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Selected:User InterviewsATAM (Architecture Tradeoff Analysis Method)ARID (Active Reviews for Intermediate Designs)
| Criterion |  UX Research User Interviews |  Architecture ATAM (Architecture Tradeoff Analysis Method) |  Architecture ARID (Active Reviews for Intermediate Designs) |
|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | When teams derive needs only from assumptions and real motives are missing, user interviews give direct access to behavior and meaning. Conversations from the target group's everyday life make patterns, tensions, and open questions solidly visible. | ATAM helps teams weigh architecture decisions when quality goals compete. The team considers business goals, stakeholder expectations, and technical decisions together. The evaluation shows which risks need further investigation. | ARID examines how well developers can work with a technical design. It focuses on a part of the system that can still be revised, between the architecture overview and the detailed specification. |
Complexitydifferent | Low | High | Medium |
Timedifferent | 30–60 min per interview | Several meetings plus preparation and analysis; total effort depends on scope | 2–4 h review as a planning range; preparation and evaluation additional |
Participantsdifferent | 1 participant per interview | Evaluation team, architects, and relevant stakeholders | Designers, developers as users, and facilitation |
Formatsame | Workshop + async | Workshop + async | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Interview Notes, Themes, Insight Summary | Prioritized quality scenarios in a utility tree, Architecture risks with reasoning and assumptions, Sensitivity and trade-off points, Findings report with open investigations | Prioritized development tasks, Jointly produced code or pseudocode, Observed difficulties and open design questions, Proposed design revisions |
Tagsno overlap | QualitativeResearchCustomerDiscovery | ArchitectureQualityRiskTradeoffsStakeholders | ArchitectureEngineeringFeedbackValidationTasks |
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