skip to main content
10.1145/1111360.1111367acmotherconferencesArticle/Chapter ViewAbstractPublication PagesclihcConference Proceedingsconference-collections
Article

Online help system design based on the situated action theory

Published: 23 October 2005 Publication History

Abstract

Nowadays, different forms of assistance are available in interactive computer-based systems. However, current online help systems, which correspond to the main components of online assistance, often are unsuccessful in providing support to users. The help that is offered is not well-suited to the problem the users encounter and to the particular needs they have. This paper reports on a new approach to online help system design based on the situated action theory. The approach has been implemented in a system called AIDE. The system has been evaluated with 15 subjects having to do programming tasks in C++, and compared to the online help available in the programming environment they were using and on the Web. The main results show that the assistance provided by AIDE was three times as effective as the two other forms of assistance to help in defining the problem, and twice as effective to help in resolving it. Results also show that with the AIDE system, students had much less recourse to human assistance when trying to complete their tasks.

References

[1]
Desmarais, M. C., Leclair, R., Fiset, J.-Y. (1997). «Cost-Justifying Electronic Performance Support Systems». Communications of the ACM. 40:747. P. 39--48.]]
[2]
Grayling, T. (2002). If We Build it, Will They Come: A Usability Test of Two Browser-Based Embedded Help Systems. Technical Communication. 49. P. 193--209.]]
[3]
Spool, J. M. (1997). « Online help: Sometimes doesn't help ». Eye for design. 4. 3:9--10.]]
[4]
Lawyer-Brook, D., Sherry, L. (1996). «Creating Connections: An Internet training program for rural K-12 teachers». In Creating Connections. http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~lsherry/pubs/ejvc.html. Electronic Journal of Virtual Culture (EJVC).]]
[5]
Hackos, J. T. (1999). «Let's Stop Writing Documentation and Start Working for Users.». In Proceedings of the Society for Technical Communication. Cincinnati, Ohio. P. 134--135.]]
[6]
MacDonald, M. P. (2002). Context-Sensitive Disaster: Designing the Difference Between Help and Print. http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/magazine/technical/helpandprint.html]]
[7]
Kahney, L. (2001). «MS Office Helper Not Dead Yet». In Wired News MS Office Helper Not Dead Yet. http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,43065,00.html.]]
[8]
Suchman, L. A. (1990). «What is Human-Machine Interaction». In Cognition, Computation and Cooperation. Robertson, S. P., Zachary, W., Black, J. B. (Eds). Ablex Publishing Corporation. Norwood. New Jersey. P. 25--56.]]
[9]
Capobianco, A., Carbonell, N. (2001). «Contextual online help: elicitation of human expert' strategies». Proceedings of the 14th French-speaking conference on Human-computer interaction. P. 57--64.]]
[10]
Fischer, G. (2001). «User Modeling in Human-Computer Interaction». In User Modeling and User-Adapted Interaction. 11. Kluwer Academic Publishers. P. 65--86.]]
[11]
Horvitz, E., Breese, J., Heckerman, D., Hovel, D., Rommelse, K. (1998). «The Lumiere Project: Bayesian User Modeling for Inferring the Goals and Needs of Software Users». Proceedings of the Fourteenth Conference on Uncertainty in Artificial Intelligence. P. 256--265.]]
[12]
Göker, M., Thompson, C. A. (2000). «Personalized conversational case-based recommendation». Proceedings of the Fifth European Workshop on Case-Based Reasonning. Trento, Italy. P. 99--111.]]
[13]
Gupta, K. M., Aha, D. W. (2003). «A Framework for Incremental Query Formulation in Mixed-Initiative Case-Based Reasonning». In ICCBR'03 Workshop Proceedings. Trondheim, Norway.]]
[14]
Corbin, M. (2003). «From Online Help to Embedded User Assistance». Proceedings of the STC's 50th Annual Conference.]]
[15]
Spolsky, J. (2000). «Designing for People Who Have Better Things To Do With Their Lives». In User Interface Design for Programmers. Chapter 6.]]
[16]
Fréjus, M. (1999). Analyser l'activité d'explication pour concevoir en termes d'aide: Application à la formation et à la négociation commerciale. Thèse de doctorat de psychologie cognitive, mention ergonomie. Laboratoire d'Ergonomie Informatique. Université Paris V.]]
[17]
Suchman, L. A. (1987). Plans and Situated Actions: the Problem of Human-Machine Communication. Cambridge University Press.]]
[18]
Groleau, C., Taylor, J. (1996). «Toward a Subject-Oriented Worldview of Information». Canadian Journal of Communication. 21. 2.]]
[19]
Salambier, P. (1995). «Cognition: située, distribuée, socialement partagée, etc.». Gric Aramiihs. Toulouse. Document inédit. 13 p.]]
[20]
Stein, D. (1998). Situated Learning in Adult Education. ERIC Clearinghouse on Adult Career and Vocational Education Columbus. OH. ERIC Digest No. 195.]]
[21]
Bereither, C. (1997). «Situated cognition and how to overcome it». In Situated cognition: Social, semiotic, and psychological perspectives, Kirshner, D. and Whitson, A. (Eds). P. 281--300.]]
[22]
Menzies, T. (1998). Towards Situated Knowledge Acquisition. In the International Journal of Human-Computer Studies. 49. P. 867--898.]]
[23]
Darses, F., Falzon, P., Robert, J.-M. (1993). «Cooperating Partners: Investigating Natural Assistance». Proceedings of the HCI International'93 - 5th Conference on Human-Computer Interaction. Orlando. Floride. P. 997--1002.]]
[24]
Harajdi, Y., Jeffroy, F. (1993). «Expérimentation ergonomique pour la conception d'un système d'aide à l'utilisation d'applications micro-informatiques». Actes du colloque ERGO-IA'92. Biarritz. P. 222--234.]]
[25]
Vouligny, L., Robert, J.-M. (1999). «Définir le modèle-utilisateur des systèmes informatiques coopératifs». In Actes du 3e Congrès international de génie industriel. Langevin, A., Riopel, D., Ladet, P. (Eds). Montréal. P. 1047--1055.]]
[26]
Vouligny, L., Robert, J.-M. (2000). «Étude empirique de dialogues humains dans une tâche d'assistance informatique». In Actes de la Conférence ERGO-IHM 2000. Scapin, D. L., Vergison, E. (Eds). Biarritz. P. 211--218.]]
[27]
Vouligny, L., Robert, J.-M. (2001). «Étude empirique d'une tâche d'assistance humaine effectuée par l'entremise d'une interface informatisée». In Actes de la Conférence JIM'2001. Martin, B. (Ed). Metz. P. 85--92.]]
[28]
Capobianco, A. (2002). « Demandes d'aide procédurale: Spécification des besoins d'utilisateurs novices ». Proceedings of UAHCI'01. 3. P. 266--270.]]
[29]
Vouligny, L., Naggar, R., Langheit, C., St-Arnaud, R. (2004). «A Dynamic Development System for Knowledge Applications in Engineering». Proceedings of the 8th World Multi-Conference on Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics. Callaos, N., Lesso, W., Nomura, S. and Zhang, J. (Eds). Orlando. P. 207--212.]]
[30]
Krull, R., Friauf, J., Brown-Grant, J., Eaton, A. (2001). «Usability Trends in an Online Help System: User Testing on Three Releases of Help for a Visual Programming Language.». IEEE Communication Dimensions. P. 19--26.]]
[31]
Vouligny, L. (2004). Étude empirique d'une approche de conception de l'assistance informatisée basée sur l'action située. Thèse de doctorat de génie électrique. École Polytechnique de Montréal.]]

