Reading news on mobile devices has during the past decade transcended into an every- day activity, which induce greater demands on design and presentation of news. Several researchers have examined essential components in the area of digital newspapers, despite this, there are few newspapers that have switched to a reader-friendly format. The objective of this thesis is to evaluate how the reading experience in digital newspa- pers can be improved by abandoning the traditional structure of today’s printed newspapers. Based on numerous tests and studies, as well as support from literature, a set of guidelines has been produced as a result of this thesis. The design guidelines contain recommendations for optimal line size, typeface, point size, appearance, functionality, placement, recognition factor and packaging. To ensure quality, all guidelines were validated in order to prove that the reading experience had increased. An evaluation was performed that attempted to determine that. The statistic result of this thesis showed a significant difference in both reading speed and the subjective experience. However no significant difference could be seen regarding the reading comprehension. The conclusions made was that structure and design of content can influence both reading speed and reading experience. All design guidelines can be used as guidance when developing templates for digital newspapers.

Achieving the feeling of a personal connection over the internet is difficult but at the same time more relevant than ever with the world moving more and more towards digital meetings and online events. This study investigates how an exhibition area at an online conference could be created to provide a good user experience as well as provide value for the exhibitors at the conference. The study was performed through interviews, three stages of prototyping as well as usability testing of these prototypes to gather data and feedback on what could be done to achieve this goal. Through the principles of social presence, human centered, and user centered design, a prototype of how such a solution could look was developed. As a result, the test users felt that they would feel welcome in the digital booth and that they felt a greater incentive to join conversations with the exhibitors. On the other end, the exhibitors also felt like this solution would provide value in the form of monitorable gathered data that could be followed up on to investigate the value that the conference has given them. This concludes that engaging and valuable online exhibitions can be created as long as careful thought is put into designing them with the user and human in mind.

The administration software is a crucial component of any successful company. It is often overlooked, but it plays an essential role in ensuring the smooth operation of the business. It is the backbone of the company's operations, and it must be able to meet the evolving needs of its users. Although many people may not notice the admin systems, their impact on the overall performance of the company should not be underestimated. The system's ability to reduce the cognitive load on users helps them to work more efficiently and effectively. A well-designed user interface (UI) can also shorten the learning curve and reduce errors, resulting in cost and time savings for the company. This project delves into the design of Once Upon's administration system, aiming to enhance efficiency for expert users, those intimately familiar with the system. The study includes an analysis of the current software, identification of areas for improvement, and proposals for design modifications. The overarching goal is to reduce the workload and improve efficiency for the customer care team. The study employs the human-centred design thinking process, encompassing phases such as empathising, defining, ideating, prototyping, testing, and implementing. Methods include literature studies, heuristic evaluations, semi-structured interviews, affinity diagramming, brainstorming, and prototyping.  Key issues found in the study included intricate workflows, necessitating excessive steps for routine tasks, resulting in heightened cognitive load and slower task execution. The non-intuitive information architecture posed difficulties for users in navigating and locating essential data. Inconsistencies in language and icon usage introduced confusion, impacting the overall coherence of the system. Moreover, the absence of a clear visual hierarchy hindered users' ability to identify and retrieve crucial information swiftly. Addressing these issues was imperative for enhancing the overall usability and effectiveness of the administration software at Once Upon. The new design, addressing identified challenges, received positive feedback, showcasing improved clarity and aesthetics. Using the System Usability Scale, the current interface scored 68, while the prototype scored 94, indicating a substantial improvement in usability. Despite the promising results, the study acknowledges limitations, including a small sample size. Further testing and refinement of the proposed design changes are essential. The broader field requires additional research on defining efficiency in user systems, ensuring optimal design for work tools used predominantly by expert users.

This thesis evaluates the usability and user experience (UX) of the Nordnet mobile application, with a focus on the challenges or barriers faced by novice users. Nordnet is one of the leading digital platforms and banks for savings, investments, loans, and pensions, in the Nordic. As financial technologies continue to advance, good usability and user experience of mobile financial applications become important, especially for users with no or limited experience using financial applications such as Nordnet. Through a combination of usability testing with interviews and the use of the System Usability Scale (SUS), this study aims to uncover the primary barriers novice users encounter, and from those recommend design improvements to enhance the usability and overall user experience.The methodology used consists of a task-based evaluation with a total of five first-time users performing a predefined set of tasks to assess different usability aspects such as learnability, efficiency, cognitive load, and the overall user experience. The findings indicate significant challenges in navigation, feature discoverability, and complex interface, affecting the overall usability and user experience negatively. The overall usability rating calculated through the SUS questionnaire was rated as below average, with only one test participant rating it as above average. Despite these challenges, certain features were appreciated for their functionality and ease of use. Suggested improvements include simplifying the interface to reduce cognitive load and enhancing the clarity of icons with the help of text labels.This research contributes to the field by highlighting the critical areas where mobile financial applications such as Nordnet can improve to better serve its novice users.

