Stephen Greene, Jason Finnegan

Usability of Mobile Devices and intelligently adapting to a User's needs

Telecommunications Software and Systems Group (TSSG)
Waterford Institute of Technology (WIT)

Usability is defined in ISO 9241 (1998) as the extent to which a product can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction. Usability in relation to mobile services i.e. services that run on Mobile Phones and PDAs must look at the mobile user and surmise what interfaces for mobile services are appreciated and anticipated by the user. This paper will cover the area of usability issues when developing Mobile services. It will look at the mobile users and will propose a system that will store and utilise users’ context information to help a user carry out a task. It will formulate a structure that allows applications to learn the significance and interrelations of people, places, objects and documents. By knowing the significance and relationships between objects and data, applications can always provide the user with the most relevant data and build up a context for user interaction.