Usability concerns in GIS development for a wider user-base - A qualitative usability research in Swedish municipal infrastructure

Nedanstående innehåll är skapat av Mimers Brunns besökare. Kommentera arbete

We now live in a society where communicating is done mostly through computer-technology based mediums. In Swedish municipal infrastructure a lot of the communication-data consists of geospatial data-collections. This data is generated with Geographical Information Systems (GIS) which usage in Sweden has increased rapidly. This has lead to a competition between developers in designing their systems for a wider user-base. A transition between designs that has its focus on a small target group and designs intended for a wide range of different users puts the developers in a challenge where usability is one of the big concerns. In this thesis we, have adopted a qualitative research approach with contextual observations and usability testing, in order to identify the crucial usability concerns when designing GIS for a wider user-base. Results show that the most crucial usability concerns are related to system feedback and the GIS not being compatible with other GIS data formats. The research has been concentrated within municipalities in Sweden and results presented in this thesis are rough, but true indications. More research is needed to get detailed accuracy of the usability concer...