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    The Need for A Friendly User Interface

    The Need for A Friendly User Interface To Access the Online Catalog:

    A Comparative Study Between Two OPAC Interfaces;

    University of Pittsburgh OPAC Interface & Carnegie Mellon University

    OPAC Interface

    Essam Mansour

    Dr. Essam Mansour*

    [email protected]

    The Department of Library and Information Science (DLIS)

    Faculty of Arts, South Valley University (SVU), Qena, Egypt

    .

    .

    *Ph. D (University of Pittsburgh)

    Master (University of Wisconsin), USA

    BA (Cairo University).

    1

    mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]
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    Introduction

    There is no doubt that the world has witnessed a great revolution in

    information technology in the last 20 years. And this has required a respectful

    understanding for end-user needs and behavior, as they are considered the real

    aim of creating and developing this technology. The program designers,

    developers, and vendors feel a great responsibility towards these users who are

    using their products (programs). In other words, software developers need to

    expand their focus beyond functional requirements to include the behavioral

    needs of end-users. What users really want from these people is not only that

    they build applications that meet users needs for information, but also that

    they make these applications easy to use and friendly. So, the problem is how

    to make applications usable without the need to read complicated manuals or to

    receive hard and long training.

    Defining the User Interface (UI):

    The user interface (UI) in its simplest definition is the point of contact

    between human needs and the computational, data-storage and communication

    capabilities of a computing device (Frank, 1995). Dumas defined human-

    computer interface as the words and symbols that people see on the computer

    screen; the content and layout of displays; the procedures used to enter, store,

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    and display information; and the organizational structure of the interface as a

    whole (1988, p. 68.)

    Understanding the User:

    (Who is, what he/she expects, )

    It is important to understand the user and his/her needs of information

    and what he/she can expect the library to offer. If the users are not familiar

    with the use of an automated library system, the library should make some

    training available to help them learn to understand and deal with the system.

    Hackos and Redish (1998) stated that we greatly need to study users because

    the more we know about them, the better we can design for them. The users are

    people with likes and dislikes, habits and skills, education and training that

    they bring into practice whenever they use any computer system. Any

    automated catalogue system should put into consideration who the user is, how

    he/she thinks about the machine and the OPAC, what he/she waits expects

    from them, and what he/she needs to be adapted to deal with the OPAC

    interface. The Library should convey all desires of the users to the program

    designers and vendors so that they can consider and respect them when

    creating the OPAC interface.

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    The Need for A Friendly User Interface

    The Goal of the Graphical User Interface:

    The primary goal of interface design as Lynch (1994) indicated, is to

    create and support an appropriate and coherent mental modal of the operations

    and organization of the computer system. Graphical user interfaces incorporate

    visual and functional metaphors to help orient the computer user to the

    possibilities and functions of the computer system.

    Why is Interface Design is Important?

    Ambler (1998) answered this question by stating the following several

    reasons:

    First of all the more intuitive the user interface, the easier it is to use, and the

    easier it is to use, the cheaper it is.

    The better the user interface, the easier it is to train people to use it, reducing

    training costs.

    The better the user interface, the less help people will need to use it, reducing

    support costs.

    The better the user interface the more users will like to use it, increasing their

    satisfaction with the work that is done.

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    The Need for A Friendly User Interface

    Designing the User Interface

    According to John and Lorne (1998), designing the user interface

    involves designing two languages that differ in the way communications

    between user and computer are expressed. The two languages are commonly

    referred to as the action language and the presentation language. The action

    language, expressed by the user, is used to tell the computer which operations

    to perform on the objects in the application. The presentation language is used

    by the computer to ask about the objects and operations requested and to

    provide the resulting information. Both languages allow communication about

    a common task domain. Hildreth (1995) tried to articulate the principles and

    goals, which should guide the design and development of the online catalog

    interface. These two principles are:

    The online catalog system should never permit a user's search attempt to fail

    to retrieve one or more bibliographic records for review and action. Many

    searches in existing online catalogs fail to retrieve even a single record, and

    most online catalogs offer little or no assistance to the searcher when this

    result occurs. The assumption behind this principle is that something in a

    heterogeneous online catalog database might satisfy the request to some

    degree, or serve, even in its rejection by the user, to supply useful

    information that can be used to further the search.

