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S. Keo-Orasarn, U. Pont, A. Mahdavi:
"Usability Assessment Of An Online Building Performance Evaluation Tool: A Case Study";
Talk: Proceedings of the 9 Conference of IBPSA-CZ - Simulace budov a techniky prostředí 2016, Brno, Czech Republic; 2016-11-10 - 2016-11-11; in: "Simulace budov a techniky prostředí 2016 9. konference IBPSA-CZ 10. - 11. 11. 2016 na Fakultě strojní VUT v Brně", M. Jaros, : Batak, O. Sikula et al. (ed.); (2016), ISBN: 978-80-270-0772-1; Paper ID 130, 6 pages.

Software tools intended to facilitate the building delivery process are widely available since the 1980ies. These encompass simple drafting tools, complex environments to generate building models and enrich them with geometrical and semantic information, and tools for assessment of different aspects of building performance. However, such tools are often insufficiently embraced and accepted by different stakeholders in the planning process. To address this issue, usability assessment (the discipline that explores the interaction between human users and software environments) can be employed. Usability is an approach to "measure" the quality of the human-computer interface, and is regularly defined via the attributes effectiveness, efficiency, and (user) satisfaction. In this contribution, we present the results of usability tests regarding a web-based software environment for building performance assessment. This tool, SEMERGY, is the result of a four-year long research and development cycle that aimed to utilize semantic web technologies for building performance assessment of new and existing buildings. The final result of these efforts is a versatile environment intended to be used as design and decision support tool for architects and clients in early design or retrofit planning stages. We subjected SEMERGY to a comprehensive usability testing, involving test persons with different backgrounds regarding professional experience and building planning knowledge, age, and gender. The participants were asked to perform a set of tasks using SEMERGY, including drafting of a demonstration building, setting different semantic properties of this structure, and performing building performance assessment regarding heating demand, ecological footprint, and cost implications. Additionally, the participants were asked to fill out a questionnaire prior to and after using the tool. Aside from providing specific cues as to how to improve the tool's usability, the results deliver some general insights regarding the skill-dependent user expectations from the interface designs of building performance assessment tools.

(no german version) Software tools intended to facilitate the building delivery process are widely available since the 1980ies. These encompass simple drafting tools, complex environments to generate building models and enrich them with geometrical and semantic information, and tools for assessment of different aspects of building performance. However, such tools are often insufficiently embraced and accepted by different stakeholders in the planning process. To address this issue, usability assessment (the discipline that explores the interaction between human users and software environments) can be employed. Usability is an approach to "measure" the quality of the human-computer interface, and is regularly defined via the attributes effectiveness, efficiency, and (user) satisfaction. In this contribution, we present the results of usability tests regarding a web-based software environment for building performance assessment. This tool, SEMERGY, is the result of a four-year long research and development cycle that aimed to utilize semantic web technologies for building performance assessment of new and existing buildings. The final result of these efforts is a versatile environment intended to be used as design and decision support tool for architects and clients in early design or retrofit planning stages. We subjected SEMERGY to a comprehensive usability testing, involving test persons with different backgrounds regarding professional experience and building planning knowledge, age, and gender. The participants were asked to perform a set of tasks using SEMERGY, including drafting of a demonstration building, setting different semantic properties of this structure, and performing building performance assessment regarding heating demand, ecological footprint, and cost implications. Additionally, the participants were asked to fill out a questionnaire prior to and after using the tool. Aside from providing specific cues as to how to improve the tool's usability, the results deliver some general insights regarding the skill-dependent user expectations from the interface designs of building performance assessment tools.

SEMERGY, usability, building performance evaluation, human-computer interface, interface design

Project Head Ardeshir Mahdavi:
Semantische Technologien für Softwaretechnik und Interaktive Systeme