Design, Prototyping, and

Construction
Mohamad Monibi
Jonathan Chen
 Iterative Design Overview
Design, Conceptual &
Physical
User Models &
Requirements Specifications

Evaluation & Prototyping &

Feedback Construction
Demos &
Products
 Conceptual Design
• User Requirements => Conceptual Model
• “a description of the proposed system in
terms of a set of integrated ideas and
concepts about what it should do, behave,
and look like, that will be understandable by
the users in the manner intended”
• High-level compared to physical design
 Guiding Principles
• Discuss and get different perspectives
• Prototyping
• Iterate, iterate, iterate!
• Consider many alternatives
• “To get a good idea, get lots of ideas”

• Empathize with the user

 Developing a Conceptual Model
• Three perspectives
– Interaction Mode
• How the user invokes actions when interacting with the
device
– Interface Metaphor
• Combining familiar knowledge with new knowledge in a
way that helps the user understand the system
– Interaction Paradigm
• Particular way of thinking about interaction design
 Interaction Modes
• Activity-based
– Instructing
– Conversing
– Manipulating & Navigating
– Exploring & Browsing
• Object-based
 Interaction Modes
• Activity-based
– Instructing
– Conversing
– Manipulating
& Navigating
– Exploring
& Browsing
• Object-based
 Interaction Modes
• Activity-based
– Instructing
– Conversing
– Manipulating
& Navigating
– Exploring
Press 1 for customer service.
& Browsing Press 3 for store hours.
• Object-based
 Interaction Modes
• Activity-based
– Instructing
– Conversing
– Manipulating
& Navigating
– Exploring
& Browsing
• Object-based
 Interaction Modes
• Activity-based
– Instructing
– Conversing
– Manipulating
& Navigating
– Exploring
& Browsing
• Object-based
 Interaction Modes
• Activity-based
– Instructing
– Conversing
– Manipulating
& Navigating
– Exploring
& Browsing
• Object-based
 Interface Metaphors
• Conceptual model similar to some aspects of a
physical entity
• Need to be evaluated
– Structure
– Relevance
– Representation
– Clarity
– Extensibility
 Interface Paradigms
• Desktop
• Ubiquitous
• Pervasive
• Wearable
• …

• Consider user tasks & environmental

requirements
 Expanding the Conceptual Model
• What functions will the product perform?
– (how will tasks be divided up?)
• How are the functions related to each other?
– Temporal (sequential or parallel)
– Categorization
• What information needs to be available?
– What data is required to perform the task?
– How is this data to be transformed by the system?
Techniques used in Conceptual Design
• Scenarios
– Basis for the overall design
– Basis for technical implementation
– Means of cooperation within design teams
– Means of cooperation across professional
boundaries (multidisciplinary teams)
• Prototyping
 Prototyping & Construction
• What is a prototype?
• Why prototype?
• Low vs. high fidelity prototyping
• Compromises in prototyping
•Vertical vs. horizontal
• Construction
•Evolutionary vs. throwaway prototype
 What is a prototype?
Limited representation of a product design
• Scale models, etc.
• In interaction design it can be (among other things):
• a series of screen sketches
• a storyboard, i.e. a cartoon-like series of scenes
• a piece of software with limited functionality
 Why prototype?
• Interactive exploration with People cannot describe what
envisioned product they want, but they are quick to
recognize what they do not like!
• Clarifies vague requirements
with concrete communication
between stakeholders
• Answers questions and
supports design decisions
with forced reflection
• Tests feasibility &
compatibility
• Sells product ideas
• Inspires innovation in
“prototyping cultures”
 Low vs. High Fidelity Prototypes
• Low-Fi: Cheap to produce,
does not realistically simulate
the final product
Conceptual Design
• Hi-Fi: Increased similarity to
final product, possibly even
using the same “parts”
Physical Design
• Prototypes should shift
from Low-Fi to Hi-Fi as
project progresses
 Low-Fidelity Prototyping
• Uses medium unlike the final product
(e.g. paper, cardboard)

• Quick, cheap and easy to modify

• Important early on to
encourage creative flexibility
and exploration of ideas
during conceptual design
 Sketching
• Core skill for most low-fidelity prototyping
• Not about drawing ability! Simple symbols
• Cruder sketch will emphasize conceptual design
over superficial, physical design
 Storyboards
• Storyboards often used with scenarios, bringing
detail and a chance to role play

•Series of scene sketches showing user

progression through a task flow

•Series of screenshots illustrating use case

Checkout: Product List, Shipping, Payment, Confirmation
 Card-Based Prototypes
• Index cards, post-it notes, etc.
• Each represents one screen or section
• Often used in website development
• Facilitates stepping through elements
• Convenient to dynamically reorder work flow
 High-Fidelity Prototyping
• Uses similar materials as and “looks like” final product
• Common high-fidelity software prototype environments
include Macromedia Director and Visual Basic with WYSIWYG
layout editors
• May include “real” code to demonstrate functions

Simulation or demo of final product to address feasibility and

physical design issues, but costlier to develop and can
confuse boundary between prototype and real product
 Horizontal vs. Vertical Prototypes
• Horizontal: Wide range with little detail (sales tool)
• Vertical: Much detail for few functions (incremental dev)

