IMAT 5209: Human Factors in System Design - BA Android Usability

This report presents a usability evaluation of the British Airways Android application, focusing on human factors in system design. It begins by introducing interactive systems and their sub-categories, highlighting the importance of User Experience (UX) in interface design. The evaluation employs heuristic analysis, extending Nielsen's 10 heuristics, to assess the application's Android version. The report details the user base, features, and functionalities of the British Airways app, including flight booking, boarding passes, and payment options. A use case diagram illustrates the application's workflow, from user registration to accessing various features. The methodology section justifies the selection of heuristic evaluation over other techniques like Cognitive Walkthrough and Keystroke Level Modelling, emphasizing its suitability for assessing a wide range of human factors. The evaluation section compares the British Airways app based on heuristics such as system status visibility, real-world compatibility, user control, consistency, error prevention, recognition, efficiency, and aesthetic design, providing screenshots and analysis to support the findings.

Running head: HUMAN FACTORS IN SYSTEM DESIGN
Human Factors in System Design
[Name of the Student]
[Name of the University]
[Author note]

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Interactive System:
Interactive systems are considered as a viable advancement in technology that has
been attained in todays world by making use of man and machine interaction. The interactive
systems have been responsible for putting forward numerous sub-categories that are
responsible for the changes. The main sub-categories mainly include the following BCI or the
Brain Computer Interaction, the HCI or Human Computer Interaction and many more
(Neelapu et al. 2017). The user interface or the UI has been associated with witnessing
numerous different kinds of upgrades that is from the Skeuomorphism to the designs which
are much simple. However now it has been seen that the User Experience or The UX acts as
the prime factor for the designing of the interactive systems interface. Before moving to the
finding sections all the interaction systems are compared and contrasted so as to summarize
the results. The report is associated with analyzing the interactive system that has been
selected by the British Airways and Lufthansa for the Android Version of their mobile
application (Sarcevic Marsic and Burd 2018). Heuristic evaluation has been used for the
purpose of evaluating the system which in turn is associated with considering the heuristics
extending the 10 heuristics of Nielson.
User of the Interactive System:
Android version of the mobile application that is to be used by the British Airways is
the main subject of this paper. British Airways is associated with providing international
service and is one of the well-established airways of the European Continent. The interactive
system that is used by the British Airways is entirely responsible for providing various kind
of air flight services and different air flight services like the boarding, booking of tickets,
details of the flight, distance, price and many more are offered (Guerrero 2016). Another
example of the functionality provided by the British Airways is the “Pay for Brinks and M&S

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on board snacks”. Beow are the screenshots of the interactive mobile application used by the
British Airways so as to help in gaining an insight of the firm along with the system and the
users. Besides this a general use case diagram has also been created so as to put forward an
understanding of the functionality of the mobile applications.
British Airways is one of the oldest and the largest air carrier existing in UK in
terms of the size of the fleet ad the second largest air carrier in terms of the number of
passengers carried. This organization was established in the year of 1974 on 31st March and
its headquarter is situated in Waterside, Harmondsworth, United Kingdoms. The air carrier is
associated with providing different kind of air services which are generally provided in
different platforms and generally ranges from the website to mobile applications
(Venugopalan et al. 2018). The android version of the mobile application is chosen for
conducting this study which can be downloaded from the Google Play Store that is having a
rating of 4.2 and has been reviewed by almost 28,321 peoples. Features like the timeline,
personalized home screen, boarding passes, flight booking, checking the status of the flight,
widget, management of flights and many more are provided in order to gain an advantage.
The primary users include the passengers.

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Use Case Diagram:

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The use case diagram created is for the mobile application which is entirely dedicated
towards the airways. The application firstly consists of a sign-up section where the users
needs to get them registered and this is followed by the validation of the data by the users and
for storing the data in the database. Followed by this is the deployment of the credentials that
is to be used by the users so as to get access to the system as well as to the capabilities (Lin et

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al. 2015 ). After logging in into the application the users would be capable of getting an
access to various kind of features like the searching of flights, booking of the tickets, making
payments and other similar type of features.
Methodology:
The usability of the interactive system designs can be done by means of the few
prominent techniques like the Cognitive Walkthrough, heuristic evaluation and the Keystroke
Level Modelling. Amongst these three techniques the heuristic evaluation and the Cognitive
Walkthrough is generally associated with considering the users whereas the Keystroke Level
Modelling is not associated with considering the users and is an analytic technique. The
report is mainly associated with evaluating the usability of the interactive system that
generally involves the different human factors and for this reason the Keystroke level
modelling has not been chosen. Besides this amongst the heuristic and the Cognitive
walkthrough, the heuristic evaluation method has been chosen as this is driven by the
guidelines and the principles. Another main reason lying behind the selection of the heuristic
evaluation is that the interactive system which has been selected for the subject of this study
is consisting of numerous features that can be discussed (Neelapu et al. 2017). The cognitive
walkthrough evaluation method is associated with limiting the evaluation process to a number
of aspects that the functionality, visibility, interactivity and the usability however the
heuristic evaluation method would be associated with availing the evaluator with aspects like
the human limitations, the consistency, accuracy and many more. So, for the flexibility and
the in-depth assessment of the heuristic evaluation method acts as a primary reason for
selecting this particular methodology.
Heuristic Evaluation:

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Neilson and Molich in the year of 1994 was associated with introducing the heuristic
evaluation of the User interfaces and this is the most popular guideline used for reviewing
any kind f interactive system. The most prominent advantage of the heuristic advantage is
that it provides an easy and quick output. Deriving of the adequate output by making use of
this methodology is possible if the requirement is defined in a proper way (Guerrero 2016).
Firstly, the product is to be defined and the subject of this study is the mobile application.
Followed by this the selection of appropriate expert so as to discuss the study. Lastly the final
requirement includes the selection of the heuristics.
Evaluation
The evaluation of both the systems have been done based on the heuristics that have
been discussed above. Furthermore, to enhance the understanding and do a comparative
analysis between the two systems based on the heuristics, have been presented below.
System Status Visibility
British Airways application both of them offers the visibility of the status. As
evidence to the above made statements the screenshot from the applications have been
attached below.

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BA System Visibility

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The images attached that has been provided above is associated with depicting the
fact that the animations of the application have been designed in such a way that different
operations of the business can be carried out in an easy way. It is to be noted that the
animations of this application are also responsible for making the application slower and this
is one of the major problems that needs to be mitigated (Sarcevic Marsic and Burd 2018).
These animations are designed along with being made suitable so as to be utilized by various
kind of operations and British Airways have been associated with limiting the animations
which are suitable for the heuristics that has been discussed.
“Limited animation of BA limits the understanding of the users of what action is being
undertaken and why the user has to wait. While Lufthansa offers better system status
visibility with suitable animation for each action.”
Real World and System compatibility
Understandable outputs are put forward by the application of the British
Airways to the users and is also responsible for providing offers related to the relevancy of
the understanding. The output that is presented by BA does not account for any of the activity
but is only associated with considering the completion of the work (Venugopalan et al. 2018).
Additionally, the application is also associated availing the users with the various kind of
opportunities for reviewing the details that have been provided acting as one of the most
crucial factors.
User Control and Freedom
Designing of the interface has been done by considering the various discussed
aspects along with the findings which has been associated with reveling various features of

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the application. In the application of the BA whenever a user makes an error they are drafted
back to the initial page and they have to undertake the actions again which they have done
before making the mistake.

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