Observing Bad Designs, Assignments of Human-Computer Interaction Design

Download Observing Bad Designs and more Assignments Human-Computer Interaction Design in PDF only on Docsity!

Student Name:

Course Number: CSCI

Assignment Number: Assignment 1

Instructor Name:

Due Day: Aug 28, 2024 11:59 PM

Day of Submission: Aug 2 8 , 2024

Today, I’d like to discuss my Whirlpool Goldseries refrigerator. It is a stainless steel French door model with a 26 cubic feet capacity. It features adjustable shelves and a spacious interior with a dedicated crisper drawer for fruits and vegetables. The external water and ice dispenser offers filtered water and cubed or crushed ice, and the unit has advanced cooling technology for consistent temperature management. It also includes LED lighting for better visibility inside and is Energy Star rated for efficiency. I recently discovered a design flaw in the refrigerator that bothers me a lot. The main issue with the device is its sound alert feature. While this feature is designed to provide user feedback, it actually creates some difficulties to use. Specifically, the sound occurs whenever the refrigerator door is opened or a button on the door is pressed, but there are no clearly labeled buttons for adjusting or turning off the sound on the device. Even though I have used this refrigerator for over five years, I still cannot find a way to adjust or turn off the sound. This results in inconvenience, particularly when quiet is needed, such as at night or in situations where noise reduction is important, making it difficult to effectively control the sound. I believe this design violates two of the most important principles of design: visibility and mapping. They use one or a few button combinations to control so many different functions. This easily leads to user confusion and makes the product difficult to use. According to Don Norman’s principles outlined in "The Design of Everyday Things," effective design should ensure that all necessary functions are easily accessible and understandable to the user. In