Empirically Derived Multimedia Design Guidelines for Browsing Large Volumes of E-Mail Data.

Abstract

This paper introduces multimedia design guidelines for browsing large volumes of e-mail data. These software design guidelines derived from two sets of experiments under a prototype version of a multimedia e-mail tool. The experiments tested various forms of audio-visual communication metaphors. For example, the auditory stimuli consisted of musical sounds (earcons), compositional sounds, environmental sounds (auditory icons), stereophony, pitch, synthesised and recorded speech as well as other sound effects. The first set of experiments involved the multimedia browsing of simple and complex sets of e-mail data. The second set of the experiments involved the communication of e-mail categories and other related e-mail information such as the presence or absence of an attachment, priority status and subject of an e-mail. The results of these two sets of experiments are described and linked with other experiments in the literature. The paper integrates and discusses all these experimental results, the incorporation of auditory stimuli and the suitability of different types of multimedia metaphors for the design of audio-visual browsing techniques of large volumes of e-mail data. The totality of the multimedia design appeared to offer a meaningful, easily understood and recognised interaction mechanism and therefore demonstrated a potential way to maximise the volume of information that could be communicated to users. The application of synthesised and recorded speech, earcons and auditory icons as well as sound effects are also discussed in the light of the experimental results with emphasis upon issues of synergy, synchronisation, consistency, structure, classification and presentation of different types of communication metaphors as an integral part of the software design process. Furthermore, the suitability and use of compositional sounds are also discussed. The paper concludes with a set of practical guidelines for software and multimedia designers and a design approach for this type of data browsing.