Guidelines on design for dynamic use situations
Problem definition
As mentioned in the introduction, the ISO-definition of usability is: “the extent to which a product can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction in a specified context of use.” (ISO, 1998: p.2) This definition suggests that usability can only be defined for a specified use situation: a specified user, goal and context. However, in practice products are used by varying users, for different goals in varying contexts of use. I define this issue as ‘design for dynamic use situations’. Designing for dynamic use situations is difficult because it is hard to predict which situations a product will encounter, and consequently what this means for usability. Although this issue is acknowledged in the design research field (Shackel, 1984; Green and Jordan, 2002), little guidance can be found on how to deal with it in design.
Goals
The goal of this study is firstly to gain insights in how designers currently deal with design for dynamic use situations. Secondly, guidelines will be developed to support designers in tackling this design problem.
Method and results
How designers currently deal with dynamic use situations was studied by means of a retrospective case study of three design projects at Oce, Philips and Indes (Van der Bijl-Brouwer and van der Voort, 2009). This study concluded that there are different types of solutions to accommodate products to dynamic use situations. These solutions revealed no particular problems for designers. The analysis of current design processes, however, does lead to a point of departure for development of a support tool. This support tool should give designers insights into which means can be used to better understand potential use situations and how these use situations can be taken into account in the design process by means of offering a shared frame of reference for design evaluations, and generating solutions. The support tool consists of a set of guidelines to guide these activities and the Envisioning Use workshop, which is aimed at sharing knowledge about usability and use situations and building a first frame of reference of product use. Section 6 describes the development and validation of the workshop tool.
Innovation
The guidelines for design for dynamic use form a practical support in dealing with different users and contexts of use in the design process. They are not intended as a replacement for an existing design process, but are represented in such a way that they can be accommodated to the current way of working. The guidelines are unique in the sense that they can lead to an approach which makes dynamic and diverse situations explicit in the design process and thereby makes it possible to take them into account.
Validation
Since the success of the guidelines can only be validated in a complete design process, it was chosen to validate the guidelines in two student projects, because this process can easily be observed and it does not require any financial risks from companies. The design projects were based on real cases, inorder to be representative for a realistic design situation. The first project was executed with Bongo innovations BV, a producer of carrier bikes. The guidelines were adjusted based on the results of this project. The second validation will take place in September 2011.
Valorisation and benefits
The guidelines will be presented in a booklet. Since the guidelines are best used in combination with the Envisioning Use workshop, the booklet can be distributed to companies during the execution of this workshop. These guidelines will benefit companies by, amongst others, inspiring designers and usability engineers to accommodate their design and evaluation process to deal with dynamic use situations.