On 10/14/04 4:36 PM, "Umesh Persad" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> If you had to list the characteristics of users that would be important
> to consider in designing a product, then what would they be?
There are of course many "users" of a design with different objectives
regarding it - the person or organization who commissions it for economic or
personal gain as well as its manufacturers, distributers, and marketers for
example. But the end user for whom the product is a meaningful and useful
artifact in their life is the most important user. A users intention
regarding a product, their understanding of its features, the relationship
of these features to their intentions and circumstances of use, its ease of
use in these circumstances; how it functions during use; its capacity to
satisfy the users intention and its significance to them and to others are
the important dimensions of usability.
The end user should be considered as an individual person in particular
circumstances of use. (ie a blind child at a traffic light, an impatient
adolescent at the same light, an elderly and infirm person there, etc.).
This is why firms such as IDEO use scenarios to try to capture the needs of
users in particular situations. Empathy with users in the circumstances they
confront is essential. Scenarios constitute a research method used in
practice that rarely surfaces in academia. Defining a user out of context,
is, it seems to me, a bad idea and I fear that is what you are about to do.
"Presenting user information for effective use" is the object of design.
There is no single format in which it is organized. Similarly "it might
depend on the product being designed" puts the cart before the horse, as it
were. It is more important to think of an individual and what they may want
or need in a situation than a type of product typically found there.
Anyway, these are my thoughts in response to your request.
Chuck Burnette
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