of commonly used Web site success factors emerged from the analysis and included a total of nine factors: (1) information quality; (2) ease of use; (3) responsiveness; (4) security/privacy; (5) visual appearance; (6) trust; (7) interactivity; (8) personalization; and (9) fulfillment. Additional factors to further inform Web evaluation efforts were identified based on Werthner and Klein's dimensions of Web communication. The article concludes with a discussion of implications for future research.
This paper advocates for a more extensive definition of recommender systems, stressing in particular the importance of information browsing and discovery. A recommendation tool, called "seeking for inspiration" is here presented. It is aimed at users that are seeking for suggestions, do not have complete knowledge of the tourism jargon and can be intimidated by more traditional search tools based on queries. Our tool, in the first place computes a small number of travel offers and displays them on a graphical user interface that relies on pictures to illustrate the offers. The user can browse the offers and provide feedbacks/critiques about them. The system uses a diversity-based retrieval to incorporate the user feedbacks and to suggest some more offers that are supposed to be a better match to user's preferences. We report the results of the empirical evaluation that shows the usefulness of such an approach especially for travelers coming from more distant countries and those with a more holistic learning style.
E-commerce, purchase activities on the Web became more and more important. However, there is an abundance of information which makes it increasingly difficult to find a desired piece of information. Thus, recommender systems are a valuable and convenient tool to overcome this problem. A lot of studies investigated factors which contribute to the satisfaction with the usage of websites. However, research considering the peculiarities of recommenders is very limited. This study aims to enhance an appropriate model explaining satisfaction with and commitment to recommender systems which are not limited to pure information retrieval. An empirical investigation was conducted evaluating three different recommender systems (flight, travel, digital cameras). Findings suggest a strong influence from on-line experiences such as trust, flow, and exploratory browsing. These factors, in turn, are partially driven by personal characteristics such as internet expertise, product involvement, and internet purchase attitudes.
Travel search engines are a new breed of technology that has the potential to significantly change the online travel distribution
landscape. Using innovation diffusion and technology acceptance models as the theoretical foundation, the paper presents a
research framework to evaluate such newly emerging technologies without relying on individuals’ previous exposure to or familiarity
with the technology to be evaluated. Perceived usefulness, complexity, trust (reliability and intentions) and subjective norm
emerged as reliable constructs; however, only the first three factors were found to have a significant influence on individuals’
willingness to adopt and/or recommend travel search engines. Limitations of the research framework are discussed and implications
for future research are presented.
Prior knowledge of the social aspects of prospective destinations can be very influential in making travel destination decisions, especially in instances where social concerns do exist about specific destinations. In this paper, we describe the implementation of an ontology-enabled Hybrid Destination Recommender System (HDRS) that leverages an ontological description of five specific social attributes of major Nigerian cities, and hybrid architecture of content-based and case-based filtering techniques to generate personalised top-n destination recommendations. An empirical usability test was conducted on the system, which revealed that the dependability of recommendations from Destination Recommender Systems (DRS) could be improved if the semantic representation of social attributes information of destinations is made a factor in the destination recommendation process.
This study is a part of a research effort to develop the Questionnaire for User Interface Satisfaction (QUIS). Participants, 150 PC user group members, rated familiar software products. Two pairs of software categories were compared: 1) software that was liked and disliked, and 2) a standard command line system (CLS) and a menu
driven application (MDA). The reliability of the questionnaire was high, Cronbach’s alpha=.94. The overall reaction ratings yielded significantly higher ratings for liked software and MDA over
disliked software and a CLS, respectively. Frequent and sophisticated PC users rated MDA more satisfying, powerful and flexible than CLS. Future applications of the QUIS on computers are
discussed.
Intuition and previous research suggest that creating a compelling online environment for Web consumers will have numerous positive consequences for commercial Web providers. Online executives note that creating a compelling online experience for cyber customers is critical to creating competitive advantage on the Internet. Yet, very little is known about the factors that make using the Web a compelling experience for its users, and of the key consumer behavior outcomes of this compelling experience.
Recently, the flow construct has been proposed as important for understanding consumer behavior on the World Wide Web, and as a way of defining the nature of compelling online experience. Although widely studied over the past 20 years, quantitative modeling efforts of the flow construct have been neither systematic nor comprehensive. In large parts, these efforts have been hampered by considerable confusion regarding the exact conceptual definition of flow. Lacking precise definition, it has been difficult to measure flow empirically, let alone apply the concept in practice.