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    The Need for A Friendly User Interface

    It should be never assumed the display of a bibliographic record is the end of

    a search, merely to be selected or rejected, then "set aside." Bibliographic

    records are for use, not just as location devices, but also as information-

    laden devices for furthering the search. This action role of bibliographic

    displays is often overlooked in system design. Bibliographic records can be

    generative; they may have a springboard effect in the search process, or

    serve as information seeds to fertilize subsequent searching.

    Review of the Literature

    In a study of what screens should look like and making effective OPAC

    screens, Shires and Olszak (1992) display the most basic principles and present

    these with rationale and practical checklists. They discussed the physical

    screens and general principles; menus, commands, inquiry screens, and

    messages. Crawford (1992) presents principles for the design of OPAC

    displays accompanied with checklists. Also, Matthews (1987) presents detailed

    guidelines for the design of OPAC screens, including bibliographic displays.

    Hildreth (1995) tried to investigate user-interface features of about ten OPAC

    systems using also checklist methodology. He focused mainly on the role of

    the Graphic User Interface and asked What Do GUIs Bring to OPACs? He

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    answered this question by stating the features of GUI like Hot buttons for

    activating functions, Sizeable, moveable windows,etc.

    Research Question

    The research question for this paper is:

    To what extent does the design of the graphic user interface (GUI)

    increase/decrease the use of the online public access catalog (OPAC) in the

    academic library?

    Research Methodology

    Data were collected from two universities (University of Pittsburgh &

    Carnegie Mellon University) having two different and variant OPAC

    interfaces. A questionnaire was distributed to 20 students taking classes at both

    Pitt University & CMU universities, and of course, using their OPAC

    interfaces. I got 11 answers from these 20 students..! The 11 students

    answering the questionnaire were six at Masters level, and five at Ph. D level.

    There were five students have a native language of English (3 Ph. D and 2

    MA), the nature language of two of them is Spanish (Ph. D). One of them has

    the Arabic as the native language (MA). One of them has Turkish as the native

    language (Ph. D). Two of them have French as the native language. These

    students are made up of 10 men and one woman (this selection is not on

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    All that the user has do to get a translated interface to his/her language

    is that he/she copies the URL for the web page that he/she wants translated,

    and then pastes into the box of translation of this program.

    Translate Now!

    Translate a Web page, enter or paste the URL.

    To translate text, type it or paste it.

    But, what I noticed here in this program that it deals only with languages that

    appear in Roman characters (e.g., English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese

    languages), and I think some languages that do not appear in Roman characters

    such as the Arabic language have special programs to translate from the Roman

    languages to their own language like the program: www.ajeeb.com. This is a

    program created to translate from and to the Arabic language. What I also

    noticed was that all translating programs could not translate the icons, because

    they are considered as images, not as texts that can be possible to be translated.

    So, system designers that make these icons should make them flexible for

    translation as with any text in the page.

    All the 11 students depend on the OPAC to meet their educational

    needs for information where ten of them (90%) use both OPAC interfaces.All

    9

    http://www.ajeeb.com/http://www.ajeeb.com/
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    the students using the OPAC at both Pitt and CMU feel great comfort when

    using the CMU OPAC interface. Five of these 11 students (45.45%) feel

    uncomfortable when using the Pitt OPAC interface. All the 11 students (100%)

    prefer to use some other databases (some of them pointed to ERIC, EBSCO

    and lISA) and some search engines (Yahoo, Altavista, Hotbot, Google, and

    Exie). There are some reasons for that such as:

    These tools (search engines and databases) display a lot of relevant results

    that can match up their queries.

    They have a lot of similar pages that can give more help, options, and

    support to their search.

    They are more organized.

    They have more than one media (like video and audio) helping display

    information in more than one attractive way.

    Some ways/tools such as search engines allow the user to use natural

    language and avoid the ghost of Controlled Vocabulary and the Library

    of Congress Subject Heading (LCSH) or of Sears Subject Heading

    (SSH) and their rules that need carefully to be understood.

    Nine of these 11 students (81%) asked for some improvement in both

    OPAC interfaces especially in the Pitt OPAC. These improvements were

    suggested:

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    More screen help. For each function, the user can ask for help; not general

    help as in Pitt.

