Topic30

Topic 30
Need for interface standards by Dwarkesh Iyengar

What is the Technology?

In telecommunications, an interface standard is a standard that describes one or more functional characteristics (such as code conversion, line assignments, or protocol compliance) or physical characteristics (such as electrical, mechanical, or optical characteristics) necessary to allow the exchange of information between two or more (usually different) systems or pieces of equipment. An interface standard may include operational characteristics and acceptable levels of performance.

What are the issues associated with this subject?

User interface standards have become the object of increasingly intense activities in recent years including work in the International Standards Organization (ISO) and the European Community. These activities are part of a general concern in information processing standards but are also based on the widely held feeling that consistency is one of the most important usability considerations. Even though consistency is obviously not the only usability factor, there are still good reasons to obtain it in balance with other usability considerations in a usability engineering process, and such additional considerations are indeed also included in many current standards activities.

Who are the stakeholders?

The responsible developers have different perspective about the problem. Based on a report conducted by the ISO- The products of developers and companies deviated from the standard due to the fact that the developers mostly claimed that they had chosen alternative design solutions because they had found them to be better than the one mandated by the standard. Other explanations were that the development tools did not allow compliance with the standard and that the developers had indeed planned compliance but had not yet had time to implement it. Further explanations were that the developers were not aware of the rule they had broken or that they had overlooked the deviation. In no case did it turn out that the developers had actively misinterpreted the standard and designed a specific deviating interface feature in the explicit belief that they were following a rule from the standard. This indicates that the individual parts of the standard are reasonably understandable - perhaps because the standard almost always contains elaborations of the rules and backs them up with a rationale.

What are the advantages and disadvantages for those stake holders?

Benefit for users:

• Flexible systems built from interoperable components. • Multi-provider solutions reduce lock-in. • Maximal utility, minimal cost. • Benefits for providers, developers, vendors • Opens up a healthy component marketplace. • Conformant software is more marketable. • Easier to specialize in one field or component (don’t have to provide a complete or general solution).

What solutions can overcome the problem?

To increase the usability of user interface standards, some steps could be taken by having development tools or Web templates that support implementation of interfaces that follow the standard including many concrete examples of correctly designed interfaces making sure that all examples are 100% compliant with the standard complying with older standards as much as possible.

What areas of impact does it affect?

The deviation from the standards affects the quality of the interface and thus results in an impact on the people and their usage standards. This results in them turning to other available options and thus negatively affecting the developer or the company.