Chapter 7: User-Centered Design
Summary
This closing chapter summarizes all of the concepts that have been described in the book. It mentions what designers should be keeping in mind when designing a product. Norman suggests seven design principles to keep design simple. The chapter also discusses how designs can affect society in both positive and negative ways.
Discussion
I feel this summary chapter was a good way to wrap up the book. The way Norman writes this chapter, it is simple to remember the concepts he talks about in previous chapters. He suggests increasing usability and effectiveness. This is interesting because the professor that I consider to be the best in the Computer Science Department always tries to convey the idea of usability, portability, and effectiveness.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Book Reading # 22
Chapter 7: Formal Sex Relations
Summary
In this chapter Mead describes how young girls have evolved their sexual actions and how the boys seek sex from the girls. She explains how woman cannot be seen as a higher role than man. A girl's virginity is considered an attraction.
Discussion
Given that there are rules for everything, I was surprised when I read this chapter. It would seem to me that Samoans would be more conservative. The idea of woman not having a higher role than man is still a similar idea to the Hispanic culture so its interesting to read about.
Summary
In this chapter Mead describes how young girls have evolved their sexual actions and how the boys seek sex from the girls. She explains how woman cannot be seen as a higher role than man. A girl's virginity is considered an attraction.
Discussion
Given that there are rules for everything, I was surprised when I read this chapter. It would seem to me that Samoans would be more conservative. The idea of woman not having a higher role than man is still a similar idea to the Hispanic culture so its interesting to read about.
Book Reading # 42
Appendix III: Samoan Civilization as It Is Today
Summary
In this appendix, Mead talks about how life in Samoa has changed since her original research. The Samoan civilization has been influences by the merging European ideas. These ideas seem to inject some progression into the Samoan culture. Some of the ideas include a government system for each village, religion influences, and education.
Discussion
I think the influences described in this appendix are the classic influences Europe can have on an evolving civilization. The adaptations seem to have made life a little easier. The European lifestyle is a very interesting one because it is very flexible.
Summary
In this appendix, Mead talks about how life in Samoa has changed since her original research. The Samoan civilization has been influences by the merging European ideas. These ideas seem to inject some progression into the Samoan culture. Some of the ideas include a government system for each village, religion influences, and education.
Discussion
I think the influences described in this appendix are the classic influences Europe can have on an evolving civilization. The adaptations seem to have made life a little easier. The European lifestyle is a very interesting one because it is very flexible.
Book Reading # 41
Chapter 2: We All Search for Meaning & Chapter 3: We Connect the Dots
Summary
Chapter two talks about memory and how people are prone to remembering things when they have some sort of personal meaning as supposed to meaningless things. Hallinan gives as an example people forgetting names. In the next chapter, Hallinan talks about people making choices based on what he calls "invisible" factors. Also as the chapter title suggests, Hallinan describes how the human brain connects meaning without you realizing it.
Discussion
The example Hallinan gives in chapter two about forgetting names is something that happens to me all of the time. There are people that I take classes with, and I recognize their faces but tend to forget their names unless we worked on a project together. Chapter three reminds me on how important a first impression is.
Summary
Chapter two talks about memory and how people are prone to remembering things when they have some sort of personal meaning as supposed to meaningless things. Hallinan gives as an example people forgetting names. In the next chapter, Hallinan talks about people making choices based on what he calls "invisible" factors. Also as the chapter title suggests, Hallinan describes how the human brain connects meaning without you realizing it.
Discussion
The example Hallinan gives in chapter two about forgetting names is something that happens to me all of the time. There are people that I take classes with, and I recognize their faces but tend to forget their names unless we worked on a project together. Chapter three reminds me on how important a first impression is.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Paper Reading # 18
Comments
Comment1
Comment2
Reference
Embedded Media Markers: Marks on Paper that Signify Associated Media
Qiong Liu, Chunyuan Liao, Lynn Wilcox, Anthony Dunnigan, Bee Liew
IUI'10, February 7-10, 2010, Hong Kong, China
Summary
This paper talks about embedded media markers (EMMs) which are marks on printed documents that help relate certain text areas to associated media. EMMs serve a similar purpose as bar codes and hyperlinks. The advantage EMMs have is that unlike bar codes, EMMs do not affect the appearance of the document. Also unlike hyperlinks, EMMs are printed on a paper document. The authors claim that paper is the most widely device used for viewing information. It has many advantages such as portability, low cost, high resolution, etc. The disadvantage is that it cannot play video or audio, however cell phones are great for this purpose. The proposed design in this paper merges the use of paper and cell phones. The idea is to print iconic marks on paper documents corresponding to media which will then be captured by a cell phone. The purpose of the cell phone will be to retrieve information about the EMMs and play the associated media. Some of the previous work include Microsoft Tag, DataGlyphs, RFID, HotPaper, Mobile Retriever amongst many other applications. EMMs can be printed in low-resolution paper at a relatively low cost. EMMs should be visible to humans, should be meaningful, and should not affect the layout of the document. In order to achieve this there should be different icons to infer distinction between the associated media.