    Some translating programs to help translate the interface commands and

    Some helping programs like talking and video programs, and chat programs

    that help the user ask and get the answer directly and clearly at the

    time of searching.

    Here is why the most students (90%) prefer to use the CMU OPAC

    interface; and why they do not prefer to use the Pitt OPAC. This is based on

    the checking of each OPAC interface of each university separately then making

    comparison between the two.

    The OPAC interface of Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is available at:

    http://webcat.library.cmu.edu/, and the OPAC interface of PittsburghUniversity is avail be at: http://pittcat.pitt.edu/.

    The first important icon and command is . I think it can

    answer any question regarding what to find, where to find and how to find.

    If the user needs any help about something s/he does not understand or it is

    difficult for him/her to know, s/he clicks right on the help button to get an

    answer to his/her question. The user using the OPAC interface of CMU, can

    find this command in each page s/he is in or when s/he goes forward or goes

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    http://webcat.library.cmu.edu/http://pittcat.pitt.edu/http://webcat.library.cmu.edu/http://pittcat.pitt.edu/
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    back; and this command helps him /her understand each function separately.

    On the contrary, this command in the OPAC interface of Pitt just explains all

    the page functions at one screen.

    If you are using the OPAC interface of CMU, you can refine your search by

    scrolling down using the mouse or by using the page down key on the

    keyboard until you reach the following diagram:

    Search Again

    Keyword Browse Exactlibrary:

    or even click left with the mouse on the icon ; this can give you

    more than one option to renew or refine the search. This contrasts with going

    back to the first page of the system as in the Pitt OPAC interface, and this also

    surely can save time and help the user go on searching without any disorder or

    even forgetting something.

    If you use the CMU OPAC interface, you can move up and down easily not

    only by using scroll up and scroll down, but also by using some special

    commands such as the Top command: . In the Pitt OPAC interface,

    only by using scroll up/down, can you move up and down.

    12

    http://webcat.library.cmu.edu/uhtbin/cgisirsi/wGjqLO0hgj/25829034/49
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    If you are using the CMU OPAC interface, you can be helped by the Java

    script graphic (scrolling status bar) to know the results of your search (how

    many items you get for your search) and what you should do to get these

    results in their complete bibliographic records just by clicking left on the

    mouse on this icon to view.

    If you use the CMU OPAC interface, you can find in each page all locations

    (the main library and the other libraries that are branches to it) as in this

    diagram:

    library:

    If you use the CMU OPAC interface, you can see the new list

    of items that was added recently to the main library and at

    the same time to its other branches, and how many copies of

    each item and also the complete bibliographic record of it;

    just click left on the mouse on

    If you use the CMU OPAC interface and you need a book that is not

    available in Cameo (the CMU OPAC), you can probably get it through the

    PALCI Borrowing Program, which is a service that enables you to borrow

    books directly from other academic libraries in Pennsylvania. You search a

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    combined catalog of participating libraries and request to borrow books that

    are not available at CMU libraries; just click left on the mouse on

    .

    If you use the CMU OPAC interface, you do not worry about misspelling;

    little mistakes can be corrected automatically by the system. For example,

    write down (Egypt) in the search box in an incorrect spelling like Egyopt

    and wait for the result. You will find the same result if you write down the

    correct spelling Egypt. The CMU OPAC system does not refuse your query

    just for a simple mistake. It deals with the closest hits to your query.

    If you use the CMU OPAC interface, you will find a Keyword and browse

    search. Thus if you want to find the term(s) you type anywhere in a single

    field and in any order. The Keyword search results in a list of items that

    contain the term(s) you typed. If Cameo (the CMU OPAC) cannot locate

    items containing the term(s) you typed in the indexed field you specified,

    Cameo automatically performs a browse search. The results of a browse

    search will be a list of items beginning with or most closely matching the

    term you typed. And also, there is an Exact search. You can find term(s)

    precisely as you type themin that order and with an exact letter-for-letter

    match, beginning with the first word you type. If Cameo cannot locate items

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    with the term you typed in the indexed field you specified, Cameo

    automatically performs a browse search.

    If you use the CMU OPAC interface, you can find a lot of indexed

    search boxes that can increase or narrow and limit your search

    options (library, publication

    year, series, etc.) to the closest

    point or area you want.

