Usability

I was fortunate to witness the "explosion" of computer technology in late eighties. While working as a Senior Research Fellow at the State Museum in Vilnius, Lithuania, I first heard about the little book-like gadget that allowed a professional to pull out articles and images onto the screen. It sounded like magic. All those magic globes that showed some fairy tale characters (step-mother in Snow White, for example) the distant places and events where coming to real life now.

I first saw a desktop computer in 1987 while visiting someone in their office. It was a dark screen with green text on it and a command prompt. While typing in certain commands, the text turned into a printout. That first printout is still around somewhere in my home. Remembering it makes me smile. The excitement experienced while touching that modern tool with one finger was just too huge to forget. I told myself then that I cannot survive in this country without learning computer technology.

Years past, and now I have my own "magic book." Moreover, in 2001 I was awarded a Masters Degree in Computer Science, Human Computer Interaction field. Prior to that, I enjoyed every single class that I took at a city college. Perhaps then occurred my first encounter with some usability issues not even knowing what usability was. In reality, only in mid-nineties, with expansion of E-commerce, usability became the mainstream discipline in the United States of America.

While in my first Data Processing class , I remember how stressful and overwhelming it was having to follow instructor's lecture that was referencing to the gadget that I knew nothing about. Keyboard details were not being thoroughly covered in the intro class. I was looking at all the additional keys that I have not seen on a typewriter and felt scared and lost. Somehow, it was assumed that students already understand how it works. Later in life, while working with students and teachers in a megalopolis high school, I always kept in mind that patience and clarity are necessary in training users to use computer systems. Otherwise, good luck eradicating chronic "disease" called computerphobia, that some people still have today.