Designing activity diagrams aiming at achieving usability in interactive applications: An empirical study

Abstract

With the increasing use of interactive applications, it is necessary that software companies produce applications providing a good quality of use for end users. It is important to assist designers in elaborating of design models, aiming at achieving usability of the interactive applications. We proposed a technique, called UDRT-AD (Usability Design Reading Technique for Activity Diagrams) that helps designers in modeling Activity Diagrams aiming at achieving usability in interactive applications. The goal of this paper is to present an empirical study carried out to verify the feasibility of using the UDRT-AD technique. The analysis of the results showed that the UDRT-AD technique could be employed to help in both creating the activity diagrams and early prevention of usability problems. Furthermore, we identified some issues that need to be improved in the UDRT-AD technique to further facilitate its use for industry.