Courses in Computer Science, Roskilde University

HCI: Human-Computer Interaction (preliminary course description)

The course covers the following topics:

• User-centred design, which involves principles for and barriers to a managed, iterative, user-driven process alternating between design and evaluation
• Visual structure, which involves the use of grouping, hierarchy, relationship, and balance in the layout of screens
• Information visualization, which involves the use of overviews, interaction, and other techniques in the presentation of information
• The concept of usability, which involves the three dimensions effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction
• Prototypes, which involve design sketches, prototypes for use laboratory-like settings, and pilot systems for evaluation under realistic conditions
• Empirical usability evaluation, which involves the thinking-aloud method and other ways of eliciting user feedback about a design prototype
• Usability inspection, which involves usability evaluations performed analytically by usability specialists, includes cognitive walkthroughs and the keystroke-level model
• Usage aspects of selected user activities, which involve information seeking and retrieval and computer-supported collaboration

User needs and requirements must be understood in the context of users' tasks and the technological possibilities. Consequently, needs and requirements are discovered, elaborated, and revised during software development processes through two types of activity: design and evaluation. The development of innovative, useful, usable, and pleasing IT applications requires competence in a set of design and evaluation methods, and knowledge of conceptual models and design principles enabling informed use of these methods. The aim of the HCI course is to provide participants with this competence and knowledge.

• With respect to design, course participants learn to use and theorize about techniques and concepts that are central to the visualization of information and thereby to the design of visual interfaces. This includes the use of prototypes and design sketches to illustrate and drive a process of discovering and communicating design ideas and user needs among designers and user representatives.
• With respect to evaluation, course participants learn the theories and frameworks underlying selected usability evaluation methods, and they learn to choose among, apply, and tailor these methods to concrete situations in order to measure effects of system use, determine whether design goals are achieved, and enable new insights about user experiences and design opportunities to emerge.