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FACULTY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
EXAMINATION FOR THE BSC (HONS) COMPUTER SCIENCE
EXAMINATION FOR THE BSC (HONS) INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
ACADEMIC SESSION MARCH 2013
CSC3024: HUMAN COMPUTER INTERACTION
FINAL –JULY 2013 EXAM CYCLE
TIME: 2 HOURS + 10 MINUTES READING TIME
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INSTRUCTIONS TO CANDIDATES
Answer any FOUR questions.
All answers must be written in the answer booklets provided using blue or black INK
IMPORTANT NOTES TO CANDIDATES
Materials Allowed
Standard Items :
Special Items :
Pen, Pencil, Eraser or Correction Fluid, Ruler
Non Programmable Calculators
It is your responsibility to ensure that you do NOT have in your possession any
unauthorised notes or any other means that would improperly help you in your work. If
you have any unauthorised materials with you, hand it to the invigilator BEFORE
reading any further.
DO NOT REMOVE THIS QUESTION PAPER FROM THE EXAMINATION HALL
[This paper contains FIVE questions printed on SIX pages]
Question 1 (25 marks)
a)
Explain what is meant by Human Computer Interaction and justify its (4 marks)
importance in our daily lives.
b)
Describe THREE populations of users with special needs. For each of (12 marks)
these populations, suggest THREE ways current interfaces could be
improved to better serve them.
c)
Figure 1 shows the interior of a cab equipped with a multitude of
electronic devices.
Figure 1
i)
In your opinion, would the usage of these devices while driving
interfere with the driver’s attention? Justify your answer.
(5 marks)
ii)
Suggest TWO possible solutions to improve the interaction of
the driver to all these devices while maintaining the safety
aspects of driving.
(4 marks)
Question 2 (25 marks)
a)
With the help of an appropriate illustration, explain what is
and its impact in the design of daily devices?
law
(4 marks)
b)
Direct manipulation interfaces are preferable over command-line
interfaces in the general population. Compare and contrast the
advantages and disadvantages between direct manipulation and
command-line interfaces.
(10 marks)
c)
Examine the interface provided in Figure 2.
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Fitt’s
Figure 2
i)
Identify FIVE mistakes that the designer made in the layout of
the interface that violated the guidelines for perception.
(5 marks)
ii)
Sketch and describe an improved version of the layout.
(6 marks)
Question 3 (25 marks)
a)
Explain what mental models are and describe, with illustration, the three
different aspects of mental models in interface design.
(6 marks)
b)
Differentiate between ‘gulf of execution’ and ‘gulf of evaluation’ and
elaborate the importance of reducing these gulfs in HCI design.
(4 marks)
c)
Mr. Donald, a 65 year old man, recently bought a new laptop. He
searches for the power button on the top panel* and presses what he
thinks is the right button. However, the display remains off. He repeats
the same steps with the remaining buttons and even tried holding the
buttons for different lengths of time but the laptop remains turned off
and silent. After an hour of frustration, he calls the service centre and
discovers that the power button is not a button but a switch situated at
the far left-hand corner on the back panel where he never expected it to
be.
*His previous laptop from the same manufacturer has a power button
situated on the top right-hand corner of the top panel.
i)
Describe Norman’s seven stages of action with respect to Mr.
Donald’s actions.
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(7 marks)
ii)
Suggest a possibility to the cause of Mr. Donald’s confusion and
provide a possible explanation based on human perception and
cognition why Mr. Donald would have acted the way he reacted.
(4 marks)
iii)
Suggest TWO design principles that can be followed by the
laptop company to prevent such mistakes in the future.
(4 marks)
Question 4 (25 marks)
a)
The management of Kuala Lumpur International Airport wants to
introduce a new system that enables tourists to find information. For
example, a user may specify a price range and/or a location etc. and
the system provides a list of hotel names with the corresponding
contact details. You are assigned the task of designing the interface of
the system in question.
b)
i)
Identify TWO areas of human diversity that should be
considered in your design and explain why they should be
considered in the context of the application.
(4 marks)
ii)
What interaction styles would you use? Justify your answer.
Describe using a rough sketch how the interaction would take
place.
(11 marks)
A competitor designs an interface for a similar system as follows:
 First, user selects the price range (how this is implemented is not
important – you may assume that it is well-designed).
 Next, the system presents a map of the country, subdivided in
ten rectangular areas, each with a different colour.