Following the conceptual model of flow proposed by Hoffman and Novak (1996), we conceptualize flow on the Web as a cognitive state experienced during navigation that is determined by (1) high levels of skill and control; (2) high levels of challenge and arousal; and (3) focused attention; and (4) is enhanced by interactivity and telepresence. Consumers who achieve flow on the Web are so acutely involved in the act of online navigation that thoughts and perceptions not relevant to navigation are screened out, and the consumer focuses entirely on the interaction. Concentration on the navigation experience is so intense that there is little attention left to consider anything else, and consequently, other events occurring in the consumer's surrounding physical environment lose significance. Self-consciousness disappears, the consumer's sense of time becomes distorted, and the state of mind arising as a result of achieving flow on the Web is extremely gratifying.
In a quantitative modeling framework, we develop a structural model based on our previous conceptual model of flow that embodies the components of what makes for a compelling online experience. We use data collected from a largesample, Web-based consumer survey to measure these constructs, and we fit a series of structural equation models that test related prior theory. The conceptual model is largely supported, and the improved fit offered by the revised model provides additional insights into the direct and indirect influences of flow, as well as into the relationship of flow to key consumer behavior and Web usage variables.
Our formulation provides marketing scientists with operational definitions of key model constructs and establishes reliability and validity in a comprehensive measurement framework. A key insight from the paper is that the degree to which the online experience is compelling can be defined, measured, and related well to important marketing variables. Our model constructs relate in significant ways to key consumer behavior variables, including online shopping and Web use applications such as the extent to which consumers search for product information and participate in chat rooms. As such, our model may be useful both theoretically and in practice as marketers strive to decipher the secrets of commercial success in interactive online environments.
This paper surveys the use of Spreading Activation techniques on Semantic Networks in Associative Information Retrieval. The major Spreading Activation models are presented and their applications to IR is surveyed. A number of works in this area are critically analyzed in order to study the relevance of Spreading Activation for associative IR. Key words: spreading activation, information storage and retrieval, semantic networks, associative information retrieval, information processing, knowledge representation.
In this paper, we present an information retrieval system for tourism information that allows query formulation in natural
language. We describe a knowledge representation model, based on associative networks, for defining semantic relationships
of terms. The relatedness of terms is taken into account and we show how a fuzzy search strategy, performed by a constrained
spreading activation algorithm, yields beneficial results and recommends closely related matches to users’ queries. Thus,
spreading activation implicitly implements query expansion.
This paper describes recent research in subjective usability measurement at IBM. The focus of the research was the application of psychometric methods to the development and evaluation of questionnaires that measure user satisfaction with system usability. The primary goals of this paper are to (1) discuss the psychometric characteristics of four IBM questionnaires that measure user satisfaction with computer system usability, and (2) provide the questionnaires, with administration and scoring instructions. Usability practitioners can use these questionnaires with confidence to help them measure users' satisfaction with the usability of computer systems.
Valid measurement scales for predicting user acceptance of computers are in short supply. Most subjective measures used in practice are unvalidated, and their relationship to system usage is unknown. The present research develops and validates new scales for two specific variables, perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use, which are hypothesized to be fundamental determinants of user acceptance. Definitions for these two variables were used to develop scale items that were pretested for content validity and then tested for reliability and construct validity in two studies involving a total of 152 users and four application programs. The measures were refined and streamlined, resulting in two six-item scales with reliabilities of .98 for usefulness and .94 for ease of use. The scales exhibited high convergent, discriminant, and factorial validity. Perceived usefulness was significantly correlated with both self-reported current usage (r=.63, Study 1) and self-predicted future usage (r =.85, Study 2). Perceived ease of use was also significantly correlated with current usage (r=.45, Study 1) and future usage (r=.59, Study 2). In both studies, usefulness had a significantly greater correlation with usage behavior than did ease of use. Regression analyses suggest that perceived ease of use may actually be a causal antecedent to perceived usefulness, as opposed to a parallel, direct determinant of system usage. Implications are drawn for future research on user acceptance.
This thesis presents methods for usability evaluation and experiences in applying the methods. The work aims to give background knowledge for selecting evaluation methods in various situations. The thesis presents experiences in usability evaluations gathered in 72 evaluations during years 1993-1999. In these evaluations, both software and embedded systems have been studied. Usability evaluation is an essential step in human-centred design. A variety of usability evaluation methods are needed in a development process, because usability is a complex multidimensional concept that should be looked at in many ways. Different methods serve different evaluation purposes and reveal different problems. Therefore, several methods should be used as a complement to each other. In this thesis, usability evaluation methods are divided into empirical user testing and usability inspections without user involvement. The most common user testing method is a usability test in which a participant does given tasks with the evaluated system. The most common usability inspection method is a heuristic evaluation in which an inspector evaluates a user interface against a set of usability guidelines. The thesis also presents some new evaluation methods modified from usability testing and contextual inquiry. The evaluations that we have conducted at Helsinki University of Technology have shown that user testing is possible even with moderate resources. For example, usability tests with cardboard mock-ups and pluralistic usability walkthroughs with paper prototypes have given valuable results that have affected the product development. On the other hand, inspections have helped to find potential usability problems even before any prototypes have been built.