This thesis sets out to answer the question “How does Persuasive Technology influence the User Experience in a Learning Management System?”. The aim was to further the understanding of Persuasive Technologies (PT) within Education and better the insights in how PT affects the User Experience (UX) due to the increasing number of online students in Sweden. By using a mix-method approach the thesis focuses on understanding how the Dashboard within Linnaeus University’s Moodle environment interacts with Persuasive Technology. By combining both quantitative and qualitative methods such as the System Usability Scale (SUS), Usability Testing with Concurrent Thinking Aloud as well as Retrospective Probing Questions the aim is to better understand the effect. The study indicated that PT has the possibility to affect the User Experience both positively and negatively. The results suggest that if the adaptation of persuasive elements have not been thoroughly thought through the LMS runs a risk of being seen as unlikable and untrustworthy. This thesis’s result shows that the Persuasive Design Principles Liking and Trustworthiness are key Principles when it comes to affecting the user’s experience.

This thesis aims to fill a gap in academic literature regarding stand-up comedy, particularly research about relationships between comedians in a social media setting. The research analyzes such relationships with the uses and gratifications approach, which ties the use of a particular medium of mass communication with gratifications expected by the audience. The first objective is to understand whether the gratifications that comedians expect from social media when networking and looking for performance opportunities are fulfilled. The second is to propose a design solution that could better provide these gratifications. The research included four different methods: a survey, a series of interviews, a prototype and a focus group. Results from the survey showed that the gratifications sought by comedians are obtained in current social media platforms. The interviews revealed that there were still specific features missing that could benefit the comedians. The information gathered in the first two phases informed the features in the prototype of a mobile application. In the fourth phase, comedians participated in a focus group where they analyzed the prototype, with an overall positive impression. The comedians also gave suggestions for improvements that can inform future research. / MACOM / Stand-up comedy is a business that generates billions of dollars every year in the United States, and social media has become a fundamental aspect of the way comedians communicate. Yet, there is no research on relationships between stand-up comedians, especially in the social media setting. This research aims to fill that gap in the literature using four methods. The first was a survey to understand whether current social media platforms fulfill the expectations that comedians have regarding networking and finding performance opportunities. The second was a series of interviews with comedians to further explore what they expect from social media in those regards. The third was the design of a solution, which took the form of a mobile app, catered to comedians's specific needs. The fourth was a focus group in which comedians evaluated the solution. Results indicated that existing social media do fulfill comedians' expectations, however there were opportunities to improve in the form of specific features. The solution proposed combined the collaborative nature of social media with an automation of processes to optimize time and energy for the comedians. Regarding the app's evaluation, opinions were overall positive, with suggestions on how to improve even further.

This study examines the technology and appointment scheduling habits of older adults over the age of 55 through an exploratory sequential three phase mixed methods study. Phase One of this study examined features of ten existing mHealth applications through a qualitative content analysis, then a mHealth wireframe was developed from the app to replicate in addition to a redesigned version. Phase Two of the study was a thirty-four questions survey with 40 participants that inquired about their background with appointment scheduling, prior experience with technology, and demographics. After that, the mHealth applications were revised into two mHealth application prototypes. Lastly, Phase Three conducted a user test with the two mHealth prototypes through A/B testing with 15 participants. Findings from the survey showed the preferred method of scheduling an appointment among participants was primarily in-person or by phone. The user test revealed that some participants were willing to use a mHealth application to schedule an appointment if it was deemed easy to use. Recommendations for future research suggests that the iterative design process of a prototype with an underserved population would garner feedback inclusive of those older adults who are less tech savvy. The major contribution of this research was the development of the mHapps Framework which will be tested in a future study.