 A user may click on an area to restrict the search to that subarea.
 If they do so, they are presented with a new map, zoomed in on
the selected sub-area. The new map is again subdivided in ten
areas, each with its own colour. Again the user may zoom in to
restrict the search even more, etc. However much is zoomed in,
the system always displays a map with ten colour-coded areas.
Assume that at each level, it is possible to go back to the
previous level.
 Finally, when the user has selected the appropriate area in
sufficient detail, he/she presses a ‘SEARCH’ function located at
the bottom of the screen which displays the results (if any).
 The results are displayed on a new screen and each resulting
record is displayed in the colour that corresponds to the sub-area
on the map that was last shown (i.e. the map on the previous
screen).
i)
Regardless of what colours are used, criticise the way in
which colour is used, focusing on the capabilities of human
users.
ii)
interface
Indicate THREE additional problems with this
design and suggest solutions to solve the problem.
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(4 marks)
(6 marks)
Question 5 (25 marks)
a) A computer games manufacturer is producing a new game called
Gulliver. In this game the players travel through a virtual landscape in
which are found various villages. Some of these villages are occupied
by Lilliputians, who are only 6 inches tall; some by ordinary people;
and some by Brobdingnagians, who are giants. The game uses a fully
immersive Virtual Reality (VR) headset. You have been asked to
advise the game makers.
i) If the user “stands still” in the virtual environment, a Lilliputian
village that is very close, a normal village some way off and a
Brobdingnagian village in the far distance will all look the same
apparent size. What visual cues can the designers use to enable a
user to distinguish them? (Say in your answer if any cues are
better at distinguishing the miniature village from the normal one,
or the normal one from the giant one.)
ii)
How does this change when the user is allowed to move in the
environment?
b) Andy has an old mobile phone as shown in Figure 5(a). It has no
features beyond dialing a number. Scenario A and B illustrates two
different cases when Andy makes a phone call.
(a)
(b)
Figure 5
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(6 marks)
(6 marks)
Scenario A
Andy decides to ring a friend for whom he already has the number in
his (paper) address book.
A.1 Andy looks up the phone number in his address book
A.2 He dials the number into the phone
A.3 The digits appear on the phone display
A.3 He presses ’YES’
A.4 The phone display says ’calling’
A.5 A few seconds later it says ’connected’
A.6 Andy talks to his friend
A.7 When they finish talking Andy presses ’NO’ to finish the call
Scenario B
Andy decides to ring a friend for whom doesn’t know the number
B.1 Andy dials 192 (directory enquiries) into the phone
B.2 The digits ‘192’ appear on the phone display
B.3 He presses ’YES’
B.4 The phone display says ‘calling’
B.5 A few seconds later it says ’connected’
B.6 Andy talks to the operator and asks for the number of his friend
B.7 As the operator reads the number to him he writes it down on a
scrap of paper
B.8 He starts to dial the number as in A.2 in Scenario A
When Andy gets his new phone, Figure 5(b) he can still use his paper
address book and directory enquiries as in scenarios A and B, but in
addition the phone has a series of menus reachable using the arrow
keys. These include an electronic ’phone book’ of shortcut numbers on
the phone. If Andy has stored his friend’s number on his phone he can
ring his friend as follows:
Scenario C
Andy decides to ring a friend in his electronic phone book
C.1 Andy presses the left arrow key
C.2 The phone display says ’phone book’.
C.3 He presses ’YES’
C.4 The phone display says ’recall’
C.5 He presses ’YES’
C.6 The phone display says ’pos?’ (requesting position in phone book)
C.7 Andy enters the shortcut digit for his friend.
C.8 The digit appears on the phone display
C.9 Andy presses ’YES’
C.10 The phone display says ’calling’, as in A.4 in Scenario A
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i)
A user interface designer analyses Andy’s behaviour with his
original phone and realises that both scenarios A and B are part of
a general pattern as shown in the following Hierarchical Task
Analysis (HTA).
(5 marks)
Complete the HTA for phoning based on Scenario A and B and
briefly describe your solution.
ii)
Produce a complete HTA for phoning using the new phone based
on Scenario C only.
(3 marks)
iii) Analyse whether the solutions to (i) and (ii) can be modified to
emphasise the common features and whether this would clarify
the overall task description. If yes, describe and illustrate the new
HTA.
(5 marks)
~ END OF PAPER ~
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