A Case Study in Interaction Design

In this thesis I examined how an idea for a web service can be turned into an interaction framework from a loose collection of ideas. In my research for the thesis I examined two disciplines, usability and interaction design, and found the latter to best serve my needs. The process of goal-directed design (an approach to interaction design) provided a way for me to keep the future users of Traveling Books in mind as I was designing the interaction framework. I became familiar with the concept of personas as a powerful tool in designing interactions, and created a provisional primary persona to represent the target audience of Traveling Books, building upon behavioral variables and informed assumptions. Sketching up this persona's goals and motivations in a context scenario, I was able to infer functional and data requirements for Traveling Books. These data and requirements formed the foundation for the functional and data elements, the main building block of the interaction framework. These elements were then represented in a sketch of the interaction framework, emphasizing the high level arrangement and navigation, rather than detailed representations of interface elements. The framework provides a good starting point for developing all the functions of Traveling Books in the same manner. A complete interaction framework supplemented by a visual framework, a detailed study of the visual language of Traveling Books, forms the foundation for the actual implementation of the site as a real, working service on the web.egyetemiangol nyelv és irodalo