HUMAN COMPUTER

INTERACTION/INTERFACE
ACMP 446/ SOEN 426/COMP 401
Sept/Dec 2020

Introduction

Mzee Awuor
 Background

 BSc. Computer Science (MU, KE)

 MTech. Electrical Engineering (TUT, S.A)
 MSc. Electronics and Electrical System (ESIEE, Fr)
 PhD. Business Information System (JOOUST, KE)
 PhD. Social Networks and Human Centered Computing
(AS/NCCU, TW)

fawuor@kisiiuniversity.ac.ke
 Background

… and who are you?

Tell us something boring about your

everyday activity or daily chore
 Computing Systems that aren’t “Human-
Centered”
 While many computer systems and interfaces are
built for users to use, not all of them are built in a
“human-centered manner”
• Confusing train ticketing system
• Hard to use MP3 music players
• Hard to configure and manage email clients
• … etc.

People still use these systems don’t mean that

they’re great. People are (amazingly) adapting
themselves and tolerating… 4
 How might we design for the “boring”
morning activity identified previously?

 Confusing “buttons” in the elevator

 Signing class attendance sheet
 Putting phone on silent mode during meeting
 An introduction to human-centered
design
 As human-centered designers, it’s important to embrace
your “beginner’s mind;” to approach problems as a novice
even when you already know a lot about them.
 Your beginner’s mind is eager to learn and willing to
experiment!
 An introduction to human-centered
design
What would you like to learn during the course?

Tell a story about the last activity that you tried for the
first time?
o Was it exciting or scary?
o How did being a novice help you?
 What This Course Is About?

• Understanding the ideas and practices human computer

interaction/interface (i.e. human-centered computing)
Keep in mind that human-centered computing has to deal
with people, such as people’s thinking processes,
behaviors and social contexts

Really innovative designs are not easy to obtain and often

require deep studies and insights of user needs,
characteristics and behaviors.
- The course is designed to engage students in this kind of deep inquiry
and innovation.
- I won’t teach you programing or system building explicitly in this
course. The focus is on DESIGN (interaction and interface).
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1. Design Philosophy
Course Outline
• What is Design?
• How do we Design?
2. Introduction to Human Centered Design
3. Design Methods and Processes
4. Understanding and Conceptualizing Interaction
5. Problem Space
• Understanding a Problem
• Defining a Problem
6. Solution Space
• Creative Thinking
7. Cognitive Aspects
8. User Interfaces: Usability and Usefulness
9. Prototyping
10. Evaluation
Course Requirement
Course Requirement
 Course Activities
• Talking: Lecture, in-class discussion and class activity
participation
• Assignments
• Commenting: Comment papers you read on Moodle (e-
learning)
• Project: Group Team project (3-4 people)

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 Course Activities
• The weakly reading assignments are to be submitted before
the next class
• There are 6 tutorial readings for this class
• All submissions are to be made to the LMS
• Class reps populate the list of students who do not have the
LMS accounts

This is a blended learning – leverages LMS with some face to

face interactions.

13
 Introduction
Interactive Design
Good and Bad Design Case Studies

Please read the following extracts from Rogers Y. et al. (2012), watch the video link therein,
and try to think about responses to the questions highlighted in the extracts (Reading_1.pdf)
 Goal: Useful Design
• All roads lead to Rome
• The ultimate goal of human-centered computing is to create
useful designs that benefit people

• We wish you to become a builders who designs, and a

designer who builds.

15
 Part I
Overview of Human Centric Design (Human Computer Interaction/Interface)
 Introduction

How might we
solve water
problem in
rural Kenya 17
3 Phases in human-centered design process
What is Human Centered Design ?
What can I use human-centered design for?
What can I use human-centered design for?
What can I use human-centered design for?
What can I use human-centered design for?
Innovation
 Empathy

Test Define

Prototype Ideate
 Discovery

Evolution Interpretation

Experimentation Ideation
Design Thinking
Design Thinking
Synthesis Framework
If you only
remember a few
things…
 Part II
Form a Team of 3-4 people
Identify a Problem (Challenge that you will work on through out this course)
Submit (group leader) the name of the group and the group members to Moodl
before next class
Choose your Design Challenge
 More Challenges
 Staff Publication Repository
University Alumni Project
Staff and Student Birthday Reminder
Large-Scale Surveillance of Crop Pests and Diseases
Talent Audition Pre-qualification
Where to Locate Business
 Covid-19 digital response
Kaggle Challenge
 …. etc etc.
 Possible Projects

University Alumni Project

Staff and Student Birthday Reminder
Online Admission
Context Aware Lunch invitation
Large-Scale Surveillance of Crop Pests
Large-Scale Surveillance of Crop Diseases
Talent Audition Pre-qualification
Where to Locate Business
 …. etc etc.
 LMS

 Introduction to LMS –Hands on experience

 How to log in and to access the learning material
 How to a upload assignment
 How to access a class online
 How to participate in discussions
End

fawuor@kisiiuniversity.ac.ke