title: The effect of visualizing the flow of multimedia content among and inside devices.
abstract: This study introduces a user interface, referred to as the flow interface, which provides a graphical representation of the movement of content among and inside audio/video devices. The proposed interface provides a different frame of reference with content-oriented visualization of the generation, manipulation, storage, and display of content as well as input and output. The flow interface was applied to a VCR/DVD recorder combo, one of the most complicated consumer products. A between-group experiment was performed to determine whether the flow interface helps users to perform various tasks and to examine the learning effect of the flow interface, particularly in regard to hooking up and recording tasks. The results showed that participants with access to the flow interface performed better in terms of success rate and elapsed time. In addition, the participants indicated that they could easily understand the flow interface. The potential of the flow interface for application to other audio video devices, and design issues requiring further consideration, are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Cognitive Systems Engineering Laboratory, The Ohio State University, 210 Baker Systems, 1971 Neil Avenue, Columbus, OH 43210, USA. dongseok.lee@gmail.com
authors.forename: Dong-Seok
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Lee
mesh_terms: D004867:Equipment Design; D006804:Ergonomics; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007723:Korea / Q000208:ethnology; D008328:Man-Machine Systems; D008875:Middle Aged; D019212:Multimedia; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis; D013690:Television; D014741:Video Recording / Q000295:instrumentation; D014796:Visual Perception