The decade of the Sixties served to introduce most university campuses to the computer; the Seventies brought the computer, via a terminal, into every facet of university life. Computing in the Eighties will cause every university and college to evaluate and reconsider its exploitation of modern computing equipment for education and research.For example, at Northwestern University, it was recognized that continued growth in timesharing would be a major factor in computing at NU in the 1980s and that this growth would come from a large community of new users and of casual users. In January 1980, the Computing Center began a long-range planning study. A five-year equipment enhancement and replacement plan was to be developed which was intended to reverse an unsatisfactory trend toward computer saturation, to further improve and modernize our computer offerings, and to ensure that NU remained on a path of excellence in computing. Since time-sharing had already increased to over 50% of the total usage of the computer, a decision was made to begin the evaluation of modern timesharing systems, with special emphasis in two areas: 1) efficiency and reliability, and 2) the user interface.This paper describes the processes which were developed and used for the evaluation of the user interface, or as it came to be known, the "friendliness" study [1].

Abstract A surprising difference is found in the acceptance of on‐line bibliographic search between university research workers and students in the classroom. The typical research worker, even after careful preparation and individual help, abandons the on‐line system in favor of more traditional searching techniques. The student and the seminar participant, on the other hand, take to this new tool with enthusiasm and profit. Bibliographic data bases in physics, astronomy and urban systems are available to users through on‐line access to the Remote Information Query System (RIQS). Examples of introductory on‐line sessions are presented and a report of one of the professors participating is included.