Users' Frustration and HCI in the Software Development Life Cycle

Abstract

Users’ frustration on the software used will affect the productivity. In addition, the ignorance of users’ involvement in the system development methodology will cause problems to the users later on. In the human-computer interaction (HCI) literature, it has been recommended that user’s involvement and HCI consideration in the software development life cycle (SDLC) as an important mechanism for a successful system implementation. However, it is still unclear to what extend do the users’ involvement and HCI consideration have been adopted by software development practitioners. This paper reports on the results of a survey on the importance of HCI in SDLC from the practitioners’ perspective. The survey involves thirty two (32) software designers. The objectives of the study are to identify the state of users’ involvement in SDLC and to identify the HCI elements that have been addressed. Results show that many of the practitioners have involved the users in SDLC, but majority only during the requirement analysis phase. The findings have also revealed that HCI elements on functionality are well addressed. However, the non-functionality elements such as cultural and affective values have not been emphasized by practitioners. The paper concludes with a recommendation to further investigate the users’ awareness on the importance of users’ involvement in the software development.