UCD Project News Edition 15, October 27, 2003
UCD Project News is a fortnightly e-newsletter devoted to increasing
awareness of user-centred design (UCD) principles and contributing
towards a culture of UCD within the Smart Internet Technology CRC.
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In this issue:
1. Supriya: Reflecting on UCD Achievments
2. UCD Researchers “Play” in Virtual Café
3. Access Grid Update
4. Upcoming Conferences & Calls for Papers
5. Useful Links & References
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1. Supriya: Reflecting on UCD Achievements
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All of us have been pre-occupied with the detail of the proposals
for the Research Advisory Committee this Tuesday and Wednesday.
The process of reaching joint understandings within our group has
been reinvigorating. But after reading the listing of milestones
and outcomes, Trevor Barr, the UE program manager, warned that at
the presentation, I would be asked what we have achieved.
The dot points are there, and we are pleased to show we have real
and potential links with ten technology and demonstrator projects.
Nine peer review papers have been submitted or accepted. Our areas
of user research are expanding. As our linkages increase, we are
reflecting on them methodologically. But Trevor’s question
was a good one. In trying to answer it, I thought our real achievement
cannot be caught in a dot point. The real achievement is that when
people in SITCRC talk of design, users are in the picture. Thinking
of technology design and users goes together more frequently than
it used to.
We in the UCD team have changed too by being in the conversation
about the design of technologies. We are translating the technology
and demonstrator projects so that they say something to people about
their activities in social and cultural contexts. In the process,
we can articulate what we do not understand. The process of working
it out together involves a translation by both sides – us
putting user insights into design language and the technologists
telling us why the technology will matter to people in their everyday
life. It is the thought of such continuing conversations that has
kept our team excited.
Supriya
Assoc Prof Supriya Singh,
Project Leader
supriya.singh@rmit.edu.au
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2. UCD Researchers “Play” in Virtual Café
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At the Smart Internet CRC conference the Smart Networks Program
gave a poster session and demonstrated demo software of the very
first version of the Virtual Cafe. According to Mike Rumsewicz who
is a senior research fellow on the Project from the University of
Adelaide, "It's a fairly simple demonstration to look at, primarily
aimed at giving us experience in the sort of software development
required to support audio functionality and distributed processing.
Jeremy McMahon, who did all of the development work, has done a
terrific job of getting together a stable and robust package in
a relatively short period of time.”
Members of the UCD Project were invited to try out the Virtual Café
demo, have a bit of a play, and provide the SN team with some feedback.
After a tentative start, those who took up the challenge were able
to use the software to enter and move around the Virtual Café
and speak with each other using microphones and headphones. Not
only was it really exciting to see the early stages of the application
in action, but it also provided the team with food for thought regarding
possible ways in which it could be improved from a user perspective.
The UCD team is looking forward to experiencing the next version
of the Virtual Cafe and providing useful input into the design process.
Our thanks to Mike for letting us play!
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3. Access Grid Update
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Recently some of the CRC PhD students had another chance to use
the latest version of the Access Grid collaboration suite on the
GrangeNet node at RMIT. GrangeNet is a high-speed experimental network
that runs between Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra, and Brisbane at speeds
of up to 1000 times that of an average office network. There are
also high-speed links out of Sydney that connect it with other experimental
international high-speed networks via Aarnet2. The Access Grid software
is a suite of applications designed to allow video conferencing
and collaboration across high-speed networks such as this.
The students connected to the conference room at the SIT CRC office
at the Australian Technology Park. As the RMIT GrangeNet node is
now running at full speed in multi-cast mode, the experience was
far more enjoyable than the students’ last attempt at using
the system. They were also able to resolve the sound problems, which
reduced the audio quality of the last session. As a result, this
session went very smoothly and the students were able to talk and
interact with those on the other end quite easily.
However, while the experience was better overall, one of the students
commented that it was still a little like using Microsoft NetMeeting,
except there is the potential to talk simultaneously to people at
a number of other sites. In light of this, one of the ongoing challenges
for the CRC is to develop other applications that can run on top
of the network to move beyond “video conferencing on steroids.”
This would be a good opportunity for the CRC and there needs to
be broad ranging discussions about what the possibilities might
be.
There have been some precedents set in the US as part of the Internet2
project, which is the US equivalent of GrangeNet. Some of the more
interesting applications have been developed as part of the tele-immersion
initiative, such as the “tele-cubicle” which provides
immersive video presence and concepts such as shared virtual objects
that users can control. There are of course many other possibilities,
and our understanding of the important applications will only emerge
over time. However it is crucial that we understand which applications
are significant now, as these high-speed networks will become increasingly
common in the next decade as they move towards becoming mainstream
technologies.
Michael Coburn
PhD Student, RMIT
Links:
http://www.grangenet.net/
http://www.accessgrid.org/
http://www.aarnet.edu.au/
http://www.internet2.edu/
http://www.advanced.org/teleimmersion.html
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3. Upcoming Conferences & Calls for Papers
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* ATNAC 2003
The Australian Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference
(ATNAC) will be held in the Sheraton Towers Southgate, Melbourne,
Australia on 8 - 10 December 2003. The conference provides a forum
for Australian and international researchers in Telecommunications,
Networking and Applications to meet and exchange ideas on current
issues in telecommunications research and industry. The focus of
this year’s conference will be Development in Industry, Mobile
Communications and Networking.
