Is ACI a subset of HCI?

Received this conference announcement and could not resist sharing with the group (sorry it has been so long since my last note).  It does reflect how ubiquitous intelligent devices are and how they will affect interaction with other species.  I would be interested in your comments and whether there is a place for an app store for pet owners.  If you have heard of the app Yo, why not Woof or Meow!  Actually Yo has a practical side - check out this:  http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2014/07/15/Yo-app-being-used-to-alert-Israelis-of-Hamas-rocket-attacks/6801405450267/?spt=hts&or=6 - it is being used to alert Israelis to rocket attacks.

Later,

   --Gregg



ACI’14 - Animal-Computer Interaction: Pushing Boundaries beyond ‘Human’

Workshop, NordiCHI’14, 27th October 2014, Helsinki
http://nordichi2014.org/submissions/workshops-participants/ws16/
http://www9.open.ac.uk/ACI2014


CALL FOR PAPERS
An increasing body of work originating from within the HCI community is shaping the emerging discipline of Animal-Computer Interaction (ACI), aiming to: study the interaction between animals, technology and humans in naturalistic settings; develop user-centered technology that supports animals and interspecies relationships; inform user-centered approaches to the design of technology intended for animals.
The ACI’14 workshop aims to bring together researchers who have worked in areas relate to or are interested in ACI, from within HCI or other relevant disciplines. Through a range of collaborative activities (including short presentations, group design exercises and plenary discussions) the workshop will explore issues relevant to ACI, for example in relation to accessibility, methodology and ethics.
We invite position papers - up to four pages in ACM extended abstract format - on theories, applications and practices related, for example, to: interaction modalities for diverse sensorial apparatuses, cognitive capabilities, and ergonomic characteristics; methodologies potentially useful for researching, designing or evaluating multispecies technology; ethical frameworks and approaches possibly appropriate for working with humans and other animals. Email submissions to: Clara.Mancini@open.ac.uk

IMPORTANT DATES
Deadline for workshop papers: August 14, 2014
Notifications of acceptance: September 11, 2014
Workshop dates: October 27, 2014

ORGANISING COMMITTEE
Clara Mancini, The Open University
Oskar Juhlin, Stockholm University
Adrian David Cheock, City University London
Janet van der Linden, The Open University
Shaun Lawson, University of Lincoln


For more information about NordiCHI’14 workshops:
http://nordichi2014.org/submissions/workshops-participants/

-- The Open University is incorporated by Royal Charter (RC 000391), an exempt charity in England & Wales and a charity registered in Scotland (SC 038302). The Open University is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority.
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EMTM

I have been teaching courses for an Executive Master's in Technology Management at the University of Pennsylvania, EMTM, since 2004.  This is the last year of the program and I decided to provide all my class notes on the web.  They can be found at my personal web site.  I hope you find it useful.

Some statistics from my involvement int he program: taught 26 trimesters involving 126, 3 hour lectures.

I hope you enjoy the material.  More posts soon, I have a backlog finally.  Later!

Using User Stories

Seems like I spend considerable time each week working on user stories either for work or for class.  One of my students, Pradnya Agarwal, suggested this article http://www.scrumalliance.org/community/articles/2010/april/new-to-user-stories.

Although the article tries to make user stories more complex than they should be, it is a great discussion of them and does start a debate on what should and should not be included and why.

More coming now that I have some time to think.  Also heating up my soldering iron to attack some of the kickstarter kits I received.  More here or on the aging hacker chronicles   Later!

Killer UX Design

I just got finished reading Killer UX Design by Jodie Moule.  (Please note that O'Reilly provided a copy of this for free through their review program, which I recommend by the way.)  The book has several features that make it ideal for someone who is interested in usability or has been doing it for a few years.  What is unique about this book is that it provides a very comprehensive case study and weaves it into a thorough usability process.  This book is a great complement for more encyclopedic books such as Designing the User Interface or User Interface Design and Evaluation.  At the end an app, cook,  is produced and I actually downloaded it from Apple's app store. 

The book takes the reader through the process using the app to illustrate the steps in the process: Research, Insight, Concept and Design.  Throughout she provides sage advice on when to delve deeper and when to let it go.  She also focuses on behavior and behavior change.  A quote from page 125:

Based on what we know about the users and the environment, what does a [new way of living and behaving] look like?

