In systems design, user analysis is the means by which scientists, engineers and technical writers determine the characteristics of users which will influence the development of software systems or other technological products. During the process, developers in technical fields gather information about users of their products though interviews, focus groups and other forms of qualitative research. This is typically performed by forming use cases based upon the actual work flow tasks which the users will perform while using a given piece of technology. Such analyses are vital to the composition of software documentation.
Though very distinct, user analysis is related to task analysis.
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