ATNAC 2003 is being organised by a consortium from the Telstra Research
Laboratories, the University of Melbourne and the Australian Telecommunications
Cooperative Research Centre.
Plenary speakers will include; Mel Slater from NICTA, Hugh Bradlow
from Telstra Research Laboratories, Richard Dennis from BT Exact,
Rod Tucker from CUBIN and Paul Kuehn from Stuttgard University,
Germany. Tutorials in a variety of wireless and networking technologies
will be run on Sunday, 7 December.
For further information, please visit: http://atnac2003.atcrc.com
or email: atnac@atcrc.com
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* Effective Design with Users in Mind
Two workshops, by local and international experts, on the fundamentals
of usability design and evaluation will be hosted by The Interaction
Design Group, Department of Information Systems, The University
of Melbourne, Parkville. The workshops are intended for people involved
in user interface design. They are not intended for usability specialists
or people who have completed coursework study in human computer
interaction or interaction design.
Day 1 - 11 Nov 2003, 9am-5pm
"Cognitive Factors in Design: Basic Human Memory and Problem
Solving"
Conducted by: Thomas T Hewett (Drexel University, USA & visiting
Professor, Creativity and Cognition Research Studios, Faculty of
IT, University of Technology Sydney)
Day 2 - 12 Nov 2003, 9am-5pm
"Usability Evaluation: An Introduction to What, Why and How
to"
Conducted by: Sandrine Balbo, Steve Goschnick, Steve Howard, Frank
Vetere (The University of Melbourne) & John Murphy (Novell)
For further information, please visit: http://idealab.dis.unimelb.edu.au/tutorial/
or email James Morrison: jamesmm@unimelb.edu.au
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* CONTEXTUAL INVENTION '03
Contextual Invention 2003 is a maiden conference which plans to
bring cultural, design and technology experts from around the world
to discuss how they apply multi?disciplinary research in developing
new ICT?based (information and communication technology) business
opportunities. The inaugural meeting will be held from 9.30-5.30pm
on November 6, 2003 in Bangalore, India. It will focus on development
and innovation for the emerging markets.
Contextual Invention is an extension of contextual design, which
seeks to define new product requirements from an understanding of
the social and cultural contexts of use. In this extension, ethnographic
research is used as the driver for related activities in market
and business research, design envisioning, and technological invention.
Such extensions are required to develop design ethnographies into
innovative new business proposals.
For further information, please visit: http://www.kestoneresearch.com/ci2003/
Or email: ci2003@kestoneresearch.com
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4. Useful Links and References
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* Jan Gulliksen, Ann Lantz, and Inger Boivie, (1999) “User
Centered Design in Practice Problems and Possibilities, Centre for
User Oriented IT Design, Stokholm, Sweden
Project leaders and managers in France give lip service to the idea
of participatory design. Books such as Psychology of Everyday Things
(Norman, 1988) have influenced both industry and academia. However,
in practice, users are often left out. Why is it so hard to involve
users? Participatory design involves more than just designers and
users; it must also include human factors experts and managers as
well. This paper explores gaps between theory and practice based
on my experience with two industrial participatory design settings.
It examines how the different prejudices, competencies and goals
affect participatory design projects.
http://www.nada.kth.se/cid/pdf/cid_40.pdf
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* What Works Case Study: Vodacom's Community Services Phone Shops,
Digital Dividend Digest Vol. 31, October 15, 2003.
The third in a series of "What Works" case studies, the
Vodacom case study focuses on the success of the Community Services
model of providing cellular telephony to underserved populations
in South Africa. The shared access initiative has proven not only
profitable for Vodacom but for thousands of entrepreneur-owners
of local phone shops while providing low cost telephone access to
low-income rural and urban residents.
The executive summary is available at: http://www.digitaldividend.org/case/case_vodacom.htm
The entire case study (PDF) is available at: http://www.digitaldividend.org/pdf/vodacom.pdf
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* Mauricio S. Featherman, and Paul A. Pavlou (2003), Predicting
E-Services Adoption: A Perceived Risk Facets Perspective, International
Journal of Human-Computer Studies, Special Issue on HCI and MIS,
59(4), pp 397-522 (October 2003)
Internet-delivered e-services are increasingly being made available
to consumers; however, little is known about how consumers evaluate
them for potential adoption. Past Technology Adoption Research has
focused primarily on the positive utility gains attributable to
system adoption. This research extends that approach to include
measures of negative utility (potential losses) attributable to
e-service adoption. Drawing from Perceived Risk Theory, specific
risk facets were operationalized, integrated, and empirically tested
within the Technology Acceptance Model resulting in a proposed e-services
adoption model. Results indicated that e-services adoption is adversely
affected primarily by performance-based risk perceptions, and perceived
ease of use of the e-service reduced these risk concerns. Implications
of integrating perceived risk into the proposed e-services adoption
model are discussed.
http://melody.syr.edu/hci/ijhcs03/Featherman.pdf
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* Fabio Paterno (2003) Understanding interaction with mobile devices,
Editorial Interacting with Computers 15(4) (1 August 2003), pp 473-478
This editorial paper introduces an emerging and important area for
human–computer interaction research, which concerns interaction
with mobile devices. The design of interactive mobile applications
should differ from that of traditional desktop applications. To
this aim, the paper discusses some concepts and models that help
to understand the new challenges as well as recently introduced
techniques that can be useful for exploiting the characteristics
of these devices. Lastly, tool support for the design of nomadic
applications is considered, taking into account the potential contexts
of use, with particular attention to the platform features.
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