Ubiquitous Computing

1. Ubiquitous Computing Computers everywhere

2. Thursday: presentations • UCook • Team NoName • Save the Best for Last • Food Networking

3. Ubiquitous Computing (Ubicomp) • Move beyond desktop machine • Computing is embedded everywhere in the environment • A new paradigm?? • “everyware”, “off the desktop”, “out of the box”, pervasive, invisible, wearable, calm, anytime/anywhere/any place, …

4. Ubicomp Notions • Computing capabilities, any time, any place • “Invisible” resources • Machines sense users’ presence and act accordingly

5. Marc Weiser: The father of ubicomp • Chief Technologist Xerox PARC • Began Ubiquitous Computing Project in 1988 • 1991 Scientific American article got the ball rolling http://www.ubiq.com/hypertext/weiser/SciAmDraft3.html

6. Not an interface problem? “The most profound technologies are those that disappear” • HCI: new focus on unobtrusiveness, invisibility • How do we make technology “vanish”?

7. Videos • http://www.nttdocomo.co.jp/english/corporate/future/hokusai/index.html • http://www.nttdocomo.co.jp/english/corporate/future/mobilelife/index.html • What interfaces did you see? • How did users interact? • What do you think of this vision?

8. Ubicomp is ... • Related to: • mobile computing • wearable computing • augmented reality • In contrast with: • virtual reality (augmented virtuality)

9. HCI Themes in Ubicomp Some of the themes: • Natural interaction • Context-aware computing • Automated capture and access • Everyday computing

10. Natural Interaction • How do input and output change? • Different form factors, more devices • Input • Towards implicit information • Feeds context-aware computing (later) • Output • Towards distributed, peripheral and ambient displays

11. Natural / implicit input • Integrate into human life Pen input Gesture Speech Perceptual UI Tangible UI http://tangible.media.mit.edu/

12. Device scales • Inch • PDAs • Blackberry • Voice Recorders • smart phones 5.5” 3.1” OQO

13. Device scales • Foot • notebooks • tablets • digital paper Ultra mobile PC

14. Device scales • Yard • electronic whiteboards • plasma displays • smart bulletin boards

15. Another take on scales • Based on ownership and location • body • desk • room • building From the GMD Darmstadt web site on I-Land

16. Distributed Displays The Everywhere Display Project at IBM Microsoft Research Play Anywhere: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muibPAUvOXk&feature=related

17. Ambient Displays • The Information Percolator • http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~hudson/bubbles/ • Ambient Orb • http://www.ambientdevices.com/

18. Peripheral Displays Kimura Digital Family Portrait

19. What is Context? • Any information that can be used to characterize the situation of an entity • Who, what, where, when • Why is it important? • information, usually implicit, that applications do not have access to • It’s input that you don’t get in a GUI

20. Example: Location services • Outdoor • Global Positioning Satellites (GPS) • wireless/cellular networks • Indoor • active badges, electronic tags • vision • motion detectors, keyboard activity

21. How to Use Context • To present relevant information to someone • Mobile tour guide • To perform an action automatically • Print to nearest printer • To show an action that use can choose • Want to phone the number in this email?

22. Context-aware scenarios • Walk into room, lights, audio, etc. adjust to the presence of people • Communication between people (intercoms, phones, etc. ring to room with person) • Security, emergency calls based on people in the home • Monitor health, alert when needed

23. Automated capture and access • Use of computers to preserve records of the live experience for future use (Abowd & Mynatt 2000) • Points of consideration: • capture needs to be natural • user access is important • details of an experience is recorded as streams of information

24. Capture & access applications • Compelling applications • Design records • Health care monitoring and therapies • Family memories • Annotations • Fusion, indexing, summarization

25. Example: Personal Audio Loop

26. Designing for Everyday Activities • No clear beginning or end • Closure vs. flexibility and simplicity • Interruption is expected • Design for resumption • Concurrent activities • Monitoring for opportunity • Time is important discriminator • Interpret events • Associative models needed • Reacquire information from multiple pts of view

27. Technical Challenges • Connectivity – almost constant • How to gracefully handle changes? • Sensing • How to gather useful info? (i.e. location?) • Integration and analysis of data • How to recognize activity and recover when incorrect? • How to function at acceptable speeds? • Scale – both in information and size of displays

28. Challenge of Evaluation • Bleeding edge technology • Novelty • Unanticipated uses • Quantitative metrics • Variety of social implications/issues

29. Social issues • Privacy – who has access to data? • How do we make users aware of what technology is present? • Differing perspectives and opinions • Jane likes that the environment is aware she is present, but John doesn’t…

30. Conclusions • Interfaces and interactions moving into the world • Real life interaction … noisy, erroneous • Continuous interaction … time sensitive • Design and evaluation get more complex

31. Now what? If you like this course… • ITIS 3150 (currently 3050) Rapid Prototyping and Interface Building • Offered next fall by Dr. Latulipe • Senior project or research • If one isn’t listed, come talk to Dr. Latulipe or me • Courses with HCI component: gaming, visualization, software design • Cognitive Science • Minor: this course is one of the free electives • Paid Research Internship: http://www.psych.uncc.edu/pagoolka/reu.html