    If you use the CMU OPAC interface, you can print and e-mail the

    results of your research to a friend or anyone else. For example, if your search

    result is 746 as indicated below, you can determine which item (1-746) you

    want to print or email. Here, in this research result, the item is no. 17 of 746.

    It will print/e-mail in a complete bibliographic record.

    Print/Email Items

    Out of746 records, print/email numbers:type of output: sort by:view of records: library:

    order of call numbers:Choose onePrint item records 1. Click "Print" and then use your Web browserto print the item report.1. Enter email address

    15

    http://webcat.library.cmu.edu/uhtbin/cgisirsi/O5UB8KgR2r/25829034/60/30777
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    Future Interface

    Recent inventions and current research indicate that the

    development of the next generation of interfaces will necessitate a change in

    both hardware and software. I hope program designers and system vendors do

    their best to create intelligent programs that are able to enable each user to be

    comfortable and satisfied, to help him/her, to get answer to any request s/he

    wants, and also to save his/her time.

    Conclusion and Recommendation

    Each library has its own system and its specific users. Each library tries

    to do its best to meet the needs of its users, especially the educational needs.

    The automated library system, therefore, should:

    Do a lot of surveys to learn how to help the user accept and deal with the

    system interface and to determine exactly the variant and different

    perceptions of the users.

    Explain how the system works to its users in simple rules and short sentences.

    Deal with both novices and experts students on equal footing!

    Not make users confused with some words/commands that have more than

    one meaning or with some abbreviated words (like MeSH in the Pitt

    OPAC interface; what does it mean to the user, especially the novice one?).

    Organize the interface screen according to the 30Percent Rule*

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    Not waste space with unimportant signs or words.

    Make each icon have its own function; no two icons should have the same

    function, because the user does want to get lost among icons having the

    same task.

    _______________________________________________________________* This rule states that the interface screen should not have more than 30% of Instructions,

    commands, icons, and menus to help the user to not be confused.

    8. Provide the OPAC system with dictionaries helping the users to know some

    difficult words and spelling.

    9. Not return any query of any user using the system with no results. It

    can design programs that accept any queries or match these queries to the

    closest results.

    10. Offer many Help screens, as they provide assistance to users to understand

    the system efficiently.11. Prompt messages that help the user, especially if he/she makes errors, to

    know exactly what the error is, and what he/she should do to solve it.

    12. Make an interface that is more attractive and colorful than character-based

    interfaces to make OPAC searching both easier and more richly interactive putting

    also into consideration those who are with disabilities.

    13. Find substitute solutions for displaying the library material (the

    bibliographic records) in more than one language, not only in Roman characters,

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    because I think now the library moves towards universality. So, it should serve all

    people including those in different languages and variant cultures.

    The OPAC has been the most common tool for library users to satisfy

    their needs for information, especially educational needs such as answers to a

    class assignment or writing a paper, etc. So, it is obvious that if we give

    respectful attention to creating a well-designed user interface, it will improve

    user-friendliness, especially for novice users. Finally, let me finish this paper

    with Crawfords statement. He said snazzy design and clever features are

    pointless if they do not serve the aims of the library (1992, p. 63). The aims

    of any library existed in any environment should always be dedicated to serve

    its users and what they expect from it.

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    Reference

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    Galitz, W. O (1993). User Interface Screen Design. Boston: QED.

    Hackos, J. T., and Redish, J. C. (1998). User and Task Analysis for

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    http://info.med.yale.edu/caim/manual/papers/gui1.htmlhttp://ehostvgw9.epnet.com/jndetail.asp?booleanTerm=%22Journal%20of%20Management%20Information%20Systems%22&maindatab=Academic%20Search%20Elite&searchTag=JNhttp://ehostvgw9.epnet.com/jndetail.asp?booleanTerm=%22Journal%20of%20Management%20Information%20Systems%22&maindatab=Academic%20Search%20Elite&searchTag=JNhttp://info.med.yale.edu/caim/manual/papers/gui1.htmlhttp://ehostvgw9.epnet.com/jndetail.asp?booleanTerm=%22Journal%20of%20Management%20Information%20Systems%22&maindatab=Academic%20Search%20Elite&searchTag=JNhttp://ehostvgw9.epnet.com/jndetail.asp?booleanTerm=%22Journal%20of%20Management%20Information%20Systems%22&maindatab=Academic%20Search%20Elite&searchTag=JN