article

Direct manipulation interfaces

Authors:

Edwin L. Hutchins,

James D. Hollan, and

Donald A. NormanAuthors Info & Claims

Human-Computer Interaction, Volume 1, Issue 4

Pages 311 - 338

https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327051hci0104_2

Published: 01 December 1985 Publication History

Abstract

Direct manipulation has been lauded as a good form of interface design, and some interfaces that have this property have been well received by users. In this article we seek a cognitive account of both the advantages and disadvantages of direct manipulation interfaces. We identify two underlying phenomena that give rise to the feeling of directness. One deals with the information processing distance between the user's intentions and the facilities provided by the machine. Reduction of this distance makes the interface feel direct by reducing the effort required of the user to accomplish goals. The second phenomenon concerns the relation between the input and output vocabularies of the interface language. In particular, direct manipulation requires that the system provide representations of objects that behave as if they are the objects themselves. This provides the feeling of directness of manipulation.

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Cited By

Taeumel MLincke JHirschfeld R(2024)Unanticipated Progress Indication: Continuous Responsiveness for Courageous ExplorationCompanion Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on the Art, Science, and Engineering of Programming10.1145/3660829.3660843(80-86)Online publication date: 11-Mar-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3660829.3660843
Morazan MMinic TMonga MLonati VBarendsen ESheard JPaterson J(2024)Nondeterministic to Deterministic Finite-State Machine Visualization: Implementation and EvaluationProceedings of the 2024 on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education V. 110.1145/3649217.3653641(262-268)Online publication date: 3-Jul-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3649217.3653641
Pohl HHornbæk K(2024)Integrated Calculators: Moving Calculation into the WorldProceedings of the 2024 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference10.1145/3643834.3661523(343-355)Online publication date: 1-Jul-2024
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Index Terms

Direct manipulation interfaces
1. Computing methodologies
  1. Artificial intelligence
    1. Knowledge representation and reasoning
      1. Cognitive robotics
    2. Philosophical/theoretical foundations of artificial intelligence
      1. Cognitive science
  2. Modeling and simulation
    1. Model development and analysis
      1. Modeling methodologies
2. Human-centered computing
  1. Human computer interaction (HCI)

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Published In

cover image Human-Computer Interaction

Human-Computer Interaction Volume 1, Issue 4

December 1985

82 pages

ISSN:0737-0024

EISSN:1532-7051

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Publisher

L. Erlbaum Associates Inc.

United States

Publication History

Published: 01 December 1985

Received: 03 October 1985

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Cited By

Taeumel MLincke JHirschfeld R(2024)Unanticipated Progress Indication: Continuous Responsiveness for Courageous ExplorationCompanion Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on the Art, Science, and Engineering of Programming10.1145/3660829.3660843(80-86)Online publication date: 11-Mar-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3660829.3660843
Morazan MMinic TMonga MLonati VBarendsen ESheard JPaterson J(2024)Nondeterministic to Deterministic Finite-State Machine Visualization: Implementation and EvaluationProceedings of the 2024 on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education V. 110.1145/3649217.3653641(262-268)Online publication date: 3-Jul-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3649217.3653641
Pohl HHornbæk K(2024)Integrated Calculators: Moving Calculation into the WorldProceedings of the 2024 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference10.1145/3643834.3661523(343-355)Online publication date: 1-Jul-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3643834.3661523
Lin DCaba Heilbron FLee JWang OMartelaro N(2024)VideoMap: Supporting Video Exploration, Brainstorming, and Prototyping in the Latent SpaceProceedings of the 16th Conference on Creativity & Cognition10.1145/3635636.3656192(311-327)Online publication date: 23-Jun-2024
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Zong JPedraza Pineros IChen MHajas DSatyanarayan A(2024)Umwelt: Accessible Structured Editing of Multi-Modal Data RepresentationsProceedings of the CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613904.3641996(1-20)Online publication date: 11-May-2024
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