CHI 96 Workshop: HCI and the Web, Position Papers

Scooter Morris

Genentech
scooter@gene.com

Introduction

The World Wide Web has revolutionized the way people perceive computers today. Until the Web, people generally used computers at work, or if they had a home computer, it was used for word processing, home finance, and perhaps the occasional game. Some employees of educational, research, or high-tech institutions had the opportunity to use their computer for more, however. They used their computers to communicate with their colleagues; solicit input from a world-wide constituency; and exchange data, software, drafts of papers.

Enter the Web. Individuals are now thinking of their computers as a communications tool, a tool for mining information from sources around the world, and in some cases, entertainment. The "personal" computer is now beginning to fulfill some of its original promise: its now beginning to become much more a part of the fabric of our daily lives, both at work, and at home.

HCI and the Web

What is HCI's role in this emerging new age of computers? At this point HCI as a discipline has had a relatively limited impact on the development of the Web. This is unfortunate, because I believe that the goals of the Web and the goals of HCI compliment each other. A pervasive goal of HCI as discipline is to promote the inclusion of the user, the user's tasks, and the user's objectives as part of the design of interactive systems. The Web gives the user control. User's can visit your site, or not. Users can "vote" on their candidates for good design by repeat visits to sites. Users can even easily become system designers themselves by developing their own web pages and making them available to the rest of the Web. HCI also investigates how people use information systems, how we can design systems to be more usable, and more accessible. The Web likewise concerns itself with usability and accessibility. The use of the web is user-driven. Users will visit sites that provide them with information or entertainment in an easy-to-use manner. Furthermore, the technology of the web allows sites to track some information about who is visiting their site, where they came from, and what pages they visit. This provides feedback which allows the site to be enhanced and modified to more closely meet the users' needs, unfortunately, this information is sometimes not utilized.

HCI and the Web are then quite compatible. The Web provides HCI access to a wealth of information about users' usage patterns, perceptions of usable sites, and effective ways to organize information. In addition, the upcoming technologies which provide for more dynamic pages and user interaction provide designers with increasing tools to improve/enhance the user's experience. At the same time, as these new tools begin to provide richer interaction the experiences and techniques of HCI become increasingly important.

HCI professionals are rapidly recognizing the opportunities and synergies the Web provides for improving the interaction between people and information systems. The Web is a little slower to recognize the role of the traditional HCI on the Web. How does HCI as a discipline become a part of the evolving Web technologies? First, HCI professionals can utilize the Web and the evolving Internet technologies to help investigate and develop interfaces which enhance the user's experience. Second, as Web interfaces continue to evolve from relatively static presentations of linked pages to more dynamic, interactive interfaces to information, the role of good HCI design becomes increasingly important, and HCI professionals must be ready to play their role in the design of good Web interfaces.

HCI Professionals as Web Users

In order to fully utilize the experience and techniques we as HCI professionals have gained in design of usable systems, we need to understand how those experiences and techniques apply to the evolving technology of the Web. In many ways, the Web is similar to current information systems: users use a Web browser to connect to a site to access information, fill in forms, and to interact with information systems of some form. During this interaction, systems need to present information in a usable manner, forms need to meet users' expectations and not offer any surprises, and information systems need to be designed with the user and the user's tasks in mind. Web interfaces need to exhibit some consistency to help users navigate through the information and access it with a minimum of confusion.

On the other hand, the Web is a very different place. Often driven more by what's "cool" than by what's useful. Web interfaces need to attract users' attention like marquis outside a movie theater. And like advertisements, Web interfaces need to be new and different -- changing occasionally to maintain interest and attract users to come back often. In general the goal of a Web site is to provide useful information so that people will visit it often to access that information. Sometimes that information can be work-related and at other times it can be for pure personal information or entertainment.

I believe that the first step to excellence in design for the Web is use of the Web. There is information for HCI professionals on the Web, starting with the HCI section in the World-Wide Web Virtual Library. The CHI conferences have begun putting conference information and conference proceedings on the Web. And many HCI-related academic and industrial groups have begun making information available via the Web. Using the Web is also a great way to find usable Web sites and to experience unusable ones.

The next step, in my view, is for HCI professionals to begin using the Web to make information available about their own projects available. As they become more familiar with the technology, newer technologies provide the opportunity to use the Web for prototyping, particularly static "low-resolution" prototypes. This experience will be invaluable in working with Web developers to understand the limitations of the technology.

HCI Professionals in Web Development

The advent of increasing interactivity is going to drive the need for increased involvement by HCI professionals in the Web. We've already seen reports of improvements to Web sites through usability analysis (e.g. Sun's WWW site), but as Java, JavaScript, VisualBasic, LiveMedia, and Collaborative VRML begin to come into use, the design of Web sites is going to increasingly become a multidisciplinary exercise. At this point, HCI professionals with the understanding of the Web, and Web technologies will be much in demand.

HCI and the Web at Genentech (the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly...)

The Good - Redesigning Genentech's Internal Home Page

Genentech began experimenting with the Web using an early release of NCSA Mosaic. The Technology Development group began tracking this technology and investigating possible uses within the company. After a long search for systems to make corporate information available to all employees internally the company decided to utilize an internal Web. The initial information store was called gWiz! and it began providing information to company employees in early 1995. The original design was hierarchical in nature with information organized in groupings. The initial (Home) page had a couple of short-cuts to useful information, but the organizational hierarchy remained. The home page also displayed a list of news items as well as a feature known as a "HotFlash" which would put the full text of critical corporate announcements on the top of the Home Page.

