Build Working Taxonomy of Human-centric Issues

Software is designed and built to solve human challenges in almost every domain. However, we continually hear about many issues with current software relating to its poor fit with its target end users. This results in hard-to-use software that does not meet the user’s needs and causes frustration, economic cost, inefficiencies, not fit-for-purpose solutions, and even dangerous and life-threatening situations. Many of these problems can be traced to a lack of understanding and incorporation during software engineering of end user human aspects. Humans are diverse and present software designers and builders with diverse challenges, including but not limited to different age, gender, culture, language, language proficiency, socio-economic status, physical and mental challenges, personality, emotional reaction to technology, engagement, and many others.

To date, we have developed an initial taxonomy of end user human aspects that impact software usage and hence design, implementation, testing, defect reporting and correction and ultimately its requirements and processes, methods and and tools needed for development. Providing a taxonomy of human centric aspects in software engineering helps not only to classify human-centric aspects, but also provides a language to use when describing human aspects. Taxonomies are used in science to define, group and rank by similar characteristics, and by doing this we will generate a scientific nomenclature that can be used to explore and address human centric aspects relevant to the industry.

Our aim is to better characterise these diverse end user aspects and their impact on software development, with some examples from our recent work addressing some of these.