Chapter 5: To Err Is Human
So far, I like this chapter the best because the slips are something that I, and a lot of other people, can relate to. There was one part in this chapter that talked about leaving your card at an ATM machine after taking your money; I haven't done that before but it reminded me of when I would play zombies on Call of Duty and go to upgrade my weapon. After I would put it in the upgrade machine, I would run to check for zombies nearby and several times I forgot about going back to pick up my weapon, and by the time I remembered it had disappeared. My family and I recently moved and I've noticed that sometimes my mom would be half way to our old house before she realized that she was going to the wrong place.
The dealing with error and forcing functions section was very interesting, too. I hate that a chime goes off whenever I don't have my seatbelt, yet I don't wear my seatbelt still. It's uncomfortable and the risk of a crash is low. Typing about this right now makes me think that I should wear it all the time because it's better to be safe than sorry, but as soon as I get in my car my mind changes. I do agree that forcing someone to do an action usually results in them trying to rebel. I don't think there is much you can do to force someone to do something when they really do not want to do it.
Chapter 6: The Design Challenge
Designing products so that all users can use it perfectly is impossible. Even trying to design a product so that 95% of users can use it without difficulty is hard. I think that the amount of experience with a product and whether it was around in your time period has a lot to do with the product's usability. I have a lot of computer science teachers that can barely work a computer for regular tasks, but can code up the most complex projects with ease. This is kind of frustrating to me because they have there Ph.D. and work with computers all the time, yet they don't know how to search for a file when they can't find it on the desktop. That's why I say the period in which it was released matters. I think checking e-mail is a very simple task, but it might be because I've been doing it for a long time. However, my mom has a really hard time checking her e-mail. She thinks that once she types her username into the address bar, her e-mail will magically appear. She works with a computer everyday at work and she still can't get to her e-mail without calling me to walk her through the process. I believe it's because she never had e-mail when she was younger (ideal for learning) and she really has no need for it. I agree that design does play a big role in usability, but I also think the frequency of use and the age at which you begin to learn it, both, play major roles.
Chapter 7: User-Centered Design
I thought the cartoon at the beginning of the chapter pretty much summed it up. There are many products out there that have the potential to be extremely useful/helpful, but the way are designed takes away from actual usability. Many designers (raccoons) model products after how they would use them rather than taking into consideration the users needs (horses). It's pretty much like a math/physics class at A&M. The math and physics professors teach their course as if all the students in the class are experts. They might teach it like that on purpose, but some students have never talked about some of the difficult concepts before and are expected to know them as soon as they walk in the door. Also, they either do the hardest example possible to where it is impossible to figure out how to even approach any type of problem or they give a super easy example to where a single step is needed to solve it and then they give an impossible question on the midterm. They aren't designing their teaching for the students (user) but for people with knowledge, equal to theirs, of the topic. Another example is chairs inside of trailers. The manufacturing companies of trailers place seats that they feel are comfortable. However, my dad and his friends, who all drive trailers, are always complaining about how uncomfortable the chairs are, how the arm rests crappy, etc. The manufacturing companies design the trailer on what they feel would be comfortable, based on sitting in a chair for probably 5 minutes. However, they probably didn't take into account that truck drivers sit down in that chair almost ALL day. User-centered design is very important.
