User interface style guide compliance reporting

• US 9,841,956 B2
• Filed: 01/31/2011
• Issued: 12/12/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 01/31/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: SAP SE
• Original Assignee: SAP SE
• Inventors: Bornheimer, Karin, Haug, Tobias, Uhl, Thomas, Brandt, Carsten
• Primary Examiner(s): Gaffin, Jeffrey A
• Assistant Examiner(s): Heffington, John M
• Application Number:
  US13/017,428
• Publication Number:
  US 20120198364A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,507 Days
• Field of Search: 715762, 715825
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/38 for implementing user interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/77 Software metrics
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/451 Execution arrangements for user interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

This disclosure provides various embodiments for generating reports relating to UI models'"'"' compliance with a set of UI style guide rules. A digital UI model is parsed to determine whether a user interface, in a plurality of user interfaces within a software environment, satisfies at least one UI style guide rule in a plurality of UI style guide rules associated with the software environment. The digital UI model defines a plurality of attributes of the user interface. At least one statistical measure is calculated relating to compliance with UI style guide rules. The calculation of the statistical measure is based at least in part on the determination of whether the user interface satisfies the at least one UI style guide rule. A report is then generated identifying the at least one statistical measure, the report configured for presentation on a user interface of a computing device.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

parsing a first digital user interface (UI) model in a plurality of digital UI models to determine whether a first user interface, in a plurality of user interfaces within a software environment, satisfies at least a first UI style guide rule in a plurality of UI style guide rules associated with the software environment, the first digital UI model defining a plurality of attributes of the first user interface, and actions defining UI attributes associated with the first user interface used to dynamically select a UI rule check script determined to be relevant to the actions and modeling at least the first UI style guide rule;

ranking the first user interface among the plurality of user interfaces and the first UI style guide rule among the plurality of UI style guide rules based on a calculation of at least one statistical measure relating to a rate of compliance with UI style guide rules based at least in part on the determination of whether the first user interface satisfies the first UI style guide rule; and

generating reporting data identifying the at least one statistical measure, the reporting data configured for presentation on a user interface of a computing device.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the first digital UI model is parsed by executing a first UI rule check script, in a plurality of UI rule check scripts, corresponding to the first UI style guide rule, wherein each UI rule check script in the plurality of UI rule check scripts corresponds to at least one UI style guide rule in the plurality of user interface style guide rules and is adapted, when executed by at least one processor device, to parse UI models to determine whether user interface attributes modeled by the UI models violate the UI style guide rule corresponding to the UI rule check script.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the statistical measure relates to compliance of a first set of user interfaces in the plurality of user interfaces with a set of UI style guide rules included in the plurality of UI style guide rules, wherein the first set of user interfaces includes the first user interface and at least one other second user interface and the set of UI style guide rules at least include the first UI style guide rule.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein digital UI models corresponding to each user interface in the first set of user interfaces is parsed to determine whether attributes of the corresponding user interface defined by the UI model satisfy at least the first UI style guide rule.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the statistical measure includes an aggregate degree of compliance with the set of UI style guide rules by user interfaces in the first set of user interfaces.

6. The method of claim 3, wherein the first set of user interfaces corresponds to user interfaces of a first software application.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the statistical measure includes an aggregate degree of compliance with the set of UI style guide rules by user interfaces in the first set of user interfaces, the method further comprising:

determining that the calculated aggregate degree of compliance by the first set of user interfaces exceeds a threshold value; and

sending data approving runtime use of the first software application based, at least in part, on the determination that the calculated aggregate degree of compliance by the first set of user interfaces exceeds a threshold value.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

authorizing marketing of the first software application in an electronic storefront based, at least in part, on the determination that the calculated aggregate degree of compliance by the first set of user interfaces exceeds a threshold value.

9. The method of claim 3, wherein the statistical measure further relates to compliance of a second set of user interfaces in the plurality of user interfaces with the set of UI style guide rules, the second set of user interfaces corresponding to user interfaces of a second software application, the reporting data identifying overall compliance with the set of UI style guide rules by user interfaces of each of the first and second software applications.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein each UI style guide rule relates to user experience design guidelines for user interfaces in the software environment.

