Task analysis in transportation planning for user interface metaphor design

1. Task analysis in transportation planning for user interface metaphor design Jörn Möltgen Institute for Geoinformatics University of Münster

2. Outline • VUGIS • Motivation and Goal • Metaphors for User Interfaces • Where do metaphors come from ? • From task analysis to design • An example from transportation planning

3. Integration of GIS, Environmental models and transportation models in transportation planning Supported by a grant from the ministry of science of North-Rhine Westphalia (MSWWF-NRW) within the Innovationsprogramm Forschung, Programmschwerpunkt „Mobilität und Verkehr von morgen“

4. Motivation • GIS use for transportation domain can improve efficiency • but most GIS are intended for expert use • Transportation planners belong to group of non-experts • „over featured“ systems decrease usability • existing data collections cannot be transformed in information value for the planner • Planning processes become lengthy and intransparent

5. Motivation (2) • existing: • Data: NWSIB, GDF, ATKIS, ALK, … • Models: transportation and environmental • Systems: GIS • missing: usability for decision-making • innovation: services for planers

6. Goals • Direct GIS access for transportation planners • intuitive use of GIS • using the planners’ language • Translation between GIS and planner Metaphors help to extend the field of users

7. Goals User Interface ... ... Number of cars Noise ... Services Visualisation GIS Functions Transportation Models Environmental Models Other Models Semantic Mapper ALK GIS Database ??? ??? ATKIS

8. Levels of user • citizens • politicians • decision makers • „Träger öffentl. Belange“ • domain planner • GIS experts User Interface ... ... Number of cars Noise ... Visualisation GIS Functions Transportation Models Environmental Models Other Models Semantic Mapper ??? GIS Database ??? ??? ATKIS

10. Metaphors for User Interfaces • Allow „to understand one thing in terms of another, without thinking the two are the same“ (Sweetser 1990) • Well-tested method for UI design  XEROX STAR • They link the underlying system to the users‘s ontology • Source domain of metaphor establish an ontology of UI

11. Metaphors for User Interfaces • Distinction of paradigms and metaphors • Paradigms conceptualise the overall systems use • Metaphors depend on the framework given by the paradigm • „domain metaphors“ assign additional functions to metaphors

12. Where do metaphors usually come from ? • Choosing from a set of commonly known metaphors • Invention, evaluation, redesign • Observing explanations • Principles: structure, applicability, suitability, coherence…. • NO right or wrong way for metaphor selection • Thorough understanding of problem domain is frequently missing

13. From task analysis to design • Task analysis includes establishing of: • the actual users, • planning goals, • what information they need and they generate, • methods they use, • how do decision rules look like, • which workflows can be supported by computer use, • are the users more casual, occasional or rather daily users

14. Methodology

15. User Task Model

16. User Task Model Existence,Health and well-being Judging of protectuable objects with respect to nsensitivity npre-strain under consideration of environmental objectives and probable effects from the planned object Overlay Generation of a map with potential conflicts Species and biotopes Evaluation of inventories Protectable Objects Soil Water Climate Scenery/ Recreation

17. Use Case

18. Scenario A transportation planer sends the plan with the intended route of the new road to her colleagues at the office for environmental protection in order to createamapthat shows potential conflicts of the object with biotopes. The office for environmental protection gets biotope data from the “LÖBF”. But before the office for environmental protection checkswhether it owns appropriate data itself. The resulting map shows fruit-meadow, hedges, shrubberies, natural monuments, forest, a small river, and out-dying plants and bird hotbeds. Then they superimpose the planned road

19. intended route map creation Conflicts map Data check fruit-meadow Show hedges superimpose shrubberies natural monu. Forest River Red-list species bird hotbeds Analysis of scenario Objects Services and Metaphors

20. Systems Task Model

21. Conclusions • UIs are needed that communicate within the users’ language • Metaphors can map between the users’ domain and the software • Metaphors establish an ontology of the user interface. • “2000 light-years from home” to find a metaphor like the “GIS desktop metaphor” for transportation planning. • Task analysis is the “point of departure” for user oriented metaphor. • The acid test for our approach is still pending .

22. consequently... ….transportation planners need services instead of just data and GIS

23. Data for planning processes • Heterogenity of data • Example: Landesstraßenbedarfsplan Biotopkataster, Bodendenkmäler, Bodenkarten, Geländemodelle, Flächennutzungspläne, Flora-Fauna-Habitatflächen, Gebietsentwicklungspläne, historische Anlage, hydrologische Karten, Landesentwicklungspläne, Naturschutzgebiete, Naturdenkmale, Straßenkarten, Topologische Karten, Wasserschutzgebiete, Unfalldaten, Verkehrsmengen, Verkehrsprognosen, Straßenzustandswerte und Schadstoff- und Lärmbelastung • Different views of the same space