Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
• Important and often used GUI elements should be immediately accessible;
the hierarchical structure of the GUI elements thus has to be determined by
a use-oriented priority list.
• Functional grouping within the layout is highly recommended: Tools
should be clustered and not distributed.
• GUI elements should be user tested for ambiguity (which needs to be
minimized); the use and effect of a tool should be easily recognizable.
These findings might appear as common sense propositions, however, with
this study we confirm the principles of user-oriented GUI design (Nielsen
1999
) specifically for atlas GUIs. Together with additional information on
GUI design and user profiling, other atlas authors might benefit from the
methodology of this study to improve their digital atlas interfaces. Most
importantly, this study demonstrates again how much a design team can
benefit from running a user study, despite the tedious work involved in
conducting one.
Follow-up studies related to our project should consider more complex
tasks (e.g., interrelating map features spatially and/or temporally), other atlas
user groups (e.g., silver surfers), or interfaces including more functionality
(e.g., analysis tools). To give more realistic feedback to the participants when
performing an action, not only atlas mock-ups but rather prototypically
implemented GUIs have to be tested. An iterative testing process within the
design cycle should give further validity to our findings as well as to others
pursuing similar endeavors.
As mobile devices become a common means for visualization and infor-
mation retrieval in everyday life, business and education, atlases should also
consider tablets as communication devices. The design of an atlas GUI for
tablet devices has to conform specific mobile usability concepts (which
highly differ from a stationary
sized display), including gesture-
driven commands (Nielsen and Budiu
2012
).
To summarize, the investigation of atlas GUI designs is fruitful for both
atlas authors and atlas users. In every stage of the development process, it
may reveal positive effects and deficits on the graphical and technical level of
an atlas application. Involving digital natives with their intuitive sense for
technology into usability studies from the beginning seems to be an expedient
way to provide carefully designed atlas interfaces in the future.
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References
Balciunas A (2013) User-driven usability assessment of internet maps. In: Buchroithner MF
(ed) Proceedings of the 26th international cartographic conference, Dresden
Bartz B (1970) Experimental use of the search task in an analysis of type legibility in cartography.
Cartogr J 7(2):103-112. doi:
10.1179/caj.1970.7.2.103