This illustrates the constant strong emphasis on behavior change and not just cranking out an app.  The book is lavishly illustrated and I do recommend it highly especially for folks interested in usability or in their early years.  Do not get it if you want a comprehensive survey of Usability.  Do get it if after reading the comprehensive books listed above you want to then actually focus on usability in your next project.

Bottom line is that I do highly recommend it.  In fact, I am going to use it in my HCI class in 2014.
It has been a while sicn eI posted on this site, hope to do better!  Later,

Python Definitely or Fruit Pi, Clouds and a Snake!

Okay, so maybe I went overboard on the title!  If you are interested in effectively using the Raspberry Pi and also working with admin on the open source cloud software,  OpenStack, one of the best languages to use is python.  Even if you are not interested in clouds or raspberry pi's, python is just a blast to use, so long as you pay attention to white space.  I am brushing up on my python and was pleasantly surprised when I supported a kickstarter  on a python course.  Real Python and Real Python on the web are superb courses.  The style quickly whisks you through the knowledge with lots of examples very efficiently.  These course/books should be a model for future language texts.  Highly recommended!

Although I have not been fortunate in generating much discussion, hope springs eternal.  My topic for this post is, "What version of Python are you using?"  I have been sticking to 2.7 since OpenStack uses it.  Would anyone recommend learn 3+ or should I wait?

Please note this was originally posted on my Aging Hacker  blog but it is very appropriate for this blog too.  Recall my admonition to learn at least one language a year and learning python is a must.
Later!

STEM

The STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) coalition
http://www.stemedcoalition.org/ is a very special organization to
increasing technical literacy in the US by enriching the education in
k-12.  I think a crucial component to this literacy is code literacy. 
Others may disagree, but learning to code is and coding are truly
transforming and exhilarating.  One of my Stevens students, recommended
an excellent short video
which captures many of these thoughts much better than I can articulate
them.  Hope you enjoy it as much as I did!  Later

--Gregg

iPad experience revives market for real books!

Will my subject tagline, "iPad experience revives market for real books!" appear in a newspaper article in the next few years?

If
my experience is any judge, there is at least a chance.  I've noticed
that when using my iPad if I come across a boring part of a novel or a
tech book, rather than plowing through it, I often revert to web browing
or playing a game.  The result is I read less.  I ma now combating this
by using ereaders and dare I say, real books!

Am I just an anachronism or does anyone else share my experience?

Later,

   --Gregg

ps- also posted in my google group, software experience

UK advice on User Centered Design

One of my students,  Michael Carrano, suggested a great article by UK Government User Centered Design experts on Design Principles.  I especially liked the Need-O-Tron  for needs management, available at github. Their ten principles are augmented by examples and, of course, Principle 3, Design with data and h Principle 6, build for inclusion, "accessible design is good design," are my favorites.

I will follow the evolution of their principles and report back when warranted.  They are currently at the alpha version and it is an impressive start.

The last few weeks of the year signal the deluge of log books and I hopefully will have other chestnuts to share from my students, along with a few of my own.  Later!

Spacey Ergonomics

I usually devote a few slides to ergonomics, discussing human reach and comfort.  Today I ran across a real application for the Dragon capsule of SPACEX.  Note that they spent a day examining the human factors and ergonomics of their Dragon spacecraft design meant to accommodate up to seven astronauts. 

I have been a fan of spaceflight since the 1960's following the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs.  I  am a fan of robotic spaceflight too.  The space fellowship is a great site to follow advances in studying the universe.

Update on my fignition post.  I ordered and received the fignition kit and am following their blog.  Now all I need is time to solder and test the board to get my forth computer running!  I will keep you posted on progress.  Later!

Go FORTH

Early in December I tweeted on a great little board that ran the FORTH language called FIGnition.  It entranced me for two reasons, first it reminded me how much I missed the computer language, FORTH and second it reminded me of the days of building your own machine to experiment with softwaare (and hardware concepts).

