ABSTRACT
Reducing search time for computer menu displays and other VDU work has considerable value in terms of potential financial savings. The energy saving potential of human-computer interaction (HCI) is perhaps exemplified by Tullis’ (1983) report that employees of a single insurance company will view over 4.8 million displays per year. Employees in the Bell System using only one particular software package will extract information from over 344 million displays per year. The reduction of only a fraction of a second in the time it takes users to process each display could lead to large savings in both time and money. Tullis further estimates that 55 labour-years can be saved by accomplishing just a one second reduction in the time which workers spend analysing information on each screen of a computerised service system accessed in a particular year.
