Methodology for Rapid Prototyping and Testing of ASR Based User Interfaces

Abstract

One of the greatest challenges in the design of speech recognition based interfaces is about the navigation through the service menu structure. On the one hand, the interactions based on human machine dialogues force a high level of hierarchical structuring of services, and on the other hand, it is necessary to wait for the last phases of the user interface development to obtain a global vision of the dialogue problems by means of user trials. To tackle these problems, when Telefónica Móviles España began developing its voice portal, great care was taken in stablishing a methodology based on rapid prototyping of the user interfaces, so that designers could integrate the process of design of voice interfaces with emulations of the navigation through the flow charts. This was also the starting point for a specific software product (SIS PRUEBA) which addresses the needs of rapid prototyping of these user interfaces from the earliest stages of the design and analysis phases. SIS PRUEBA has been applied to this and to other types of voice and data services. For example, in complex services like "CINES" (to request information about cinemas, films, etc.) and "FINANZAS" (to consult financial information), the use of this methodology helped to review and to apply recommendations of the speech interfaces usability guide on concrete points of the flow charts and, consequently, the time and resources needed to redesign the critical parts of the user interface were reduced dramatically. ). In addition, SIS PRUEBA has also been successfully applied to prototype simpler services, like "ALERTAS" (which allows to program alert messages about football).

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