Please tell us your objectives in developing application software this year. Mochizuki: We set a goal "to pursue easy to follow and easy to operate input/output workflow". We put the input and output menus together, which was separated before, and made one menu called "Solution Menu" to be able to call up both printing and scanning functions from the same menu. When you start up your PC, the launcher called "Solution Menu" will be activated, and you can access to both printer and scanner menus.

Can users access to various applications easily with this software? Mochizuki: Sure! Application software became useful with various functions these days, on the other hand, users sometimes find difficult to follow with all those menus. This "Solution menu" works as a start point. When you are stuck in the middle of the operation, you can always go back to the "Solution menu" and start again from there. Also, there is a window underneath menu buttons. When you roll over the mouse on the menu items, the explanation what you can do with that item will appear on the window. Also, there are buttons to link you to the on-screen manual, products information and so on. I think the "Solution menu" can be useful as a function guide, too.

I assume you want your users to place "Solution Menu" on their desktop all the time. Mochizuki: Yes, I hope so. When you install application software, the "Solution Menu" will be displayed on the desktop without any settings. The display size is changeable, so if the display is bigger than you want, you can select display mode "Small" and put it on the corner of your desktop. It's really convenient. Actually, I'm using "Small" mode on my PC, too.

Were there requests from users behind the introduction of "Solution Menu"? Mochizuki: Yes, there were. Some users said it would be easier to use if interfaces for printing and scanning are similar look, and some others said it became difficult to reach the action what they want to do because of the various kinds of functions in the application. Considering those opinions, we worked on creating more easy-to-follow input/output workflow by integrating two user interfaces, and making new menu display to guide to each function users desired to use.