Discussion
The idea presented in this paper is awesome! There is only one thing that worries me, and that is that we are becoming very lazy. As we continue to develop new technology, we also become lazier. How awesome would it be to be reading an essay, take out your phone, scan a text area and retrieve the definition of a certain word you don't understand? This is the idea of the embedded media markers. The neat thing about EMMs is that they are low cost, and they do not change the document layout like bar codes do. This would be a neat thing to add in academia!
Comment1
Comment2
Reference
Embedded Media Markers: Marks on Paper that Signify Associated Media
Qiong Liu, Chunyuan Liao, Lynn Wilcox, Anthony Dunnigan, Bee Liew
IUI'10, February 7-10, 2010, Hong Kong, China
Summary
This paper talks about embedded media markers (EMMs) which are marks on printed documents that help relate certain text areas to associated media. EMMs serve a similar purpose as bar codes and hyperlinks. The advantage EMMs have is that unlike bar codes, EMMs do not affect the appearance of the document. Also unlike hyperlinks, EMMs are printed on a paper document. The authors claim that paper is the most widely device used for viewing information. It has many advantages such as portability, low cost, high resolution, etc. The disadvantage is that it cannot play video or audio, however cell phones are great for this purpose. The proposed design in this paper merges the use of paper and cell phones. The idea is to print iconic marks on paper documents corresponding to media which will then be captured by a cell phone. The purpose of the cell phone will be to retrieve information about the EMMs and play the associated media. Some of the previous work include Microsoft Tag, DataGlyphs, RFID, HotPaper, Mobile Retriever amongst many other applications. EMMs can be printed in low-resolution paper at a relatively low cost. EMMs should be visible to humans, should be meaningful, and should not affect the layout of the document. In order to achieve this there should be different icons to infer distinction between the associated media.
Discussion
The idea presented in this paper is awesome! There is only one thing that worries me, and that is that we are becoming very lazy. As we continue to develop new technology, we also become lazier. How awesome would it be to be reading an essay, take out your phone, scan a text area and retrieve the definition of a certain word you don't understand? This is the idea of the embedded media markers. The neat thing about EMMs is that they are low cost, and they do not change the document layout like bar codes do. This would be a neat thing to add in academia!
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Book Reading # 36
Chapter 12: Maturity and Old Age
Summary
This chapter talks about the changes in Samoan's adults. The changes are observed when people get married and when they get old. When people get married they can live in the husbands home or the fathers home. Mead describes that even though a man's role is decrease with age, men are always battling to gain a higher role throughout their life.
Discussion
The Samoan way of marriage is definitely different than ours, since they still submit to their elders. I believe that when a couple is ready for marriage, they should already be mature in some sort of way. Let's of course ignore marriages forced by pregnancies or circumstances like that. In this chapter it is also interesting to see how the woman's role increases with age but not the man's role.
Summary
This chapter talks about the changes in Samoan's adults. The changes are observed when people get married and when they get old. When people get married they can live in the husbands home or the fathers home. Mead describes that even though a man's role is decrease with age, men are always battling to gain a higher role throughout their life.
Discussion
The Samoan way of marriage is definitely different than ours, since they still submit to their elders. I believe that when a couple is ready for marriage, they should already be mature in some sort of way. Let's of course ignore marriages forced by pregnancies or circumstances like that. In this chapter it is also interesting to see how the woman's role increases with age but not the man's role.
Paper Reading # 16
Comments
Comment1
Comment2
Reference
A Practical Pressure Sensitive Computer Keyboard
Paul H. Dietz, Benjamin Eidelson, Jonathan Westhues and Steven Batiche
UIST 09 October 4-7, 2009 Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
Summary
This paper talks about a pressure sensitive computer keyboard. The idea is to design a pressure keyboard that can be a little more expensive to mass produce but not to the extent where it would be impossible to sell. In the introduction they explain that even though computers have changed dramatically since their start, keyboards have not changed much. Prior work with pressure keyboards have been used for electronic music, improving text generation for disabled people, and for biometric user authentication. All of the uses mentioned before are not suitable for mass production due to its cost. The design proposed in this paper uses piezoresistive material instead of the current flexible membrane technology, and carbon screen printed ink. This design allows for power saving as it only uses power when a key has been pressed. The way this keyboard works is that it is a matrix of resistors connecting to a unique row-column pair. The authors claim this design overcomes the problem of "ghosting". Some of the applications that are possible with this type of keyboard are gaming, instant messaging, and general typing.
