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To appear in: Proceedings of Human-Computer Interaction'96, Annual HCI Conference of the British Computer Society, London, 20-23 August, 1996 (Springer-Verlag, London).
Multidisciplinary Modelling for User-Centred System
Design: An Air-Traffic Control Case Study
Simon?Buckingham?Shum1, Ann?Blandford2, David?Duke3,
Jason?Good3, Jon?May4, Fabio?Paterno?5 and Richard?Young6
1 Knowledge Media Institute, The Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA,
U.K.
Tel: +44 1908-655723
Fax: +44 1908-653169
EMail: S.Buckingham.Shum@open.ac.uk
2 School of Computing Science, Middlesex University, London, N11 2NQ, U.K.
EMail: A.Blandford@mdx.ac.uk
3 Dept. Computer Science, University of York, York, YO1 5DD, U.K.
EMail: {Duke, Jason}@minster.york.ac.uk
4 Dept. Psychology, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TP, U.K.
EMail: Jon.May@sheffield.ac.uk
5 CNUCE-CNR, Via S.Maria 36, 56126 Pisa, Italy
EMail: F.Paterno@cnuce.cnr.it
6 MRC Applied Psychology Unit, 15 Chaucer Road, Cambridge, CB2 2EF, U.K.
EMail: Richard.Young@mrc-apu.cam.ac.uk
This paper reports work investigating how user and system modelling techniques can be integrated to support the design of advanced interactive systems, and how such modelling can be effectively communicated to design practitioners in order to evaluate their potential. We describe a large scale modelling exercise concerning a flight sequencing tool for air-traffic controllers. We outline the kinds of system and user analysis possible with the different modelling techniques, and the approach used to integrate and communicate the modelling analyses to the system?s designers. We then discuss the value of these techniques against several key criteria. The designers evaluated the modelling positively in many respects, including a commitment to explore further how user modelling can be integrated with their formal methods. We conclude that the scenario of HCI modellers working in collaboration with designers is feasible, and has analytic power.
Keywords: multidisciplinary design; user modelling; formal methods; interaction modelling; air-traffic control
1 Introduction
1.1 Modelling techniques for user-centred design
Over the last six years, the ESPRIT funded AMODEUS Project has been investigating how modelling techniques from software and cognitive engineering can be brought together in the