Naranjo_DTMS_Interface_Analysis and Redesign

RUNNING HEAD: INTERFACE ANALYSIS AND REDESIGN OF DTMS 1

Interface Analysis and Redesign: Digital Training Management System

Fabian A. Naranjo

University of Maryland University College


Table of Contents

Executive Summary ............................................................................................................ 3

1. Analysis..................................................................................................................... 4

1.1 Visibility and System Status .............................................................................. 4

1.2 Match between System and the Real World ...................................................... 8

1.3 User Control and Freedom .............................................................................. 10

1.4 Consistency and Standards .............................................................................. 11

1.5 Error Prevention .............................................................................................. 13

1.6 Recognition Rather than Recall ....................................................................... 13

1.7 Flexibility and Efficiency of Use..................................................................... 13

1.8 Aesthetic and Minimalist Design .................................................................... 15

1.9 Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors ................................ 16

1.10 Help and Documentation ................................................................................. 17

2. Redesign .................................................................................................................. 20

2.1 Visibility and System Status ............................................................................... 20

2.2 User Control and Freedom .................................................................................. 21

References ......................................................................................................................... 25


Executive Summary

The Army Digital Training Management System Lorem (DTMS) links existing systems to create

a single point of data entry for units to schedule unit training, manage training resources, and

create schedules and master calendars for training. The newest version—released in 2015—was

a complete overhaul of the previous version of DTMS, it could be considered a new system

altogether. The DTMS training and live site are both found at https://dtms.army.mil/. The

interface was analyzed against Nielsen’s 10 Usability Heuristics.

The analysis found that DTMS has several shortcomings that violate Nielsen’s Usability

Heuristics. It was found that DTMS fails to provide the user feedback to the loading of screens,

information, and saving of data. Screens at times load halfway with no indication that more

remains to load. Navigation between tasks is lacking, always requiring the user to go back one or

two screens just to navigate to the next task. While it does a good job of preventing user error,

the system does not present error messages in plain language, presenting them in stack traces.

The design begs for a redesign to improve the aesthetics and presentation of valuable information

as many screens display information not important or not in use.

It is recommended that transition animations with messages be added in order to provide the user

with feedback to the systems status. It is also recommended that navigation buttons be added to

the task detail screens to allow users to navigate better. Redundant and irrelevant links that do

not apply to training should be removed. A dashboard type feature should be implemented to the

home screen that allows users to customize the information they say as soon as they log in.

https://dtms.army.mil/


1. Analysis

The Digital Training Management System (DTMS) is the U.S. Army’s web-based

training enabler that allows units to develop training plans and manage Soldiers individual

training records to meet Army requirements. The purpose of DTMS is to link existing systems to

create a single point of data entry for units to schedule unit training, manage training resources,

and create schedules and master calendars for training (Department of Defense, 2015). The

DTMS training and live site are both found at https://dtms.army.mil/. This report will be

presented as an analysis of the DTMS live site against Nielsen’s 10 Usability Heuristics for User

Interface and Design. The 10 heuristics will be applied to the entire interface of DTMS for

analysis, while 2 issues will be selected for the redesign. The 10 heuristics to be applied to

DTMS are:

1. Visibility and system status

2. Match between system and the real world

3. User control and freedom

4. Consistency and standards

5. Error prevention

6. Recognition rather than recall

7. Flexibility and efficiency of use

8. Aesthetic and minimalist design

9. Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors

10. Help and documentation

1.1 Visibility and System Status

There are areas of DTMS that fail to meet this standard. In a properly designed interface,

every action should prompt feedback from the system in reference to what is going on at that

moment. DTMS fails to let the user know when screens are loading and if data has been saved

https://dtms.army.mil/


(see Figure 1 Screen without Feedback. In Figure 1 below, the user is not given any indication

that DTMS is loading the requested interface. This has led to confusion at times, as the user does

not know if the system is frozen, or if the system is pulling up the next page.