13. The method of claim 9, wherein the set of UI style guide rules includes the plurality of UI style guide rules and the first set of user interfaces includes the plurality of user interfaces.

14. The method of claim 9, wherein the statistical measure includes an identification, for each UI style guide rule in the set of UI style guide rules, of a degree of compliance with the respective UI style guide rule by user interfaces in the set of user interfaces.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the statistical measure includes an aggregate degree of compliance with the set of UI style guide rules by the first user interface.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein the set of UI style guide rules is a first set of UI style guide rules corresponding to a first category of UI style guide rules, at least a second UI style guide rule is included in a second set of UI style guide rules corresponding to a second category of UI style guide rules, and the statistical measure includes an aggregate degree of compliance with the first category of UI style guide rules by at least the first user interface and an aggregate degree of compliance with the second category of UI style guide rules by at least the first user interface.

17. The method of claim 3, wherein the set of UI style guide rules includes at least two UI style guide rules in the plurality of UI style guide rules.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the statistical measure includes an identification of a most-violated UI style guide rule in the plurality of UI style guide rules by user interfaces in the plurality of user interfaces.

19. The method of claim 1, wherein the first UI style guide rule is included in a set of UI style guide rules including at least one other UI style guide rule from the plurality of UI style guide rules, the first digital UI model is parsed to determine whether the first user interface satisfies each UI style guide rule in the set of UI style guide rules, and calculating the at least one statistical measure is further based on the determination of whether the first user interface satisfies each UI style guide rule in the set of UI style guide rules.

20. The method of claim 19, further comprising:

determining that the calculated aggregate degree of compliance by the first user interface exceeds a threshold value; and

sending data approving runtime use of the first user interface within the software environment.

11. An article comprising a non-transitory, machine-readable storage device storing instructions operable to cause at least one processor to perform operations comprising:

parsing a first digital user interface (UI) model in a plurality of digital UI models to determine whether a first user interface, in a plurality of user interfaces within a software environment, satisfies at least a first UI style guide rule in a plurality of UI style guide rules associated with the software environment, the first digital UI model defining a plurality of attributes of the first user interface, and actions defining UI attributes associated with the first user interface used to dynamically select a UI rule check script determined to be relevant to the actions and modeling at least the first UI style guide rule;

ranking the first user interface among the plurality of user interfaces and the first UI style guide rule among the plurality of UI style guide rules based on a calculation of at least one statistical measure relating to a rate of compliance with UI style guide rules based at least in part on the determination of whether the first user interface satisfies the first UI style guide rule; and

generating reporting data identifying the at least one statistical measure, the reporting data configured for presentation on a user interface of a computing device.

12. A system comprising:

memory configured as at least one data repository and including;

a plurality of digital user interface (UI) models, each UI model identifying attributes of at least one user interface in a plurality of user interfaces; and

a plurality of plurality of UI rule check scripts, each UI rule check script in the plurality of UI rule check scripts modeling at least one UI style guide rule in a plurality of UI style guide rules and dynamically selected as relevant to actions that define UI attributes associated with the at least one user interface, each UI rule check script configured, when executed by at least one processing device, to parse digital UI models and determine whether user interface attributes modeled by corresponding UI models satisfy the UI style guide rule corresponding to the executed UI rule check script; and

a UI style guide reporting engine interoperably coupled with the memory and containing a hardware processor, the UI style guide reporting engine configured to;

perform a UI style guide compliance analysis by executing at least one particular UI rule check script, in the plurality of UI rule check scripts, corresponding to at least one particular UI style guide rule to parse at least one particular digital UI model in the plurality of digital UI models, to determine whether the at least one particular user interface, modeled by the at least one particular digital UI model, satisfies the at least one particular UI style guide rule;

rank the at least one particular user interface among the plurality of user interfaces and the at least one particular UI style guide rule among the plurality of UI style guide rules based on a calculation of at least one statistical measure based at least in part on the performed UI style guide compliance analysis, the statistical measure relating to a rate of compliance with the at least one particular style guide rule; and

generate reporting data identifying the at least one statistical measure, the reporting data configured for presentation on a user interface of a computing device.