Guidelines for Designing and Evaluating In-Vehicle Navigation Devices: A Preliminary Study Of Their Usage And Value

More than a dozen design and evaluation guidelines exist for in-vehicle navigation devices, and are used in areas ranging from manufacturing to government policymaking. Currently, there is no central body of knowledge or one complete set of guidelines to help guide users in designing and evaluating safe, usable and ergonomic devices. To understand the value of the current guidelines, an online survey was constructed to evaluate users' knowledge, use and opinions.

Results from the survey show that respondents found many guidelines to be impractical, difficult to apply, and irrelevant to their work. While guidelines from UMTRI, Transport Canada and SAE were considered the most useful, many participants were unfamiliar with them. Engineers, designers and researchers indicate that guidelines are incomplete, not up-to-date, and don't address all of the issues arising in designing and evaluating in-vehicle navigation devices.