Product Item Product User

Search Checkout Recommendations Reviews

Full-Text Search Credit Card A.I. Ranking & Content

Index Authorization Scoring Management

Product Catalog Purchasing

DB Tracking Data
Hi-Fi Compromises & Dangers
•Software prototypes may have slow response,
sketchy icons, test halting bugs, etc.
•Long time to build  Developer resistance to
criticism and change
•Demos good for selling product ideas, but sets high
expectations 
•Users confuse demo promise with real product
•“Invisible” compromises: Hacked code, sloppy
engineering. Time to reengineer quality product 
developer pressured into recycling sloppy code
 Construction
• Creating whole product given prototype results
•‘Throw-away’ prototyping vs.
•Evolutionary prototyping

• Evolutionary prototyping is appealing, but planning

and quality must be attended to from the start!
Usability, reliability, robustness, maintainability,
integrity, portability, efficiency, etc.
 Physical Design
• Conceptual design abstractly describes system’s
intended behavior
– ATM should authenticate user ID and allow user to
withdraw cash on command
• Physical design addresses specific, concrete layout
and design issues
– ATM should have a card reader slot, a 10 digit keypad
for users to enter a PIN number, a touch screen
monitor with a menu of command options and a
mechanical reel for dispensing increments of $20 bills
 Physical Design Guidelines
• Principles
– Abstract statements open to interpretation
– e.g., Maintain consistency, keep designs simple, support user
recognition vs. recall, etc.
– Mostly same principles reviewed in first half of the quarter
• Rules
– Specific statements, with no interpretations
– e.g., Menus should have no more than 8 options
• Style Guides and Standards
– Collections of principles and rules to achieve consistency across
applications. Good for corporate identity and consistency.
– e.g., Windows or Mac style guides: File menu first, Help menu
last, etc. Standard icon for save, cut, copy, paste, etc.
– Useful to adopt ad hoc standards to meet user expectations
 Specific Widget Guidelines
• Menu Design
– Common functions should be easiest to reach
– >8 options is too much, grouping to organize
– Opposite and dangerous operators should be
physically separated to avoid accidents

• Icon Design
– Takes time to develop a good one
– Immediately recognizable (small and simple)
– Easily distinguishable from others
– More important than being very descriptive
 Specific Widget Guidelines
• Web Design Specifics
– Unique with hyperlink nature, short user attention
span, download lag time
– Key questions web pages should answer within 3
seconds of scanning
1. Where am I? 1
2. Where can I go?
3. What’s here?
2 3
 Specific Widget Guidelines
• Multi-Screen Designs
– Task flow with multiple steps
– Start with one page per “atomic” step, but balance against
too many trivial pages
– Consider frames or overlapping windows to easily move
between non-linear task flow
– Pertinent info should be available across all steps

What are good design and prototyping methods for

these?
• Perspectives
– Interaction paradigms Review • Scenarios & prototypes
– Interaction modes to explore
– Metaphors Design, Conceptual &
Physical
User Models &
• Physical design
Requirements guidelines Specifications

Evaluation & Prototyping &

Feedback Construction
Demos &
Products • Low-Fidelity
• High-Fidelity
– Vertical
– Horizontal
 Summary
• There two aspects to the design activity: conceptual design and physical
design
• Conceptual design develops model of what the product will do and how it will
behave while physical design specifies the details of the design such as screen
layout and menu structure
• We have explored three perspectives to help you develop conceptual models:
an interaction paradigm point of view, an interaction mode point of view, and
a metaphor point of view
• Scenarios and prototypes can be used effectively in conceptual design to
explore ideas
• Prototyping may be low fidelity (such as paper-based) or high fidelity (such as
software based)
• High-fidelity prototypes may be vertical or horizontal
• Low-fidelity prototypes are quick and easy to produce and modify and are
used in early stages of design
• We have discussed four areas of physical design: menu design, icon design,
screen design, and information display
 Specific Widget Guidelines
• Information Display
– Not just about showing relevant information, but also
presentation format

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 Tool Support
• Many available, though pencil-n-paper sketches are still
very valuable
• General features that make for useful design and
prototyping tools
– Helps design or implement interface given specifications
– Creates easy-to-use interfaces
– Allows rapid investigation of design alternatives
– Allows non-programmers to design and implement
– Automatically evaluates interfaces and suggests improvements
– Allows end-user customization of the interface
– Portability
– Inherent ease of use
 Tool Support Successes
Tool Description / Examples
Window Managers Allow multiple overlapping multi-window
Event Languages Maps well to direct-manipulation
interfaces
Graphical Layout / WYSIWYG layout editors
Interface Builders (e.g., Visual Basic, Dreamweaver)
Scripting Rapid prototyping (e.g., Perl, Python)
Languages
Hypertext Non-linear document traversal (i.e., Web)
Obj. Oriented Prog. Natural to model UI widgets as objects
Component Modular, easy to combine (e.g., Java
Systems Beans)
• Perspectives
– Interaction paradigms Review • Scenarios & prototypes
– Interaction modes to explore
– Metaphors Design, Conceptual &
Physical
User Models &
• Physical design
Requirements guidelines Specifications

Evaluation & Prototyping &

Feedback Construction
Demos &
Products • Low-Fidelity
• High-Fidelity
– Vertical
– Horizontal