DEPARTURE AND DESTINATION

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Inhaltsverzeichnis 1 Illustration 2 Context 3 Problem statement 4 Problem description with forces 5 Examples 6 Solution 7 Diagram 8 References 9 Literature and Links

Illustration

Context

…you have decided which LEVEL OF DETAIL you want to provide for the creation of new routes. Now you have to think about how users can comfortably enter their wanted departure and destination.

Problem statement

How can a user tell the system where she wants to depart and where she wants to go to?

Problem description with forces

Users have different requirements on entering route information. Sometimes they have an exact address they want to enter, the other time they want to navigate to a special location on a map and sometimes they are looking for special points of interests like parking lots.So it is important for a navigation or route planning system to provide different input means.

But if there are diverse input means it must be clear to users what the different functions do, when they should be applied and where they can be used.

Examples

Most navigation systems provide several means of entering route information. In SMARTPATH City users can enter departure and destination using

• map selection <LI>a mixture of text entry and list selection (even intersections can be chosen)
• favorite addresses

The different functions can be accessed either using a context menu when clicking in the maps or using the icon for planning a route in the toolbar.

Destinator 2.0 [2]provides even more input means selectable in the menu :

There are several possibilities available to select an address out of a list. Unfortunately those possibilities are confusing, not really necessary and can certainly be merged into one function.

Additional to list selection users can choose destinations using

• intersections
• map selection
• favorites ("Adressbuch")
• points of interest
• contacts
• previously visited locations

SmartST [3] also provides a menu with different option for entering destinations:

This menu contains list selection using

• addresses (text entry)
• intersections
• points of interest
• favorites
• recently visited locations

Solution

Therefore:

Provide versatile and easy to use functions for entering departure and destination of a route.

Versatile means that information can be entered in different ways, e.g.:

• Text entry
• List selection
• Selection from address book
• Selection from favorites
• Map selection
• Selection from Points of interest

Make the functions easy accessible and intuitive to use.

Diagram

References

How the different input means should be designed and what recommendations they have is described in-depth in TEXT ENTRY, LIST SELECTION, ADDRESS BOOK, FAVORITE ADDRESSES, MAP SELECTION and POINTS OF INTEREST.

Literature and Links

1. SMARTPATH City, Version 1.10 (161); http://www.navman-mobile.com/html/city-pc.htm
2. Destinator Version 2.0.06Fx; http://www.destinator.de
3. SmartST Professional; http://www.navman-mobile.com/html/software.htm