Challenges in evaluating usability and user experience of reality-based interaction

Abstract

This workshop aims to further the understanding of the challenges relating to the evaluation methods of usability and user experience that are specific to Reality-Based Interaction (RBI), and to identify effective practical responses to these challenges. The emergence of Post-WIMP interfaces has led to new ways of interacting with technologies. However, there are still no integrated ways of evaluating the usability and user experience of these interfaces. Developers and designers are left to discover their own metrics and evaluation methods. This approach presents problems, in that the metrics used in each case may provide results that are neither valid nor meaningful. For this reason, the time is ripe to integrate the methods that have been developed for evaluating interfaces that belong to the RBI umbrella. The measures and techniques will then be turned into a framework that enables designers of RBI interfaces to select appropriately existing methods and tools to evaluate systematically the usability and user experience of their prototypes and products. Reusing and adapting validated evaluation approaches can not only avoid reinventing the wheel and wasting time but also further improve and consolidate these approaches. Such a framework will also provide a basis for comparison between designs of RBI interfaces in different application contexts.