Supporting usability through software architecture

Author

Bass, Len ; John, Bonnie E.

Author_Institution

Carnegie Mellon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA, USA

Volume

34

Issue

10

fYear

2001

fDate

10/1/2001 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

113

Lastpage

115

Abstract

Software engineers should consider usability as a quality attribute in their architectural a designs. Usability determines how effectively and comfortably an end-user can achieve the goals that gave rise to an interactive system. It is an important attribute to consider during all phases of software design, but especially during architectural design because of the expense involved in adding usability aspects after users have tested the system. Since the 1980s, ongoing work on supporting usability through software architectural constructs has focused on the iterative design process for the user interface, which involves initial design, user testing, re-design to correct detected flaws, re-testing, and so on. The traditional software architectural response to repeated and expected modifications to the user interface is to use separation, encapsulation and information hiding to localize the user interface

Keywords

data encapsulation; human factors; interactive systems; program testing; software architecture; user interfaces; detected flaws; encapsulation; expense; information hiding; initial design; interactive system; iterative design process; redesign; repeated modifications; retesting; separation; software architecture; software design; software engineering; software quality attribute; software usability; user interface localization; user testing; Design engineering; Interactive systems; Process design; Software architecture; Software design; Software quality; Software testing; System testing; Usability; User interfaces;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Computer

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9162

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/2.955105

Filename

955105