FORTH is a great language, having both high level and low level aspects, it still is used in some boot loaders.  One of its unique aspects was that it used RPN, Reverse Polish Notation - think old school HP calculators.  RPN is postfix, to add two numbers one would enter " 3 <enter> 4 +", the <enter> was a real key that would push the first number on the stack.  This inspired a popular (for geeks at least) bumper sticker of the era, "FORTH love if honk then" that you can still purchase here.  It was low level in that it defined an entire very simple OS with primitive file management that made it very popular with microcomputer hobbyists. 

My recommendation for the best page to begin discovering FORTH is the homepage of a defunct organization, the FORTH INTEREST GROUP, aka FIG.  I was once a member of FIG and still miss FORTH, that is why I will probably reacquaint myself with it by building a single board computer that runs it, the FIGNITION.   It is under $35 dollars when delivered form the UK.  Note it is a kit and you should have the hang of soldering, but at the end you can claim you built your own computer with far fewer connections than my original ALTAIR.  I will keep you posted on my progress on my twitter account, SWUniverse.

Hopefully I am back in the blogging swing of things.  Have a bunch of great blogs from my students that I would like to post.  Happy 2012!  Later!

 

Valentine's Day Recommendations

This entry re-establishes a tradition on my blog suggesting technical books and novels for your significant other on Valentine's Day.  What better way to show you care than providing someone with a riveting book on Computer Science or Software Engineeirng!

My first recommendation is an edited compilation from Diomidis Spinellis and Georgios Gousios (Eds.), Beautiful Architecture.  This book provides some great chapters on software architecture and will be part of my software architecture and design course in the fall.  Diomidis is no stranger to my Valentine's list.  Year's ago I recommended, Code Reading, a book on reading code and it too would make a great gift.  Moving onto HCI, for years I have been pressing for including an anthropological approach to user experience work.  I gained this appreciation through a book by Bonnie Nardi and Vicki O'Day, Information Ecologies, and am using a new book by Bonnie Nardi in my HCI course at Penn, My Life as a Night Elf Priest: An Anthropological Account of World of Warcraft.  Night Elf Priest is a great companion to these cold winter nights with your significant other in either real or virtual worlds. My final recommendations for technical books that would make great Valentine's Day presents are: HTML5: Up and Running by Mark Pilgrim and, in case your significant other loves to learn a new software language (and who doesn't!), Getting Started with Processing by Casey Reas and Ben Fry.  If your significant other also likes to build things, you can supplement the last book with an arduino kit.

My science fiction recommendations this year start with some classics I am rereading.  The first is Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson, an excellent read even the nth time around, a gift that will keep giving.  Note that I provided a link to a used book store, alibris, which I frequently use for older technical books.  A great service and a hedge with a less expensive gift, in case you think your romance will not survive another year!  I also am in the midst of rereading the Dune books by Frank Herbert.  The two of you will gain a new appreciation for a glass of water.  Some more modern recommendations are Richard K. Morgan's, TH1RTE3N, Morgan's books will certainly encourage togetherness since they are great scifi thrillers with a new concept almost every page.  Another mind blowing idea a page flip author is Charlie Stross' Glass House, a bit of gender bending and a truly fascinating read.  Stross's books are always mind blowing.  I once communicated with Charlie and he actually gave me a manuscript version of Halting State (a great book) but alas when I got swamped and did not return any comments, he never responded to any further emails.  My loss, but don't make it yours, highly recommended.  Other authors I will cover in future posts are China Mieville, John Scalzi - Old Man's War is a modern classic as is Stross' Accelerando, all fantastic reads for your valentine.  Last I could not close the science fiction section without mentioning a novel that is hard to classify but excellent to read William Gibson's, Zero History.  Actually it is best to read the earlier novels in the triology before you gift this one, Pattern Recognition and Spook Country.  Definitely the triology would make a special Valentine's gift.  Gibson is also an avid tweeter, if you are interested follow GreatDismal on twitter. 

Phew!  Finally if you really want to make Monday special, cook for your valentine.  If you are at a loss for what to prepare, I recommend a good marinara sauce (gravy in new jersey) with pasta from Marcella Hazan's book, Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking.  A no knead bread with a great crust would complement this menu and one of the best is from Jeff Potter's, Cooking for Geeks.

Later!