Figure 1 Screen without Feedback

Furthermore, in certain cases the screen will be partially loaded, giving the impression

that the text fields are ready for input (see Figure 2 Partially Loaded Interface.

Figure 2 Partially Loaded Interface


The Event Schedule screen above (Figure 2) is only partially loaded, with some text entry

fields missing. However, there are also times when all the text entry fields are loaded except for

the Reoccurring Event and Major Event fields circled in red above. It is very easy to overlook

that they have not loaded and users have been known to begin entering data into the first few

fields. As soon as those two missing fields are loaded, all the information that was typed in

disappears and all the fields are reset to blank (see Figure 3 Loaded Event Schedule Page.

Figure 3 Loaded Event Schedule Page

In addition, there are no save confirmations once data has been entered. The Save button

prompts the screen to refresh and then reappear exactly as it looked before without any

confirmation message that the save was successful. Below is the Event Schedule screen before

the Save button is clicked.


Figure 4 Event Schedule Before Save

Below—Figure 5— is the same screen as Figure 4 after the Save button has been clicked. Notice

there is no feedback from the system that the save was successful.

Figure 5 Event Schedule After Save


1.2 Match between System and the Real World

There is one glaring discrepancy in DTMS language that does not correspond to the real

world of unit training management. In the training manager language, planning future unit

training is referred to as preparing a training schedule for a specified week or month. This

language is used in DTMS but does not have the function to it that makes sense in training

planning. In older versions of DTMS, a user would select the feature prepare a training

schedule, and then input the different tasks to be carried out for each day of the week or month.

It was a straightforward manner of quickly getting the planning of weekly or monthly schedules.

In this version, selecting Training→ Prepare → Training Schedule (see Figure 6 below) from

the menu results in a screen that

allows a user to see monthly

training schedules that have

already been entered into the

system. From that page, you

can submit an already

completed training schedule to

the higher headquarters for

approval (see Figure 7 below). Figure 6 Prepare Training Schedule

In essence, this version of DTMS confuses the preparation of a training schedule to mean

the finalization of a training schedule. In this case, DTMS language does not match the user

language that training managers have used in the past.


Figure 7 Training Schedule Preparation Screen

The action taken in DTMS to plan training schedules is now referred to as scheduling events, a

concept not familiar to the Army

training manager. To get there the user

must select Training→ Plan→

Schedule Event (see Figure 8 left). The

system then presents the Event

Schedule screen where the user inputs

the first task of a desired day.

Figure 8 Plan Schedule Event


1.3 User Control and Freedom

The only methods of navigation of the system are through link clicks or the back and

forward arrows of the browser. This is less than ideal in the situations where pressing the back

arrow does not take you to the previous screen but rather the home screen; or when going to the

next training task requires you go to the previous screen to choose the next task manually (see

Figure 9 below). Undo or redo features are missing in any of the data input interfaces of DTMS;

however, data can be deleted once it has been entered (see Figure 10 below).

Figure 9 Task Input Screen

No navigation arrows for the

next time slot of that day. User

must click on the back arrow of

the web browser or go to home

screen.


Figure 10 Delete Ability

1.4 Consistency and Standards

DTMS is not always consistent in its presentation. For example, there are three different

sets of APFT data that a user can access. However, it is not clear from the navigation links alone

as to what those differences are. Trial and error is required to find the data required.

Clicking here takes you here

Figure 11 APFT Report 1


A novice user would need to be given an appropriate amount of time to get accustomed to the

different nuances and inconsistencies in the system.

Clicking here

takes you here


Clicking here,

then here, takes

you here



1.5 Error Prevention

DTMS does have some error prevention built in. One of those is a logical test that makes

sure task start and end times are chronological and that tasks are not saved without a name (see

Figure 14 below). DTMS does a respectable job of preventing user error.

Figure 14 Error Handling

1.6 Recognition Rather than Recall

The various screens of DTMS are appropriately labeled according to the actions being

taken. The user always knows what screen and function they are in.

