ACM Queue – The Future of Human-Computer Interaction
For many years HCI has been evolutionary, not revolutionary. Is this about to change?
Personal computing launched with the IBM PC. But popular computing – computing for the masses – launched with the modern WIMP (windows, icons, mouse, pointer) interface, which made computers usable by ordinary people. As popular computing has grown, the role of HCI (human-computer interaction) has increased. Most software today is interactive, and code related to the interface is more than half of all code. HCI also has a key role in application design. In a consumer market, a product’s success depends on each user’s experience with it. Unfortunately, great engineering on the back end will be undone by a poor interface, and a good UI can carry a product in spite of weaknesses inside. [Read on]