Cited By

View all
  • (2022)Thinking about help systemsProceedings of the 21st Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3554364.3559116(1-12)Online publication date: 17-Oct-2022
  • (2015)Supporting Peer Help in Collaborative Learning EnvironmentsProceedings of the Confederated International Conferences on On the Move to Meaningful Internet Systems: OTM 2015 Conferences - Volume 941510.1007/978-3-319-26148-5_5(76-89)Online publication date: 26-Oct-2015
  • (2013)Designing help system for e-GOV websitesInformation Polity10.5555/2659342.265934818:3(261-274)Online publication date: 1-Jul-2013
  • Show More Cited By

Recommendations

Comments

Information & Contributors

Information

Published In

cover image ACM Other conferences
CLIHC '05: Proceedings of the 2005 Latin American conference on Human-computer interaction
October 2005
361 pages
ISBN:1595932240
DOI:10.1145/1111360
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

Sponsors

  • Tecnologia Virtual
  • SIG-CHI Mexico
  • SIG-CHI Brazil
  • Create-Net
  • Microsoft Research: Microsoft Research
  • SMCC
  • ITESM Cuernavaca
  • Pullman de Morelos

Publisher

Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 23 October 2005

Permissions

Request permissions for this article.

Check for updates

Author Tags

  1. contextual help
  2. mixed-initiative interactions
  3. online help
  4. situated action

Qualifiers

  • Article

Acceptance Rates

Overall Acceptance Rate 14 of 42 submissions, 33%

Contributors

Other Metrics

Bibliometrics & Citations

Bibliometrics

Article Metrics

  • Downloads (Last 12 months)7
  • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)0
Reflects downloads up to 19 Feb 2025

Other Metrics

Citations

Cited By

View all
  • (2022)Thinking about help systemsProceedings of the 21st Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3554364.3559116(1-12)Online publication date: 17-Oct-2022
  • (2015)Supporting Peer Help in Collaborative Learning EnvironmentsProceedings of the Confederated International Conferences on On the Move to Meaningful Internet Systems: OTM 2015 Conferences - Volume 941510.1007/978-3-319-26148-5_5(76-89)Online publication date: 26-Oct-2015
  • (2013)Designing help system for e-GOV websitesInformation Polity10.5555/2659342.265934818:3(261-274)Online publication date: 1-Jul-2013
  • (2013)A importância de se explicitar informações estratégicas via sistemas de ajudaProceedings of the 12th Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.5555/2577101.2577108(13-21)Online publication date: 8-Oct-2013
  • (2011)"Afinando" a comunicação entre pares para melhorar a compreensão da mensagem do designerProceedings of the 10th Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems and the 5th Latin American Conference on Human-Computer Interaction10.5555/2254436.2254462(139-148)Online publication date: 25-Oct-2011
  • (2010)Reconstruindo o diálogo em sistemas de ajudaProceedings of the IX Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.5555/1999593.1999609(139-148)Online publication date: 5-Oct-2010
  • (2009)Combining Design Patterns and Elements of Social Computing for the Design of User Centered Online Help SystemsJournal of Educational Technology Systems10.2190/ET.38.1.b38:1(3-20)Online publication date: 1-Dec-2009
  • (2008)Understanding help seeking within the context of searching digital librariesJournal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology10.1002/asi.2098860:3(477-494)Online publication date: 25-Nov-2008

View Options

Login options

View options

PDF

View or Download as a PDF file.

PDF

eReader

View online with eReader.

eReader

Figures

Tables

Media

Share

Share

Share this Publication link

Share on social media