1.7 Flexibility and Efficiency of Use

There are two accelerators in DTMS, and both have issues of their own. The first is the

Reoccurring Event feature that allows the user to create a task and tag it to occur repeatedly in

the future, thereby preventing the user from having to input it every time that it occurs. However,


this is limited to daily and weekly, while some tasks occur only once a month or bi-weekly (see

Figure 15 below).

Figure 15 Reoccurring Event

The second accelerator is the Batch Data Transfer feature that allows the user to enter

multiple task and data result information for the unit without having to enter them individually.

The main issue with this one is that it is not internal to DTMS, rather it requires the user to

download a specific excel template from the website, input the values in the spreadsheet, save it,

then upload it into DTMS for batch processing. The process is a convoluted one that even

experienced users may not attempt, as one single character in the wrong field will reject the

entire upload, resulting in time wasted (see Figure 16 below).


Figure 16 Batch Data Entry

1.8 Aesthetic and Minimalist Design

Over half of the homepage is dedicated to an Alert display that is—aside from the DTMS

release notes— of little use to the user. In addition, there is a field called Available Training

Records, which is a total of the personnel in the unit broken up by rank.

Figure 17 Home Screen


The home screen can be utilized in a more effective manner to display more relevant

information, and even better, allow users to customize what information they want the homepage

to display, a customizable dashboard.

Another design aspect that can be streamlined is the amount of tabs that are not used in

the Manage Soldiers screens for users to update soldier information. This option bloat detracts

from the tabs that are important to training and makes it more difficult to locate them (see Figure

18 below).

Figure 18 Manage Soldier Screen

There are vast amounts of tabs in the Figure above that pertain more to human resource

management than to training. Those tabs should be removed to improve the design.

1.9 Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors

DTMS does not display any messages in plain language; they are all shown as stack

traces (see Figure 19 below).


Figure 19 Error Message

1.10 Help and Documentation

Due to the complexity inherent to DTMS, a DTMS knowledge base is linked within the

Help menu. This link takes you to the DTMS portion of the Army Training Network (ATN)

website, which can be found at https://atn.army.mil/dsp_template.aspx?dpID=405. CAC access

is required to access ATN. The knowledge base provides outstanding resources: videos,

PowerPoint tutorials, DTMS user manual, practical exercises, and other information. The only

recommendation to be made is that the DTMS manual is linked separately by chapter; there is no

option to download the entire manual in its entirety. This results in 16 separate pdf files that

make up one manual (see Figures 20 and 21 below).

https://atn.army.mil/dsp_template.aspx?dpID=405


Figure 20 Knowledge Database 1


Figure 21 Knowledge Database 2


2. Redesign

2.1 Visibility and System Status

System feedback will be incorporated into the design in order to inform the user of what

is going on. The first change will be the addition of an hourglass animation that the cursor

becomes to let the user know that the requested page or link is loading.

The next redesign is to add a saved confirmation message after a task is saved in the system.

Figure 22 Loading Prompt Before and After

Figure 23 Saving Prompt Before

Clicking here takes you here …


Figure 24 Save Confirmation

2.2 User Control and Freedom

In order to give the user more control in the navigation of the system and give them faster

access to view and add tasks chronologically, a New Event button will be added to the Training

Schedule screen (see Figures 25 and 26 below).

…And ends here

Figure 25 Training Schedule Before and After


Figure 26 Training Schedule screen after event has been created

In addition, Next and Previous Event buttons will be added to the Event Schedule screen

(see Figures 27 – 28 below).

Figure 27 Training Schedule Overview

Click to go to the

Event detail


Click to go to the

next task

Figure 28 Addition of Navigation Buttons to Schedule Event Screen Before and After

Figure 29 Next Event on Training Schedule


The redesign of navigation within the training schedule function gives the user more

freedom to move from one task (or event) to the next without having to go back to the Training

Schedule screen to click on the event detail (circled below).


References

Department of Defense. (2015). DTMS User Manual. Retrieved from

https://atn.army.mil/dsp_template.aspx?dpID=405

Naranjo_DTMS_Interface_Analysis and Redesign

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