This study presents a case study that addresses a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system as a key component in managing customer relations for companies. Due to these systems being very complex and needing a complete understanding of the user requirements to support their actions, this user experience can potentially be hindered. This study aims to highlight these challenges by identifying key usability challenges faced by users and suggesting targeted design improvements from a developer perspective.   This qualitative study explored usability challenges within an existing CRM system through a user-centered approach, gathering data from the users of the CRM-system. Empirical data was collected using interviews in a semi-structured form to delve into the user experience and what issues the users was facing. This methodology has facilitated a great understanding of areas that would need further development of the CRM-system. Applying Nielsen’s usability heuristics as an analytical framework, multiple critical enhancements were identified. These recommendations for enhancements are aimed with the goal of simplifying the user interface and the work conducted in it. The active involvement of the users in this study addressed multiple critical factors of improvements in the CRM-system, with the likes of the importance of integrating direct communication tools within the CRM-system to facilitate direct customer interaction. Additionally, there emerged a need for further development of the system’s performance and responsiveness, as well as enhancing its personal flexibility to adapt the CRM-system to each user's individual work process. This study contributes to the ongoing discourse on enhancing CRM-system effectiveness and user satisfaction through strategic design enhancements.

Yes / Galaxy (https://galaxyproject.org) is deployed globally, predominantly through free-to-use services, supporting user-driven research that broadens in scope each year. Users are attracted to public Galaxy services by platform stability, tool and reference dataset diversity, training, support and integration, which enables complex, reproducible, shareable data analysis. Applying the principles of user experience design (UXD), has driven improvements in accessibility, tool discoverability through Galaxy Labs/subdomains, and a redesigned Galaxy ToolShed. Galaxy tool capabilities are progressing in two strategic directions: integrating general purpose graphical processing units (GPGPU) access for cutting-edge methods, and licensed tool support. Engagement with global research consortia is being increased by developing more workflows in Galaxy and by resourcing the public Galaxy services to run them. The Galaxy Training Network (GTN) portfolio has grown in both size, and accessibility, through learning paths and direct integration with Galaxy tools that feature in training courses. Code development continues in line with the Galaxy Project roadmap, with improvements to job scheduling and the user interface. Environmental impact assessment is also helping engage users and developers, reminding them of their role in sustainability, by displaying estimated CO2 emissions generated by each Galaxy job. / NIH [U41 HG006620, U24 HG010263, U24 CA231877, U01 CA253481]; US National Science Foundation [1661497, 1758800, 2216612]; computational resources are provided by the Advanced Cyberinfrastructure Coordination Ecosystem (ACCESS-CI), Texas Advanced Computing Center, and the JetStream2 scientific cloud. Funding for open access charge: NIH. ELIXIR IS and Travel grants; EU Horizon Europe [HORIZON-INFRA-2021-EOSC-01-04, 101057388]; EU Horizon Europe under the Biodiversity, Circular Economy and Environment program (REA.B.3, BGE 101059492); German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, BMBF [031 A538A de.NBI-RBC]; Ministry of Science, Research and the Arts Baden-Württemberg (MWK) within the framework of LIBIS/de.NBI Freiburg. Galaxy Australia is supported by the Australian BioCommons which is funded through Australian Government NCRIS investments from Bioplatforms Australia and the Australian Research Data Commons, as well as investment from the Queensland Government RICF program.

Current Augmented Reality devices rely heavily on real-time environment mapping to provide convincing world-relative experiences through user interaction with virtual content integrated into the real world. This mapping is obtained and updated through many different algorithms, but often results in holes and other mesh artifacts when generated in less ideal scenarios, like outdoors and with fast movement. In this work, we present the Interaction-Triggered Estimation of AR Object Placement on Indeterminate Meshes, a quick, interaction-triggered method to estimate the normal and position of missing mesh pieces in real-time with low computational overhead. We achieve this by extending the user's hand using a group of additional raycast sample points, aggregating results according to different algorithms, and then using the resulting values to place an object. This thesis will first cover problems with current mapping techniques, thoroughly explain the rationale and algorithms behind our method, and then evaluate our method using a user study. / Master of Science / Augmented Reality (AR) technologies have the potential to change all our lives for the better through tight and seamless integration into our daily lives. Crucial to this seamless integration is the ability for users to manipulate virtual AR objects and interact effortlessly with real-world features around them. In order to facilitate this interaction, AR devices often create 3D maps of the real world to allow the device to recognize and respect the geometry of the world around it. Unfortunately, many AR devices still have trouble creating and maintaining these maps in challenging environments, like outdoors or when moving fast, so the resulting 3D maps of the environments have holes and inaccuracies, causing user interaction with the environment to be unreliable and breaking the seamless integration. While many solutions look toward more advanced algorithms that require more specialized sensors or next-gen AR devices to improve this mapping issue, we see an opportunity to enhance any existing 3D maps using a novel interaction aggregation approach that can theoretically work with any mapping technology. In this work, we present the Interaction-Triggered Estimation of AR Object Placement on Indeterminate Meshes, a work-in-progress application providing a quick, interaction-triggered method to estimate the normal and position of missing mesh in real-time with low computational overhead.