User-friendly design of library catalogues on the web.

The aim of this thesis is to study a number of standards and theories, from the two research areas human-computer interaction and psychology, about how a graphical user interface (GUI) should be composed in order to facilitate interaction between humans and computers. Special emphasis is put on how the GUI should take into consideration the strengths and limitations of human cognition and perception. A study of three web catalogues shows how these theories appear when concretised. The following questions are answered in this thesis:What guidelines and styleguides can be found that specify the design of a user-friendly GUI?How do a few library catalogues on the web match a selection of these design principles?The guidelines are extracted from literature concerning human-computer interaction, psychology, automated library systems and web design. The standards are ISO 9241 Ergonomic requirements for office work with visual display terminals, and standardised icons from the International Federation of Library Associations. The web catalogues were studied through a questionnaire handed to five people. These catalogues belong to Lund University Library, Frank L. Cubly Library and Spencer Library Media Center. The different aspects studied were icons, information, terminology, orientation, graphics, colours and moving objects. In some cases the catalogues match the guidelines studied, in some cases they do not. Reasons affecting the choice of guidelines are the application, the users and their work, and the hardware. Reasons why guidelines are not used can be that designers do not understand or know them, or that they have found better solutions.Uppsatsnivå: