Abstract
This paper is concerned with the scaleable and systematic analysis of interactive systems. The motivating problem is the procurement of medical devices. In such situations several different manufacturers offer solutions that support a particular clinical activity. Apart from cost, which is a dominating factor, the variations between devices are relatively subtle and the consequences of particular design features are not clear from manufacturers' manuals, demonstrations or trial uses. Despite their subtlety these differences can be important to the safety and usability of the device. The paper argues that formal analysis of the range of offered devices can provide a systematic means of comparison. The paper also explores barriers to the use of such techniques, demonstrating how layers of specification may be used to make it possible to reuse common specification. Infusion pumps provide a motivating example. A specific model is described and analysed and comparison between competitive devices is discussed. © Formal Methods for Interactive Systems 2011.

Abstract
The usability analysis of information systems has been the target of several research studies over the past thirty years. These studies have highlighted a great diversity of points of view, including researchers from different scientific areas such as Ergonomics, Computer Science, Design and Education. Within the domain of information ergonomics, the study of tools and methods used for usability evaluation dedicated to E-learning presents evidence that there is a continuous and dynamic evolution of E-learning systems, in many different contexts -academics and corporative. These systems, also known as LMS (Learning Management Systems), can be classified according to their educational goals and their technological features. However, in these systems the usability issues are related with the relationship/interactions between user and system in the user's context. This review is a synthesis of research project about Information Ergonomics and embraces three dimensions, namely the methods, models and frameworks that have been applied to evaluate LMS. The study also includes the main usability criteria and heuristics used. The obtained results show a notorious change in the paradigms of usability, with which it will be possible to discuss about the studies carried out by different researchers that were focused on usability ergonomic principles aimed at E-learning.

Abstract
This paper presents a new approach in plant modeling for the formal verification of real time systems. A system composed by two tanks is used, where all its components are modeled by simple modules and all the interdependences of the system's modular models are presented. As innovating parameters in the plant modeling, having as purpose its use on formal verification tasks, the plant is modeled using Dymola software and Modelica programming language. The results obtained in simulation are used to define the plant models that are used for the formal verification tasks, using the model-checker UPPAAL. The paper presents, in a more detailed way, the part of this work that is related to formal verification, being pointing out the used plant modeling approach. © 2007 IFAC.

Abstract

Abstract
Internet accessibility for the visually impaired community is still an open issue. Guidelines have been issued by the W3C consortium to help web designers to improve web site accessibility. However several studies show that a significant percentage of web page creators are still ignoring the proposed guidelines. Several tools are now available, general purpose, or web specific, to help visually impaired readers. But is reading a web page enough? Regular sighted users are able to scan a web page for a particular piece of information at high speeds. Shouldn't visually impaired readers have the same chance? This paper discusses some features already implemented to improve accessibility and presents a user feedback report regarding the AudioBrowser, a talking browser. Based on the user feedback the paper also suggests some avenues for future work in order to make talking browsers and screen readers compatible.

Abstract
The quality of an interactive system can be measured in terms of its usability. Empirical approaches to usability evaluation attempt to assess the system under real usage conditions. This type of approach can be very expensive. Analytical approaches have been proposed as a means of reasoning about usability issues from early in development. These approaches use models to focus the analysis in specific usuability issues. In this context, the aplication of (mathematically) formal notations and tools has been proposed. This paper presents a formal approach to the analysis of interactive systems. The analysis can be carried out taking into account all possible behaviours of the device, or it can be guided by the tasks the device is supposed to support.