ABSTRACT
User experience is an important factor when building a software.
This experience aims to meet the needs of its users, allowing a good
interaction with the product. Software solutions with good user
experiences can improve the motivation to access the system when
the user is the centerpiece in the design of the software product
to be developed. Therefore, the importance of knowing the user
in the process of developing a product or service is necessary because
there are gaps in this understanding, which may be related
to lack of knowledge of users expectations, requirements poorly
defined and failures in communication between those involved in
this process. The objective of this research is to propose a methodology
to support software designers to obtain a better knowledge
about the user, their needs and experiences before modeling them
in software functionalities as support in the systems development
process. The methodology developed was applied in the context
of the covid-19 pandemic with the aim of obtaining a better understanding
of the needs of the Russas citizens during the social
isolation that took place in 2020. This methodology is based on
the activities of the Design Thinking (DT) process that provides
a mechanism for understanding potential customers, producing
quick and simple prototypes that converge to innovative solutions.
The results of applying the methodology are the characterization
of the users (three personas were specified), the description of the
interaction scenarios (three storyboards) and the specification of
the main functionalities of a software solution more appropriate for
the needs of the city Russas community in the analyzed pandemic
situation.