Transformative User Experience—
Beyond Packaged Design
Markus Latzina

SAP | [e-mail]

Joerg Beringer

SAP | [e-mail] March + April 2012

interactions

The term transformative has different connotations, but it usually refers to the concept of significant, irreversible change, often considered game changing due to its ability to redefine an entire value system. Recently we have observed new technologies that are deemed to be transformative, for example, by enabling us to maintain relationships remotely via social networks, access information anytime anywhere via mobile devices, or obtain search results instantly.

What has not yet become transformative is the user interface itself. The fundamental design rationale for designing applications goes back to the 1980s, when mainframes were replaced by personal computers and PC software was packaged into applications. Since then, the concept of a software application packaged at design time with proper functionality has dominated the design of end-user software. In this approach, each application comes with its own data model, and the user interface displays these data structures as application content. Data objects presented at the user-interface level are designed to match the user’s mental model, but this also ties them to the semantics defined by the application scope.

The application scope is typically defined by a specific set of use cases identified prior to implementing the application. Generally, system design is understood as a solution to a well-defined set of requirements. Requirements derived from an agreed-upon set of use cases are mapped to features [ 1]. This design rationale implicitly creates hard boundaries with respect to its coverage of use scenarios and ability to consume application content.

A software application design is
considered to be usable if it enables
people to perform the identified set
of tasks and matches their men-
tal model. However, in traditional
software solutions, the task models
inform only the design and are
implicit at runtime. Transformative
User Experience frames contexts
in terms of spaces of interaction
potentials where users can realize
their current goals by moving across
various task contexts along self-
determined transformative vectors.
This approach requires a much more
explicit presence of task models in
a product’s runtime—not just at
design time. To allow users to cre-
ate a proper task setting, a system
must provide mechanisms to detach
application content and move it into
different task contexts. Software
applications often lack this concept
of elasticity, primarily because
applications are designed for specific
tasks. But in reality, task contexts
are often not mechanistic; rather,
they grow organically as needed in
a given situation [ 2]. Task flows do
not always follow the typical task
life cycle, alternating between non-
routine and routine situations and
materializing as an idiosyncratic
one-time practice. We therefore
see a need to identify principles of
designing for elasticity to support
seamless transitions across contexts
rather than forcing users to switch
between isolated packaged applica-
tions or parts thereof.