Ideas and work in progress
Standard disclaimers: I reserve the right to completely change this as
I try and produce a coherent whole. It may be that things that currently
seem a good idea just won't fit when I have the whole thing together. The
course will be responsive to the input from participants. This means that
these details may change as I learn more about the people who sign up and
their particular interests.
The main thing to note about this course is that I will expect very
active participation. There will be lots of individual and group activities.
I believe the only way to learn about design is to try and do it. However
you may need help and advice and I'm happy to provide that as a major part
of our class activities. You are also encouraged to draw on the skills
of your fellow class members and other people you may have around you.
That is perfectly legitimate BUT you must acknowledge where you have received
help. More on this later.
Some of the broad themes we will be looking at:
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The case for good interface design
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Basic Interface Concepts
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Design Approaches
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Interface Analysis
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User Oriented Design
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Rapid Prototyping
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Discount Usability
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Evaluation
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Help, Errors and Manuals
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Different Kinds of User
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Teaching people how to use systems
In order to do this we will be looking at some particular kinds of user
interfaces in detail. These include:
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Web Pages
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OPACs
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CD-Roms
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Collaboratories
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Bibliographic Databases
As you can see, I'm choosing examples that have a strong library theme.
But the ideas we will cover can equally well be applied to any computer
system.
Course Overview