During the course of the year, it became clear that we were not meeting our objectives for the project. Users were not using the site on an ongoing basis. This created concerns on the part of management who wanted to use this mechanism as their primary means of providing information in a timely fashion to employees. Interviews with employees and analysis of the top 50 pages told a convincing story: employees were not really following the hierarchy, and the information on the Home Page was not timely enough. In late 1995 a project was begun to redesign the initial page users connected to. The project team included a user representative, a Web implementer, a graphics designer/HCI specialize, a systems architect, and a representative from the operations staff.

The redesign was based on two factors: access to relevant (i.e. interesting) information, and dynamic update. We wanted users to connect to the new "Front Page" (as we began calling it) in the morning and keep it up all day. In this way, we could be sure they would see important announcements and information. In order to induce users to connect to the Front Page in the first place, we needed to provide links to the information they wanted to see. We assumed that this information was in two forms: first, timely information that was relevant to the users such as press releases, company announcements, etc.; and second, information currently within the Web that they visited often as measured by our access logs.

The Front Page uses a newspaper metaphor. After an identifying banner (featuring the Wizard character used throughout the site), there is a date, and a possible headline. The headline replaces the previous "HotFlash" mechanism without sacrificing as much screen space. Also on the Front Page are links to the most popular pages, a subset of the announcements posted that day, and a graph of Genentech's stock for the day. In addition is a "Feature", which varies from day to day. The feature is used for a number of things, including the regular Friday feature: Net Roulette. The page is implemented using Client-pull, and refreshes itself every 15 minutes. This way, dynamic information (headline, announcements, and the stock graph) change every fifteen minutes, keeping some interest. The feature can also change on a periodic basis to provide increased dynamics.

The response to the Front Page was extremely positive. Users are keeping it up more often, and the total number of hits in the system has increased. We are already considering enhancements based on using frames and possibly a Java stock-ticker for headlines and announcements. The latter in particular is in response to requests by information providers to provide increased visibility to particularly time sensitive "hot" items such as computer or network outages, facilities events, or critical company announcements.

The Bad - Genentech's External Web Site

As Genentech's internal web site continued to grow, groups in the company expressed interest in having an external Web presence, including marketing, investor relations, human resources, and corporate communications. A project was started to design and build Genentech's external Web site. An outside consultant was contracted to develop the materials for the site, a separate consultant was hired to do the actual implementation, and internal resources were used for input and suggestions. The project was managed by the Corporate Communications department, which traditionally produces the bulk of the written materials about the company. Corporate Communications had not had any experience in managing a systems project, so they structured the project much like a traditional print piece. The team met rarely, relying instead on ad-hoc meetings and communications directly with the client (Corporate Communications). Eventually, in-house staff were asked if they could provide assistance with the graphic design and some overall thematic structure to the site. A graphic look was developed, and the site's content was developed.

After several months of work, the site was shown to management, who were enthusiastic in their response, but wanted additional review of some of the site's content to ensure that we were well within the US Government's Food and Drug Administration guidelines for advertising. The result was that the site was never released to the public, even though it provided useful information, was very usable, well designed and attractive, because the process for release was never clearly defined, nor were the requirements for the site. Genentech, as a pharmaceutical company, must adhere to the guidelines set forth by the US FDA. No representative from Regulatory Affairs was a member of the team. In addition, at a key point in the project, the management of the overall effort was handed off, resulting in a loss of focus. Since there was no regular project team meetings, the project languished.

In retrospect there are some important lessons that can be derived from this experience. The development of a significant Web site is a systems development project. A project team needs to be assembled with representation for interested parties, developers, designers, and management. A smaller team should be assembled which will actually be responsible for the design and implementation. The larger team provides input and feedback on the evolving design, as well as providing content review for potential management or regulatory issues. In the case of Genentech's external Web project, there was also no clear HCI responsibility. The graphic designer was not even an official part of the team, and no other representative on the team had an HCI background. Hopefully, in the near future, we will be able to revive this project along these lines to determine if the difficulties were in project structure, the newness of the technology, or regulatory uncertainties associated with presentation of information in a new medium.

The Ugly - Genentech's Department Pages

In addition to our external and corporate web sites, Genentech has made a web server available for departments to provide information about their role, their mission, their organization, and any information they wish to provide. These pages are linked into the corporate web site, but are distinct and separate. Despite the title of this section, many of these pages are well designed and provide valuable information to the company and users of the department's resources. However, Genentech enforces no stylistic or structural standards on departmental pages. We suggest they provide the standard navigation bar on the bottom of their pages, but this is not required. Browsing these pages demonstrates some of the diversity of design that the web can encourage. From clear, concise, attractive pages, to pages with large GIFs and backgrounds which can slow loading, and obscure the text. Our goal is to continue to provide this flexibility and openness to departments, and extend it to employee groups and clubs, and eventually individual employees. While it is true that one of the results of this openness is an occasional "ugly" page, in many people's view, another result is the continual growth of our internal web, and the availability of increasing amounts of information to our corporate users.

Conclusions

HCI and the Web are a natural fit. The Web provides excellent opportunities for HCI professionals to enhance the user's experience, and Web projects can benefit from the experience that HCI professionals have in designing usable systems. I've outlined what I think HCI professionals need to do to become more active in the area of Web development, and provided some anecdotal examples of Web development at Genentech. I believe that as internet technologies become and increasing part of internal corporate cultures, the role of the HCI professional is going to become increasingly focussed on the Web and emerging Internet technologies. At Genentech, many of our existing information systems are being migrated or are planned to be migrated to Web-based interfaces. This trend is expected to continue, and even accelerate as users increasingly find much of the information they desire available through their desktop browser, information that is not available will come under scrutiny and pressure to migrate it will increase. For HCI, this is an opportunity to redesign older systems and system interfaces with the user as the focus.

CHI 96 Workshop: HCI and the Web, Position Papers