The scarcity of usability studies on computer-aided design (CAD) systems has prompted three questions: (1) Is usability testing different for CAD systems than conventional software? (2) What role does domain expertise play in the use of CAD software since most CAD applications are not simple tasks? (3) How does the design parameters’ presentation affect the user's understanding of the design, the design domain, and the capabilities of the CAD system?
This thesis addresses these three questions through the application of human-computer interaction (HCI) techniques in the development of a graphical user interface (GUI) for the metal-ceramic brazing process: First, a GUI for the metal-ceramic brazing process was designed and implemented. Subjects were then invited to test the GUI by performing a set of benchmark tasks. The results of these tests were analyzed, both to characterize design flaws in the interface, and to suggest redesign solutions to observed problems. The GUI was then refined based upon the test results and retested.
To further aid in the understanding of the effects of the design parameters’ presentation, a usability evaluation was also performed for a finite element module of a state-of-the-art commercial CAD system (I-DEAS Master Series, version 1.3). This evaluation provided a comparison for the metal-ceramic interface with respect to interaction styles, presentation of domain knowledge, and task performance.
This study demonstrated that HCI methodologies can be applied effectively to CAD user interface development. In particular, it encouraged the development of a usability-oriented process for developing usable interfaces. However, it also highlighted the difficulties posed by the complexity of a CAD system and the associated task analysis.
It was observed that three distinct sets of knowledge are involved in the use of a CAD system: task knowledge, domain knowledge, and application knowledge. By separating and distinguishing the needs of these sets of knowledge, the CAD system developer is more likely to design a high-quality interface, one that supports the task performance while educating the novice user of the technical background of the application.
It was also found that a clearly and intuitively organized interface can provide an invaluable insight for users into the functionality of the system and facilitate users' learning of the system. The subjects who participated in this study were inexperienced in both the application and the application domain and relied greatly upon the organization of the interface to lead them through the benchmark tasks. The organization of the system functions or, in the case of the metal-ceramic brazing interface, the design parameters, was shown to be crucial to the subjects' understanding of the application because it was the only source of guidance the subjects had as to how to perform the benchmark tasks. In particular, it was observed that the subjects had the tendency to align their thought process to that of the interface in their attempts to understand the system. / Master of Science
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VTETD/oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/41403 |
| Date | 04 March 2009 |
| Creators | Moo, Jason |
| Contributors | Mechanical Engineering |
| Publisher | Virginia Tech |
| Source Sets | Virginia Tech Theses and Dissertation |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis, Text |
| Format | xii, 134 leaves, BTD, application/pdf, application/pdf |
| Rights | In Copyright, http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
| Relation | OCLC# 34371567, LD5655.V855_1995.M66.pdf |
Page generated in 0.0131 seconds