This paper aims to predict consumer acceptance of e-commerce by proposing a set of key drivers for engaging consumers in on-line transactions. The primary constructs for capturing consumer acceptance of e-commerce are intention to transact and on-line transaction behavior. Following the theory of reasoned action (TRA) as applied to a technology-driven environment, technology acceptance model (TAM) variables (perceived usefulness and ease of use) are posited as key drivers of e-commerce acceptance. The practical utility of TAM stems from the fact that e-commerce is technology-driven. The proposed model integrates trust and perceived risk, which are incorporated given the implicit uncertainty of the e-commerce environment. The proposed integration of the hypothesized independent variables is justified by placing all the variables under the nomological TRA structure and proposing their interrelationships. The resulting research model is tested using data from two empirical studies. The first, exploratory study comprises three experiential scenarios with 103 students. The second, confirmatory study uses a sample of 155 on-line consumers. Both studies strongly support the e-commerce acceptance model by validating the proposed hypotheses. The paper discusses the implications for e-commerce theory, research, and practice, and makes several suggestions for future research.
The information quality of commercial Web sites is becoming a focal point in the current consumer behavior literature. A consumer's perceived quality of information for products and services on the Web is believed to be the most salient factor for predicting his/her decision behavior. Combining the concepts of information quality and consumer decision behavior, this study tested a framework to evaluate the information quality of simulated lodging Web sites. Two hundred and forty conference attendees evaluated the information quality of one of eight hypothetically designed lodging Web sites. Results indicated that the adapted information quality model could be a useful framework for evaluating information quality on lodging Web sites. Of the four constructs of information quality, perceived usefulness and attitudes were found to be significant indicators to predict the customers’ purchase behavior using the lodging Web sites.
The technology acceptance model (TAM) proposes that ease of use and usefulness predict applications usage. The current research investigated TAM for work-related tasks with the World Wide Web as the application. One hundred and sixty-three subjects responded to an e-mail survey about a Web site they access often in their jobs. The results support TAM. They also demonstrate that (1) ease of understanding and ease of finding predict ease of use, and that (2) information quality predicts usefulness for revisited sites. In effect, the investigation applies TAM to help Web researchers, developers, and managers understand antecedents to users' decisions to revisit sites relevant to their jobs.
Ease of use and usefulness are believed to be fundamental in determining the acceptance and use of various, corporate ITs. These beliefs, however, may not explain the user???s behavior toward newly emerging ITs, such as the World-Wide-Web (WWW).In this study, we introduce playfulness as a new factor that reflects the user???s intrinsic belief in WWW acceptance. Using it as an intrinsic motivation factor, we extend and empirically validate the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) for the WWW context.
Intelligent Information Retrieval is concerned with the application of intelligent techniques, like for example semantic networks, neural networks and inference nets to Information Retrieval. This field of research has seen a number of applications of Constrained Spreading Activation (CSA) techniques on domain knowledge networks. However, there has never been any application of these techniques to the World Wide Web. The Web is a very important information resource, but users find that looking for a relevant piece of information in the Web can be like ‘looking for a needle in a haystack’. We were therefore motivated to design and develop a prototype system, WebSCSA (Web Search by CSA), that applied a CSA technique to retrieve information from the Web using an ostensive approach to querying similar to query-by-example. In this paper we describe the system and its underlying model. Furthermore, we report on an experiment carried out with human subjects to evaluate the effectiveness of WebSCSA. We tested whether WebSCSA improves retrieval of relevant information on top of Web search engines results and how well WebSCSA serves as an agent browser for the user. The results of the experiments are promising, and show that there is much potential for further research on the use of CSA techniques to search the Web.
Most current user interfaces are fairly similar and belong to one of two common types: either the traditional alphanumeric full screen terminals with a keyboard and function keys, or the more modern WIMP workstations with windows and a pointing device. In contrast, the next generation of user interfaces may move beyond the standard WIMP paradigm to involve elements such as virtual realities, head-mounted displays, sound and speech, limited artificial intelligence and highly portable computers with wireless communication capabilities. It is may be one of the defining characteristics of next generation UIs that they abandon the principle of conforming to a canonical interface style and instead become more radically tailored to the requirements of individual tasks, which could lead to a noncommand based interaction paradigm for future systems.
ISO 9241 – 11 Usability Definitions -Guidance on Usability
ISO (1998). ISO 9241 – 11. Usability Definitions -Guidance on Usability. Geneva,
Switzerland. International Standards Organisation. (http://www.usability.serco.com/trump
/resources/standards.htm [August 29, 2003]).
Testing Web Usability
- I W Harms
- Schweibenz
Harms, I. & W. Schweibenz (2000). Testing Web Usability. Information Management &
Consulting 15(3): 61-66.