Abstract:
This thesis presents a usability evaluation of a smart Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning (HVAC) dashboard interface through a cross-cultural study. The objective is to assess the usability problems and evaluate the user experience of the interface through quantitative and qualitative analysis. The study recruited 20 participants from three different countries, considering their familiarity and unfamiliarity with smart HVAC systems. The participants performed a set of tasks using the dashboard while providing think-aloud feedback. The quantitative evaluation measured effectiveness, efficiency, and user satisfaction based on the ISO:9241-11:2018, while the qualitative evaluation focused on identifying usability issues based on participant feedback and comparing them against established UI design heuristics. The results revealed challenges in task completion, particularly for tasks 2, 7, and 8. The time-based efficiency and post-task satisfaction scores also indicated issues with the current design. The qualitative analysis highlighted problems related to system status visibility, consistency, real world match, and lack of helpful information. The findings suggest potential improvements to the interface design, such as enhancing the landing page, using consistent titles, avoiding jargon, providing explanatory tooltips, and implementing better data filtering options. Despite more familiarity of usage of smart systems among Chinese and Thai, it is found that challenges are faced by participants of all nationalities and not just Nepalese which indicates a bad UI of the dashboard. Overall, this study contributes to understanding the usability challenges of smart HVAC dashboards by conducting a cross-cultural usability study and provides insights for enhancing user experience and system performance.
