CA567: GUI Programming and HCI

This is a course given to the M.Sc. in Computer Applications for Education Class during Semester 1 of 2001/2002 by Alan Smeaton.

The official module specification is available here (on campus access only).

The lecture schedule is as follows:

Lecture Date Lecturer Topic Project Labs
(likely)
1 October 3 Alan Introduction to Course - into to HCI    
2 October 10 Alan Basis for interface and usability engineering    
3 October 17 Hyowon Usability and usability principles    
4 October 24 Hyowon Usability in the context of the web    
5 October 31 Hyowon Website organisaton Set project 1  
6 November 7 Alan Limits of human cognition - the human in the loop    
7 November 14 Hyowon Basic HTML  

X
8 November 21 Hyowon More advanced HTML Set project 2

X
9 November 28 Alan Evaluation Project 1 due

X
10 December 5 Hyowon Case study - Video Browser design  

X
11 December 13 Alan Usability evaluation    
12 December 19 Alan Future developments - XML, Stylesheets Project 2 due


Links used in class:

Here is an XML file, its DTD, its CSS and the resultant HTML

Continuous assessment #1:
The purpose of the first continuous assessement exercise is to have each student learn how to critically examine a website and to perform a comparative constructive critique of it in terms of how it does/does not conform to usability guidelines presented in the first 5 lectures of the course. Each student will be assigned two of the websites of computing departments in the Universities in Ireland and asked to produce a WORD document summarising the two website's "performance" in terms of usability. Computing department websites address the information needs of many different audiences and rather than try to address all possible audiences, the target audiences whom you should bear in mind are the following:

(1) Secondary school careers guidance councillors and potential CAO applicants finding out about courses and facilities on offer at the different computing departments in Universities;
(2) Students in courses at those departments trying to locate a possible supervisor for their final year undergraduate project or dissertation whose expertise matches the project in mind;
(3) Outside potential applicants for a senior academic post in the department, trying to gauge from the website how research-active that department really is;

The submission should be as a WORD document (with images or diagrams of screenshots to illustrate) which can be emailed to me at Alan.Smeaton@compapp.dcu.ie

Continuous assessment #2:
The second continuous assessment is to have you build a small website of about a dozen pages, on whatever topic you want, and to design the "web" and the individual pages following the design guidelines we have covered in class. Once the website is online, send me the URL and also send me a WORD document with a rationale for the design for the website

 

Continuous Assessment marks:

Student Number Project 1 (in %)
(weighted as 20%
of overall module mark)		 Project 1 (in %)
(weighted as 30%
of overall module mark)

50217062

70

  76

50217380

80

  83

50218433

75

  66

50217003

70

  66

50219596

70

76

  50213970

80 

 76

  50218220

85 

- 

 

Useful Links:

There is no essential recommended textbook but Jacob Nielsen's "Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity" published by New Riders in 2000, makes excellent reading on the topic.

Page last updated 05 February 2002 by asmeaton@compapp.dcu.ie