GUITESTER2: an automatic consistency evaluation tool for graphical user interfaces

摘要

Computer tools for usability evaluation are useful for quantitative usability measurement. We propose methods for automatically evaluation the consistency of GUI wideget properties. These methods detect inconsistent widgets by judging widegets which have minor property values as inconsistent with widegets which have major ones, as human evaluators do. We also propose a method for recording widget property values. This method recoreds the data by using GUI application execultables. Not GUI resource files-the data is recorded by the cycle of 1) detecting widgets on the current screen, 2) recording their property values, and 3) activating one of the widgets to have the appliclation pop-u/close its windows. We developed a computer tool, GUITESTER2, that can implement the proposed method. The tool could detect inconsistencies in labelling terminology, button locations etc. for seven existing GUI applications, which confirmed the effectiveness of the tool.