Designing Dialogue: An intro to voice design

A new frontier is opening up in UX design: voice! Products like Amazon's Echo and Google Home offer designers a new place to play, and new skills to learn. In this short introduction, you’ll learn about the design process and learn some fundamental principles. You'll see just how different the design methods are, and how to conduct 'Wizard of Oz' testing.

Transcript

1. DESIGNING DIALOGUE: 
 AN INTRO TO VUI DESIGN @bensauer UX IN THE CITY, MANCHESTER, MAY 2017
2. ARISTOTLE There is only one condition in which we can imagine managers not needing subordinates, and masters not needing slaves. This condition would be that each instrument could do its own work, at the word of command or by intelligent anticipation. @bensauer
4. Curious Rituals produced by The Near Future Laboratory
6. Curious Rituals produced by The Near Future Laboratory
7. • Limited shared vocabulary • Poor skills / co-ordination • No capacity to learn • Never sure job will get done • Turns you into the a$$h0le Using VUI is a bit like dealing with Manuel…
8. https://www.flickr.com/photos/cryptik/23815673664 @bensauer ?
9. Our true calling is to make 
 the system fail gracefully.
10. REALITIES OF VUI
11. VUI is deceptively limited. @bensauer
12. @bensauer VUI USE MAY BE U-SHAPED @bensauer AWESOME SUCKS 10 100 ∞ USE CASES
14. Platforms limit possibilities. @bensauer
15. Transactions over conversations. @bensauer
16. The context of use 
 is everything.
17. WHAT IS CONVERSATION?
18. Context Language Exchange Agreement Transaction / Action
19. from Paul Pangaro's ‘Conversation is more than interface’ https://vimeo.com/207866146
20. WHAT’S DIFFERENT ABOUT VUI DESIGN?
21. Recall over recognition.
22. The first expression 
 is the goal.
23. GUI VUI THE USER JOURNEY
24. The medium you design in
 is not the medium you experience. @bensauer
25. Shorter ‘Time to Test’.
26. A.I. is getting better at understanding so that 
 we don’t have to.
27. The heart of VUI is great writing. @bensauer
28. WHAT’S THE PROCESS?
29. @bensauer 0. DOES THE CONTEXT WORK? • Hands • Eyes • Voice • Ears
30. @bensauer 0. CONTEXT 1. DEFINE YOUR PERSONA • Who is your system? • What’s the personality, the brand? • What are their characteristics or attributes? • What’s the tone of voice? • What would it say, or not say?
31. @bensauer 0. CONTEXT 1. PERSONA 2. WRITE SAMPLE DIALOGUE • What’s the scenario? • How would you improvise it? • What’s the expected exchange? • How does the system respond? • What’s too much, or too little?
33. UTTERANCE • What the user says when it’s their turn; e.g. a whole sentence or a response. • These are what you collect in research and testing. 
 UTTERANCE “Order me some glow-in-the-dark toilet paper.”
34. 
 
 “Order me a Nintendo Switch.” INTENT • An abstraction of what the user intended, based on their words. • These map to your system’s API hooks. • Systems are getting better at spotting these so we don’t have to. INTENT: Buy Product
35. 
 
 “Set a timer for 30 seconds.” VARIABLE • Information that accompanies the intent. • Often the stuff your VUI is trying to get from the user to complete their request. VARIABLE: Timer Duration
36. @bensauer 0. CONTEXT 2. SAMPLE DIALOGUE 1. PERSONA 3. WIZARD OF OZ TESTING • Can they use it? • Do they understand it? • What synonyms do they use? • Do they hesitate?
37. WIZARD OF OZ DEMO
38. TEST YOUR VUI IDEA IN 1HR WIZARD OF OZ TESTING • Write sample dialogue • Load it into a plain text file • Offer some participants pizza • Run a test using ‘Say Wizard’ on a mac https://chatbotsmagazine.com/stfu-test-your-voice-app-idea-in-less-than-an-hour-2638cdff2503
39. @bensauer 0. CONTEXT 2. SAMPLE DIALOGUE 3. TESTING 1. PERSONA 4. DIALOGUE FLOW • What are the user journeys? • What are the entry points? • What are the system states? • What happens if the input is unexpected?
40. Intent BOOKING A CAB: FLOW Location Check Recover Confirm booking Time Check Time Check Confirm Location
41. @bensauer 0. CONTEXT 2. SAMPLE DIALOGUE 3. TESTING 4. FLOW 1. PERSONA 5. BUILD AND TEST • What is the complete dialogue? • How can you avoid dialogue repetition? • What’s the error rate at scale?
42. VUI PRINCIPLES
43. Always be capturing.
44. CAPTURING WHAT PEOPLE SAY
49. Find out the things they need 
 in the things they say. WHAT 
 PEOPLE
 SAY WHAT
 THEY 
 NEED
50. Postel’s Law Be conservative in what you send, be liberal in what you accept. @bensauer
51. I’d really like to visit Llanfairpwllgwyngyll- gogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch. @bensauer USER: In North Wales? ALEXA:
52. Design for mundane realities.
53. Pair Bluetooth!!!! @bensauer HEAVILY ACCENTED USER FOR THE 3RD TIME: I’m really sorry, I still don’t understand. Can I suggest using the Alexa app instead? ALEXA:
54. Considerate confirmation.
55. Did you mean Odeon, Brighton? @bensauer SYSTEM HAS 50% CONFIDENCE: When would you like to go to 
 the Odeon Brighton? IMPLICIT: <Lights switch on> NONE:
56. Human, but not *too* human.
58. RESOURCES • Cathy Pearl’s VUI book • Wizard of Oz Testing:
 https://chatbotsmagazine.com/stfu-test-your- voice-app-idea-in-less-than-an- hour-2638cdff2503 • Say Wizard:
 https://github.com/bensauer/saywizard
59. MARC WEISER “The most profound technologies are those that disappear. They weave themselves into the fabric of everyday life until they are indistinguishable from it.” @bensauer
60. I’m @bensauer.
 (as in ‘Jack Bauer’.) “AUDIENCE. thanks for listening.” Read more of my nonsense at: http://slapdashery.org