Developing usable personal systems: a human factors perspective

The nature of personal systems requires sophisticated human factors engineering to make them effective. The multitude of different strategies that are personal to each user means that each device or system must both support a high functionality and do so with high usability. This in turn requires an integrated approach to capturing, representing and evaluating usability throughout the product design life cycle. This paper discusses the usability requirements of personal systems and presents two case studies: eDoor (an information gateway) and Wells (a device for dealing with time).