HCI course on web

No crazy title for this entry,since it is a shameless bit of self promotion! If you are interested, I am conducting a web based HCI course on the web at Stevens, CS 545WS. This course will be using a new text, Press On, in addition to texts by Stone and Maeda.

My new goal is a blog entry a week, but you've heard that before! Later!

TRAINing

One of my aspirations is to apply the same sort of creativity that goes into the look, feel and operation of computer games to business applications.  Some of the benefits of doing this are presenting information in a more efficient manner (3D and pictures provides the potential of presenting more information), minimizing training and making it more enjoyable.

This weekend an article in the New York Times Art and Entertainment section reviewed the game, Dead Space: Extraction, for the Nintendo Wii. Note - warning mature themes! What makes this game somewhat unique is that it is a "rail" game.  In rail games the game moves you, just as if you were in some invisible rail car, and your tasks are shooting and gathering objects.  This lack of concern for motion has its price - once you have passed something you can't go back, it is inherently a serial presentation.

When I read this I thought that perhaps we might be able to use this approach for work flow, especially work flow that builds on previous steps.  Although we might not have control of speed we may have the ability to slow or momentarily pause (an emergency "brake") the progression.  Work flow then becomes a natural progression rather than an annoying stream of menus and programs.  I realize this is analogous to frames and scripts from the AI literature, but perhaps we could push the rails analogy and actually have us moving by the steps, adding information as we cruise by.  A perspective button could provide a perspective on what is left in the path.

So what do you think, are their business applications that would benefit by placing users on "rails" and guiding through the workflow?  I would be interested in your thoughts on this and also whether rail games are compelling as a game genera - I like them because as I get older it is one less thing to do.  Later!

WORD!

Established products present additional challenges to User Experience Design. The central issue is how do we improve it without changing it.  There is impedance to change since users have "over learned"  the interface and change results in errors and a fairly significant re-learning process, usually more protracted than a new user would experience.  Microsoft designers have in the past few years done exactly that, changed Microsoft's office interface as described in this article.  This was a bold decision and has not been without its critics - see these comments on Amazon's Microsoft Office site.

Eric Lorenz discusses these issues in this entry from his log book.  He also discusses the quest for simplicity that may have motivated the changes, this was after we had discussed Maeda's, Laws of Simplicity, in the class.  I have mentioned Maeda's book in several posts and it is highly recommended.  Here's Eric's post:

During our lecture on 6/1/09, we covered Maeda’s “Laws of Simplicity”.  These Laws, and some of our other readings dealing with simplicity and complexity, have sparked some thoughts about two particular products on the market today that most of us come in contact with daily: Microsoft Office and the automobile. 

I brought up Microsoft Office during the lecture.  I was commenting on how the menu structure of the “new” 2007 version is considerably altered compared to the earlier versions, which had all been fairly consistent in design.  In my mind, this is a perfect example of the struggle between Consistency and organization.  The “what goes with what?” question has been answered well by Microsoft in the new version.  However, upon first inspection, the new version seems quite counter–intuitive and harder to navigate to existing users.  On an objective level, the new software is better organized and therefore offers improvement over the previous versions.  Because of its revamped organization, it is actually simpler: new users would probably find the 2007 version more intuitive, as they are not influenced by where the commands used to be located.  The menus are functionally consistent, if not version consistent.  I guess simplicity is in the eye of the beholder to some extent: Better organization may be friendlier for new users but the change of menus may actually seem to make the system more complex to confounded existing users. 

In this way, the gains in simplicity for new users are balanced with the learning and time difficulties for existing users.  (I wonder how Microsoft decides which group is more important?)  After all, most of the workforce does not receive formal training for a new version of MS Office.  Therefore we are forced to dive right in, which we know most likely costs extra time (and money) in the long run.  Along the same line, time penalties also result in user (and possibly their superiors’) frustration. 

In the end, I think Microsoft balanced its interests well because I believe they have done the right thing by improving the product first and foremost.  However, although the learning curve is probably not considered exceptionally steep for users’ of previous versions of the Microsoft Office suite, the impact is considerable because of the broadness of its effect as an organization’s entire workforce absorbs the time to adjust; not an insignificant event for something considered “productivity software.”

