Why it’s quick to be square: modelling new and existing hierarchical menu designs

We consider different hierarchical menu and toolbar-like interface designs from a theoretical perspective and show how a model based on visual search time, pointing time, decision time and expertise development can assist in understanding and predicting interaction performance. Three hierarchical menus designs are modelled – a traditional pull-down menu, a pie menu and a novel Square Menu with its items arranged in a grid – and the predictions are validated in an empirical study. The model correctly predicts the relative performance of the designs – both the eventual dominance of Square Menus compared to traditional and pie designs and a performance crossover as users gain experience. Our work shows the value of modelling in HCI design, provides new insights about performance with different hierarchical menu designs, and demonstrates a new high-performance menu type. Author Keywords Menus, hierarchical menus, performance models