An Empirical and Theoretical Analysis of the Speed and Error-Proneness of Some User Interface Widgets

摘要

Most operations in graphical user interfaces are done using a small set of standard widgets such as menus, buttons, etc. The speed and error-proneness of widgets vary, and widgets should be selected according to the frequency and severity of the associated operations. In this paper we analyse eight input widgets both experimentally and theoretically. The best widget types turned out to be buttons, radio buttons, and check boxes. The only widget in the most error-prone group and with the slowest selection times was combo box. We found a trade-off between speed and safety vs. screen space consumption and we suggest some solutions for various situations.