Discussion
Personally I had never wondered a keyboard works and well this paper definitely explains how modern keyboards work. What was interesting about reading this paper is questioning why we have not developed new keyboard technology? I believe there are many applications that can benefit from pressure sensing keyboards. The idea explained in this paper for general typing could be very beneficial. A slight tap on the backspace key and you can delete a letter, while a hard tap can delete a whole word.
Comment1
Comment2
Reference
A Practical Pressure Sensitive Computer Keyboard
Paul H. Dietz, Benjamin Eidelson, Jonathan Westhues and Steven Batiche
UIST 09 October 4-7, 2009 Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
Summary
Discussion
Personally I had never wondered a keyboard works and well this paper definitely explains how modern keyboards work. What was interesting about reading this paper is questioning why we have not developed new keyboard technology? I believe there are many applications that can benefit from pressure sensing keyboards. The idea explained in this paper for general typing could be very beneficial. A slight tap on the backspace key and you can delete a letter, while a hard tap can delete a whole word.
Book Reading # 38
Chapter 13: Our Educational Problems in the Light of Samoan
Summary
This chapter talks about the different choices young adolescents have to make. There comes a time when people have to choose if they will continue their education to become professionals, or they don't want to continue their education and just work.
Discussion
This chapter is interesting because she gives you the ability to relate everything to how the Americans go about their life. The freedom given to young people has to be tightly monitored in order to avoid them making serious mistakes.
Summary
This chapter talks about the different choices young adolescents have to make. There comes a time when people have to choose if they will continue their education to become professionals, or they don't want to continue their education and just work.
Discussion
This chapter is interesting because she gives you the ability to relate everything to how the Americans go about their life. The freedom given to young people has to be tightly monitored in order to avoid them making serious mistakes.
Book Reading # 39 - Why We Make Mistakes
Chapter 0: Introduction & Chapter 1: We Look but Don't Always See
Summary
Chapter zero introduces the concept that people frequently make mistakes and gives some examples such as the car example. The author Hallinan points out that if people are aware they make mistakes, they should decrease the amount of mistakes in the future. In the following chapter he claims how things that cause mistakes are sometimes right in front of us and yet we do not see them.
Discussion
This idea that the chapter one describes where we look but don't always see is really interesting because we would like to think that we never do this when in fact we do this all the time. We sometimes focus on a certain aspect of an environment that we forget other important details. I think this is the main idea behind people proofreading a paper before final submission, checks and balances in government, etc. This is particularly important to keep in mind when implementing software.
Summary
Chapter zero introduces the concept that people frequently make mistakes and gives some examples such as the car example. The author Hallinan points out that if people are aware they make mistakes, they should decrease the amount of mistakes in the future. In the following chapter he claims how things that cause mistakes are sometimes right in front of us and yet we do not see them.
Discussion
This idea that the chapter one describes where we look but don't always see is really interesting because we would like to think that we never do this when in fact we do this all the time. We sometimes focus on a certain aspect of an environment that we forget other important details. I think this is the main idea behind people proofreading a paper before final submission, checks and balances in government, etc. This is particularly important to keep in mind when implementing software.
Book Reading # 40 - Coming of Age in Samoa
Chapter 14 : Education for Choice
Summary
This chapter talks about the things that one can learn from the Samoan lifestyle. Mead talks about the many choices adolescents have to deal with, and the key factors that lead them to act the way they do. She describes that the parents are the ones that decide how to educate their kids. She mentions that parents should educate their children to make good decisions to face all the different choices that will be presented to them.
Discussion
I agree to some extent with the belief that parents should give some freedom to their children to make decision, but not in their early adolescent years. I like the idea that parents should lead children to make their choices because that is the only way children will actually learn by making their own mistakes.
Summary
This chapter talks about the things that one can learn from the Samoan lifestyle. Mead talks about the many choices adolescents have to deal with, and the key factors that lead them to act the way they do. She describes that the parents are the ones that decide how to educate their kids. She mentions that parents should educate their children to make good decisions to face all the different choices that will be presented to them.
Discussion
I agree to some extent with the belief that parents should give some freedom to their children to make decision, but not in their early adolescent years. I like the idea that parents should lead children to make their choices because that is the only way children will actually learn by making their own mistakes.
