Conceptual Model of User Interface Design for General Architectural Framework for Business Visual Analytics

Abstract

The user interface is the means by which the user is able to interact with the software and perceive it with his/her senses, thus enabling the user to take advantage of the software capabilities. The graphical user interface rich in details, provides enhanced software functionality but requires a higher-level training and experience to be able to use the tool. Visually facilitated graphical user interface provides users with a faster, easier and more sensible visual communication. In a company, different business users need different levels of data and information. The information that the manager or director/CEO need is much more complex and more voluminous compared to the data employees need. Managers need information on the overall workflow to be able to take strategic business decisions in a timely manner. Employees use a limited set of Business Analytics features. For this group of business users, lower levels of complexity of user interfaces are required, as they often do not require professional knowledge in the field of data science and information technology. Designing a user interface that is appropriate to the business needs and professional knowledge of different business users is one of the key factors to characterizing and improving the efficiency and effectiveness of user interfaces for business analytics. Inspired by these challenges, the paper: provides analysis of user interfaces, their role and importance for business users and their application in the field of business analytics. The paper proposes a conceptual model of complexity levels in user interface design by segmentation and classification of business users in the context of the third layer of the General Architectural Framework for Business Visual Analytics (GAF for BVA). The new conceptual model presents the three main categories: Visual Friendly-UI, Advanced-UI, and Professional-UI. The name of the conceptual model is FAP-UI (Visual Friendly, Advanced and Professional-UI). This paper relates to previous research publications of the author presenting the concept of GAF for BVA. This paper contributes to further architectural development of this business analytics framework.