Personally, even though I was used to the old version and had been using this product for years, since I have become familiar with the new version I do prefer it.  I tend to be a logical person and like to have everything in its place, especially if it is a functionally organized place.  I was also well aware of the inconsistencies in the old version.  Even though the new version of Office is much different visually, I can appreciate the simpler organization because I see the difference between it and the (in my opinion) more complex old version. 

So what do you think, was MIcrosoft correct in its interface changes for the Office Suite?  Let us know what you think.  It will also be a great question to revisit.  Later.

FLUidity

The last quarter of 2009 and the first half of 2010 is going to be interesting for software projects.  The knowledgeable lead tech person should prepare for sporadic absences caused by the H1N1 virus.  A great place to follow the spread of the contagion is the flu tracker site in Pittsburgh.   Universities are feeling the effect of the H1N1 virus and are doing all they can to make preparations.

My advice would be to make sure you have flexibility and fluidity in your assignments, insuring that all critical areas of code have a main developer and a "buddy" (Brooks' co-pilot) that is very familiar with the code.  Perhaps this is the time to begin pair programming.

This also is the time to establish a remote work program so that folks feeling ill are not tempted to come to work.  It would be worthwhile to make it clear that folks feeling ill should stay home.  It also may be a great time to experiment with Second Life as a venue for remote meetings.

Please add any other suggestions you would like to share on preparing for and coping with this pandemic.  Later!

Class Tested

Last Friday was the last HCI class for 2009 at Penn.  The last class is the time for class teams to demonstrate their HCI projects.  There were three this year:  ParkMe - an iPhone application to show available parking spots in an area, complete with such arcane details as traffic regulations; meMote - a Wii-mote based tv controller that had content based selection and accommodated the elderly and SendMe - a proprietary application that a student did n conjunction with his day job.  All three were superb, but ParkMe won the great of the 8's contest.  The class is EMTM 608 so hence the awards name.

I used a new book this year, Bill  Moggridge's Designing Interactions, ISBN: 0-262-13474-8.  It provided a perspective on design that nicely complemented the other texts in the course: Don Norman's Design of Everyday things, ISBN: 465067107, a classic that should be read repeatedly; John Maeda's The Laws of Simplicity, ISBN: 0262134721, a book that really like, great for a cross country plane trip and covered in an earlier post and User Interface Design and Evaluation, ISBN: 0120884364 by Stone, Jarrett, Woodroffe and Minocha, an excellent, practical textbook on doing HCI.  These books, complimented by Ben Schneiderman's, et.al., classic and encyclopedic, Designing the User Interface: Strategies for Effective HCI, ISBN: 0321537351 form a basis for an HCI library.

If you would like to explore my HCI lectures, they will be available for a few more weeks at my homepage.  I would appreciate any additional recommendations of books to add to an HCI library, I will suggest a few more in the coming months, but always looking for pointers.  Later!

YouTube not for Everyone

I am starting my HCI course at Penn and coincidentally some of my last lectures in my Stevens courses deal with HCI issues.  One of my students in my Stevens Software Engineering course, Todd Bernstein, sent me this perceptive email that I thought I would share with you concerning YouTube and other on line video sites.

Does the 1998 amendment to Rehabilitation act extend to online videos? I am surprised that captions are not available on the many videos posted on the web. At the very least, I think the big networks sites should have them. I know many elders would benefit from this as well as the hearing impaired population. With the explosion in video on the web, I think it would make sense to have a inclusive reach to the audience and include language translations as well but that may be out of the scope of the Rehabilitation act.

Since I am in the midst of tests and papers I have not had a chance to investigate it but my bet is it does not since the Law pre-dates the site.  As Todd points out, this limits the population that can view the site and given the role these on line video sites played in the election, it makes accessibility difficult to a significant part of the electorate.  Of course this would be an expensive process, but it could also be a differentiator and a subtle way to advertise (close captioning provided by ...).  I would like to collect opinions on this.

By the way, if you would like to follow my lectures at Penn, you can download them at my home page here.

Hopefully since I am correcting a ton of logbooks and have some free time between semesters, the posts should increase again.   Later!

Behave!

