Method and computer system for evaluating the complexity of a user interface

• US 20070162874A1
• Filed: 12/14/2004
• Published: 07/12/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 12/18/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: SAP SE
• Original Assignee: SAP AG (SAP SE)
• Inventors: Ziegert, Thomas, Spriestersbach, Axel, Ulmer, Cedric, Ma, Jun, Lauff, Markus
• Granted Patent: US 8,959,488 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/762
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/38 for implementing user interfaces

Abstract

Method and computer system for evaluating the complexity a user interface. A complexity indicator (121) receives (430) device class specific representations (301, 302) of the user interface. Each device class specific representation (301, 302) refers to a respective device class (DC1, DC2). The complexity indicator (121) determines complexity values of layout components (1 to 9) of the device class specific representations (301, 302) by using complexity evaluation functions (EF5-DC1, EF5-DC2, EF6-DC1, EF6-DC2), associated with the layout components (5, 6) and aggregates the complexity values by device class according to a corresponding layout component hierarchy (321, 322) of the respective device class specific representation (301, 302).

Claims

1. A computer complexity indicator having instructions to evaluate the complexity of a user interface that has device class specific representations, each device class specific representation referring to a respective device class and having a respective layout component hierarchy;

the complexity indicator comprising;

a library having complexity evaluation functions to determine complexity values of layout components of the respective layout component hierarchies, where each complexity evaluation fruition is associated with the layout component to which it is applied; and

an aggregator to aggregate the complexity values by device class according to the corresponding layout component hierarchy of the respective device class specific representation.

2. The complexity indicator of claim 1, further comprising:

a transformer to transform the layout component hierarchy of each representation into a corresponding complexity evaluation hierarchy so that the association of each evaluation function with its respective layout components is redirected through the corresponding component of the respective complexity evaluation hierarchy and the evaluation function is applied to the corresponding component of the respective complexity evaluation hierarchy.

3. The complexity indicator of claim 1, further comprising:

a complexity display to visualize the aggregate complexity values by device class.

4. The complexity indicator of claim 3, wherein the complexity display has a drill down portion to visualize complexity values of layout components related to a selected device class.

5. The complexity indicator of claim 4 in combination with a tree-based outline editor to generate an outline views of the representations that corresponds to the selected device class configured to highlight a layout component that is selected in the complexity display for drill down purposes.

10. A computer system having at least one computing device configured to run an integrated development environment that includes a complexity indicator according to claim 1.

12. A machine-readable medium storing a complexity indicator according to claim 1.

6. A method for complexity evaluation of a user interface, comprising:

receiving device class specific representations of the user interface, wherein each device class specific representation referring to a respective device class;

determining complexity values of layout components of the device class specific representations by applying complexity evaluation functions that are associated with respective layout components; and

aggregating the complexity values by device class according to a corresponding layout component hierarchy of the respective device class specific representation.

7. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

transforming the layout component hierarchy of each representation into a corresponding complexity evaluation hierarchy so that the association of each evaluation function with its respective layout component is redirected through the corresponding component of the respective complexity evaluation hierarchy and the evaluation function is applied to the corresponding component of the respective complexity evaluation hierarchy.

8. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

visualizing the aggregate complexity values by device class.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the visualizing comprises:

visualizing complexity values of layout components related to a selected device class in a drill down portion.

11. (canceled)