Going Beyond Mobile-App Usability: TrueContext opens “human factors” lab

Illustrating just how important ease of use and logical workflows are to software design, mobile application development house TrueContext Corp. has opened a "human factors" lab to investigate human-to-computer interaction. But according to the firm’s chief scientist, this isn’t your average "usability" investigation. Mitch Brisebois points out that human factors analysis incorporates numerous disciplines in the quest to improve users’ experiences with technology. In an interview with Telemanagement, Brisebois notes that industrial design, application development – both server-side and client side – marketing, graphics design, end-user focus groups and even chats with telecommunications service providers play a part in the mobile human factors game. Mitch Brisebois points out that human factors analysis incorporates numerous disciplines in the quest to improve users’ experiences with technology. In an interview with Telemanagement, Brisebois notes that industrial design, application development – both server-side and client side – marketing, graphics design, end-user focus groups and even chats with telecommunications service providers play a part in the mobile human factors game. Ottawa-based TrueContext, which builds the software behind mForms, a mobile document management program available through Rogers Communications Inc., was looking for a leg-up in the increasingly crowded mobile software space. The company expects the attention it’s paying to human factors in the lab now will impress clients later. "Companies are having a hard time differentiating their products," Brisebois says. "One of the ways they can differentiate is through the user experience. You want to create passion in your users – features that’ll keep them coming back." The multi-disciplinary approach that TrueContext takes to human factors is increasingly necessary for software makers to figure out what end users really want, and to deliver the requisite functionality. Brisebois says it’s no good to rely on end-user focus groups alone to steer the application development ship, and it’s no good to throw softball questions at users either. "We may say, ‘We have great technology and for $500 you could have it. It’s going to do exactly the same thing as your piece of paper,’" he suggests. "The reaction’s going to be: ‘I don’t want to spend $500 and my piece of paper works just fine.’" Brisebois says software makers must quiz end users on how they work now and devise application features impressive enough to cause users to rethink their existing workflows. Human factors researchers are watching to see when the light goes on – the point at which potential buyers figure the proposed software might be worth purchasing. "You have to push the capabilities out further and further to see at what point the person is going to realize new opportunities if they move up to new technology," he notes. Human factors aren’t only about impressing users with easy menu navigation: they’re also about finding the ROI for customers. But "you have to let come up with those opportunites on their own," Brisebois says. "Then we go back and say, ‘What are the minimum components our products have to have for this to happen?’" One of the main challenges of human factors in the mobile space is the dearth of examples, both good and bad. By contrast, there are plenty of best practices regarding website and desktop application design – good designs born in part of bad designs from the past. "It’s partly from education-by-example among designers and education of users themselves," Brisbois says. "In the mobile world, there’s still an opportunity for extending usability. That said, ‘usability’ itself is undergoing some changes. It’s "a loaded word," according to Brisebois. "We could spend an hour breaking it down into its various components. But if you’re going to match the needs of the user – the user’s expectations – to the service, there’s still going to be a disconnect," he says. "The standard usability phrase is, ‘Design this product, but it’s gotta be easy to use.’ Well, what does ‘easy to use’ mean? Most people expect the one big feature they’re buying the device for is going to be easy to use, but they’re also going to want other power features." This is a chronic problem for application providers. Consider Microsoft Corp.: its applications are feature-rich – some might say almost bloated. "But if you ask a thousand different users, they’ll have a thousand different priorities as to what that one big feature is," Brisebois says, noting that developers find it difficult to lose the bloat without annoying a substantial portion of the customer base. But unlike the desktop PC world, the mobile space affords some flexibility in terms of form factors: not all devices need look alike, and not all devices need perform exactly the same tasks. "People have learned a lot about mobility over the past little while," Brisebois says, explaining that this education came at the cost of some mobile communicaton pioneers. "One of my favourite noted failures is the Apple Newton – it would do it all. Nokia had its Communicator. They just didn’t have the one big thing that solved problems for folks. They tried to be everything for all people." But since then Apple has succeeded with its entertaiment-dedicated device, the iPod. And Nokia develops mobile handsets that address particular market niches: the 2125i is for consumers, the 2855i, for business users, for instance.TrueContext aims to play a role in the industry’s future advancements via its human factors lab, which will publish some of its research in white papers and share its findings with partners and customers – not end users per se, but communications service providers that choose to offer TrueContext applications to end users. Improving the user experience is important for TrueContext, but so is spreading the word about the new lab. "We want people to know we’re investing in the user experience for our products, because we think it’s a substantial differentiating factor," Brisebois says.

Going Beyond Mobile-App Usability: TrueContext opens “human factors” lab

News | December 1, 2006

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