This is a great time of the year! I always loved September.  It is a bit cooler,  American and world football begin and school begins.  I will never forget the smell of new crayons in grade school, the gleaming halls and lockers in high school, the trees changing in South Bend and the never ending new challenges in Pittsburgh as first year courses led to thesis, led to comprehensives and finally to dissertation.  Nowadays it means new students for the fall term and freshly corrected log books from the summer term.  This summer term resulted in some truly superb entries.  Here's the first from Joe Rafaniello on Behavior Driven Development, a new technique in agile methods that I currently do not cover in my courses.  I am still not a big fan of specification languages but many folks use and love them and any software engineer should definitely give them a try to see if it works for them.

A relatively new concept in the agile community is behavior driven development.  I have recently researched it for work and feel it is a great way for developers to deliver programs that exhibit all behaviors required to meet customer requirements and at the same time have tests that back up the code.
    In BDD, a developer writes the test or specification first just as in test driven development.  In contrast to TDD, BDD is written in a language that looks more like English and lowers the barriers to entry for customers or project managers interested in what the code does.  This can be very convenient when small teams develop directly with their clients input.  BDD in Ruby is done using RSPEC and looks like this:

# bowling_spec.rb
require 'bowling'

describe Bowling do
  before(:each) do
    @bowling = Bowling.new
  end

  it "should score 0 for gutter game" do
    20.times { @bowling.hit(0) }
    @bowling.score.should == 0
  end
end
(http://rspec.info/)

The idea is that the developer writes the specs before the code.  The spec is run and fails the test. The developer then writes the simplest code to satisfy the spec and now the spec passes. 
    The benefit of RSPEC type languages are that even someone with minimal programming experience can understand the basics of the specifications.  Whenever the business side and programming side can move closer to each other through communication, the better odds of delivering the product on time and as specified.

If you are interested in rspec, check out the site Joe listed here.  if you have time add a note on your opinion of specification languages in general or RSPEC in particular.  The title was a quote from Austin Powers.  I could not resist.  Later!

Vinge on the Future

One of my mantras in my HCI classes is that often the best interface is no interface - essentially automating it away by doing the task or making the decision in the software which may or may not require AI.  A New York Times article today explores Vernor Vinge's speculations on where this automation may end.  The article refers to Vinge's essay on, "The Coming Technological Singularity" and his new book RAINBOWS END.  Vinge speculates/extrapolates that by 2030 computers will become so juiced that a new intelligence will emerge that will surpass humans and then what do these new intelligences do about us - thus begins the Post Human world.  That "then" has been the fodder of many SciFi books and movies (e.g., the Matrix Trilogy).  It also has been discussed in books by folks such as Kurzweil's, THE SINGULARITY IS NEAR, which expands on Vinge's essay.  Exploring this train of thought does cause one to give a sideways glance at the block of silicon on your desk!

My own take on this, hardly novel, is that it has been so difficult to get software to do anything that it is a lot farther off than 2030, if ever. In fact most of what I teach is focused on trying to coax software to doing anything intelligent and at least approximate what we want. Of course the humans involved in the software enterprise, do not make it any easier!

Vinge's potential solution is to partner with the computer and become better together.  That is appealing since each entity has unique skills to bring to the table and this seamless interactivity between human and computer is something we strive for in HCI.  In fact HCI as partnership is something to explore, that may lead to new way s of viewing the user experience.  Hmmmm more on that later - and more on emergence.

By the way, Vinge is a great sci fi (and computer textbook) author.  I would highly recommend sampling his work.  I often refer to his story, "True Names"  in first nailing the issues on cyberspace and privacy - he is one of the most prescient of the current scifi writers.

I would appreciate your thoughts on this and I thank the NY Times science section for the article.  A nice thought generator for these dog days of August!    Later!

A new era of "help" messages

Often in my HCI classes I state that the best human computer interface is no interface, that you should automate the task completely if you can.  I just came across a pointer to a video from doggdot, a blog aggregator, that is worth posting and you can find it here.  It shows a robot correcting a human in a cooperative task.  Two points worth noting in the video: (1) the dialog design that results in a rather firm correction to the human and (2) the fact that the human had to adjust the platform so the robot could place the bolt on the wheel - there still is a long way to go before you will work on a daily basis with an obnoxious robot.  Gee the aibo is discontinued only to be replaced by obnoxious robots!

I think I have my nth wind and hope to increase the frequency of my posts going forward.  Later!