Paper Reading # 17
Comments
Comment 1
Comment 2
Reference
Estimating User's Engagement from Eye-gaze Behaviors in Human-Agent Conversations
IUI'10 February 7-10,2010 Hong Kong, China
Summary
This paper talks about different strategies to see if a person is engaged in face-to-face conversations, and how people interact with each other through the use of technology. The main goal of the system described in this paper is to determine if the user is fully engaged in a conversation. The most complicated issue to resolve in their research is to make sure that the system must perceive nonverbal behavior such as facial gestures, body movements, and other key movements that could infer a person is not fully engaged in a conversation. According to their research there are many eye-tracking systems that are very stable, and therefore can be used in their complex system. The system or the agent-as the authors refer to it as- must be capable of reengaging a person if the person seems to have lost the full engagement in a conversation. The agent must do this by changing the topic when some eye-gazes infer the user is bored during a dialogue. In order to analyze their system the authors describe a Wizard-of-Oz approach to collect data. The scenario of the experiment is a salesperson in a mobile phone store. The experiment is set up such that there is a person called the user located in a room looking a screen where the salesperson is being projected. Outside of the room, there is another person called the observer. The observer can look at the user through a one way window. Both of these individuals will have a button to press. The instructions are different for both individuals. The user must press the button when he believes the salesperson description to be boring. The observer will press the button when he believes the user is bored by the salesperson's description. The analysis used in this experiment is called 3-grams. The results observed by the authors show that selecting the agent's behaviors according to engagement estimation turned out to be effective in this agent-human interaction.
Discussion
This paper is really interesting because it could be implemented in academia. It would be extremely beneficial for a teacher to know when their audience is not being engaged by his/her lectures. The Wizard-of-Oz approach in this interaction showed great results in the agent-human interaction. This type of research can have great benefits for people who are always presenting, and can provide feedback to improve their presentation skills.
Comment 1
Comment 2
Reference
Estimating User's Engagement from Eye-gaze Behaviors in Human-Agent Conversations
IUI'10 February 7-10,2010 Hong Kong, China
Summary
This paper talks about different strategies to see if a person is engaged in face-to-face conversations, and how people interact with each other through the use of technology. The main goal of the system described in this paper is to determine if the user is fully engaged in a conversation. The most complicated issue to resolve in their research is to make sure that the system must perceive nonverbal behavior such as facial gestures, body movements, and other key movements that could infer a person is not fully engaged in a conversation. According to their research there are many eye-tracking systems that are very stable, and therefore can be used in their complex system. The system or the agent-as the authors refer to it as- must be capable of reengaging a person if the person seems to have lost the full engagement in a conversation. The agent must do this by changing the topic when some eye-gazes infer the user is bored during a dialogue. In order to analyze their system the authors describe a Wizard-of-Oz approach to collect data. The scenario of the experiment is a salesperson in a mobile phone store. The experiment is set up such that there is a person called the user located in a room looking a screen where the salesperson is being projected. Outside of the room, there is another person called the observer. The observer can look at the user through a one way window. Both of these individuals will have a button to press. The instructions are different for both individuals. The user must press the button when he believes the salesperson description to be boring. The observer will press the button when he believes the user is bored by the salesperson's description. The analysis used in this experiment is called 3-grams. The results observed by the authors show that selecting the agent's behaviors according to engagement estimation turned out to be effective in this agent-human interaction.
Discussion
This paper is really interesting because it could be implemented in academia. It would be extremely beneficial for a teacher to know when their audience is not being engaged by his/her lectures. The Wizard-of-Oz approach in this interaction showed great results in the agent-human interaction. This type of research can have great benefits for people who are always presenting, and can provide feedback to improve their presentation skills.
Monday, March 28, 2011
Ethnography Results Week 7
This week I observed the College Station movie theater. I arrived at 9:35p.m. on Sunday, and watched a movie at 10:05p.m. This time I observed something I had not seen yet in the seven weeks of this ethnography. I saw a person bringing in a small dish of food into the theater without the theater staff noticing. I was not very close to identify the type of dish the person was smuggling, but from a distance it seemed like a to-go plate from Fazzoli's Italian Restaurant. The even funnier fact is that the person who had smuggled the food was in the same movie I went to see. If you are asking how I know? It was because I could smell the marinara sauce all over the place, I was right!! The person brought in some type of Italian food! I have known of people bringing in cokes, or candy into the theater but never had experienced someone bringing in an actual meal. This experience reminded me of a chain of movie theaters in Mexico called Cinepolis VIP. In these theaters, you sit in lazy boys and are given a menu with beer, sushi and other type of food which you can order prior to the movie starts.
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