Navigation and choice

Interfaces that allow users to navigate options have been integral components of the television experience for as long as there has been more than one broadcast television station. With digital broadcast, internet connectivity and ever more capable TV sets and STBs, the amount of choice available to users has increased dramatically (e.g., channels, apps and VOD programmes). Without proper design the process of searching for and choosing the best option may be off-putting for users, leading them to settle for less desirable choices or avoid using these features at all. The navigation of options has long been a problem for interface designers working on PCs. As these technologies have converged, common features of PC interfaces have been applied to the television problem space. Within current television interfaces, menu and search-based interfaces are now commonplace.

Menus are a long-standing feature of GUIs to such a degree that Norman (2008, p. 556) remarked:

“if Shakespeare could write “all the world is a stage,” an interface designer could point to the computer screen and say “all the interface is a menu.””

With the convergence of television and computing technologies, this is now also true of television interfaces. Within television systems, menus facilitate programme selection (for viewing or recording), selection of service applications on connected devices, navigation of interactive content options, and the configuring of device options. As the number of options increases, so does the prevalence of the menu.

The reasons for the initial popularity of menu systems becomes clear when comparing them to the alternative, command-based interfaces. Norman (1991) pointed out that menus present options to users, reducing the amount of training required and allowing them to be used by both novice and expert users. He contrasted this to command-based interfaces, which provide little information to assist users and therefore require a greater amount of training before use. Menus can take many different forms depending on the options that they represent. Norman (1991) outlines multiple different types of menus, the simplest of which is a stand-alone one-dimensional list of options, or single menus, while more complex multi-level variations impose some structure on the options. The hierarchical menus are the most extreme form of this structuring where users navigate through a tree-like structure, refining choices as they move down a specific branch (Norman, 1991).

(a) (b)

Figure 2.2: Representation of hierarchical menu navigation (black arrows and items indicate the route): a) manual navigation of menu structure, b) navigation when a search function has been used to narrow results

et al. (1985) described five categories: scanning—navigating across many items paying little attention to the details of specific items, browsing—moving though options without any specific target until something is considered interesting, searching—navigation motivated to find a specific item, exploring—navigation through different parts of the menu structure to see the range of options available, and wandering—navigation in an unstructured fashion revisiting the same options. Search functions and natural language interfaces offer alternatives to menu interfaces. Depending on the sophistication of the implementation, these systems can help to reduce the need for users to remember specific commands or work out the exact location of desired options. These interfaces, however, only fully offer an alternative for users undertaking the behaviour referred to by Canter et al. (1985) as searching tasks. In these scenarios, a user has a strongly defined idea of a target. This means that, using well specified search terms, users can navigate directly to the desired option without any additional choices. In all of the other navigation behaviours described by Canter et al. (1985), these services will not completely circumvent the need for some menu navigation. Where the target of an item is either not, or is only partially defined, search functions may reduce the number of options that will be returned. Search functions can, therefore, be seen as a shortcut for traversing part of the menu structure. They do not remove the problem of menu representations within displays — at best they serve to allow accelerated navigation to the lower levels in the structures (see Figure 2.2) and at worst they limit exploration and discovery of new content.

Connected television systems may feature many types of menus, each with their own specific design considerations. With the ability to download applications on televisions offering a diverse range of experiences, there may be any number of different menus featured within

(a)Utility (b)Service selection

(c) Programme selection

Figure 2.3: Examples of the different menu types on a Samsung UE32F5000 and Samsung BD-F6500 Blu-Ray player

third-party applications. There are, however, a few basic types which seem to be fundamental to connected television systems. Utility menus are those which present general configuration options such as picture settings and network connection settings (see Figure 2.3a). These are likely to be used fairly infrequently in the majority of cases, when first setting up the television in a new location. This means that on each use it is not possible to assume that users will have a strong memory of the menus contents or its structure. These menus are likely to be comparatively small. The items and their structure will generally remain constant, though occasional software updates may lead to slight variations.

Service selection menus offer users choices between different applications available on the connected television (see Figure 2.3b). These may be core applications provided as part of the television/STB operating system (OS) or third-party applications (e.g., VOD services and games). These menus are likely to be commonly used when users are switching between applications. They comprise a few options that remain fairly constant. In some cases, users may download additional applications. Even when this is the case, these additions will be infrequent.

content to view or record (see Figure 2.3c). This menu differs considerably from the other two types. This category includes both the electronic programme guides (EPGs) used to navigate between broadcast channels and VOD selection interfaces. The content in these menus is likely to change regularly and offers a vast choice. Consider, for example an EPG, in some cases there are hundreds of channels to choose between, each offering different content throughout the day. Of the three categories of television menus discussed here, this type will see by far the heaviest use. In traditional digital television, unless a user wants to flick between individual channels or knows the number of a desired channel, they must traverse the EPG each time they want to select a new programme to watch. With VOD services, some form of programme selection menu must be navigated every time the user wishes to watch a different title.

Programme selection may display information regarding the duration, title, genre, time of broadcast and a synopsis. While it is likely that the majority of users will have a reasonably well defined target during utility and service selection menu navigation, this is not the case with programme selection menus. With EPGs it is common for users not to know exactly what programme or channel they wish to watch and instead have personal selection criteria, depending on the context (e.g., who they are viewing with, time restrictions, mood) (Elsweiler et al., 2010). With this in mind, it is important that any display presents information regarding these factors so that users can decide what content best satisfies their needs. With the uptake of IP content delivery OTT services are using web technologies (e.g., HTML5, and JavaScript) to create their programme selection interfaces. These can dynamically update, so that users are presented with different options on each visit, and respond to user interactions. For example, while entering a search term the displayed options may update for each added letter, converging on the desired subset.

A difficult-to-use utility menu is likely to have minimal effect on most of a user’s television experiences, so long as they are still able to eventually locate and access the desired function. Due to the more regular use of service and programme selection menus, the ease with which they may be traversed will have a much larger impact on a user’s experience of watching television. With the increasing amount of content available on televisions from an assortment of broadcast channels and online video services offered by a plethora of different companies, the user has a seemingly endless set of options to choose from. If the display is too slow or difficult to use, users may be put off fully exploring available options and miss out on content which they would have otherwise been interested in.