Category: Articles

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Centralized versus Decentralized: A Study on Tangible Control over Devices in the Living Room

By Matthijs Kwak

Interesting work done by one of the master students. [Project Report, PDF, 700K]

SCD2, Decentralized.
SCD1, centralized.

Abstract: Technology is moving to the background and interoperability between devices increases. The handles for users to explore, make and break connections between devices seem to disappear inoverly complex menu structures displayed on small screens. Two prototypes have been developed that introduce a tangible approach towards exploring, making and breaking connections between devices in the living room. One provides a centralized approach (SCD1), the other a decentralized approach (SCD2). Industrial Design students and graduates(N=12) have performed tasks and were asked to explain and grade one out of three methods: SCD1 (image 1), SCD2 (image 2) and bluetooth pairing.Findings suggest that users are better able to project their mental model of how the system works on SCD2 and that atangible solution is not necessarily a better one.

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Farm Ville: Contextual Information Exchange

B22 Project by Jaap Norbruis. [PDF Report, 1.5M]

Farm Ville
Farm Ville

“Within this project I explored how context is experienced and in what ways it can be captured and communicated. The design goal of this project is to design a system that communicates contextual information seamless across realities, the context of a remote user should be communicated to a receiving person is such a way that he or she is able to experience it.”

 

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Share your context

Hugo Christiaans, one of my students, has done an excellent project, namely Share Your Context, about contextual information exchange.

[PDF, 2M] Share your context

Summary of the report:

Share your context

Non face‐to‐face communication of social and emotional experiences between people happens nowadays through phone or other media like email, IM (Instant Message), webcam and other virtual communities such as Second Life. Share experiences, express creativity and maintain easily contacts have made these virtual worlds very popular for millions of Internet users. To support the communication in these worlds emoticons are often used. This form of context is a combination of different states (physical, information, social and emotional), which help the receivers too understand the received information right.

Continue reading Share your context

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Light and the perception of cleanliness in the metro environment

M12 Research Project by Niels Molenaar. Report: [PDF, 400K]

Metro Environment

In public spaces to improve the public perception of cleanliness different lighting conditions can be utilized to dim or to light the littered areas. One would suggest to dim the light for the littered area, or the other way around, to improve the perceived cleanliness. It is however not clear how the lighting condition in the littered area would influence the perceived cleanliness. In this paper we report the result from an experiment in which a metro environment is set up to observe how people react to darkened and lightened litter. The result is somewhat supersizing. People perceive an environment as cleaner when attention is drawn to litter by focusing light on it. The causes of this observation are discussed.

N. Molenaar, Light and the perception of cleanliness in the metro environment, M12 Project Report, Department of Industrial Design, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, 2010.
FULLTEXT: PDF
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Semantic Connections Demonstrator

Semantic Connections

For the EU project SOFIA (Smart Objects For Intelligent Applications), Bram van der Vlist and Gerrit Niezen created a demonstrator for one of the use cases: semantic connections. “The demonstrator consists of a set of devices; surround sound-set, mobile mp3 players, an ambient lighting system and interaction device(s). The interaction device is a tile-like interactive object that allows for both exploration of the Smart Space in terms of connections and manipulation of these connections and information/data streams. Coloured LED lighting and light dynamics visualize the connections and connection possibilities between the various devices. By means of putting devices close to one of the four sides of the tile, a user can check if there is a connection and if not if a connection is possible. By simply picking up the tile, and shaking it a user can make or break the connection between the devices present at the interaction tile.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdZcjqfq8RQ

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We Touch Pillow: The pillow that communicates family presence through warmth without an obliged effort for the user

by Sophie van der Weerd, [PDF | 2M]

WeTouchPillow
WeTouch Pillow

In her B22 project report, Sophie writes: “…I will offer the ‘WeTouch Pillow’; the pillow that communicates your families’ presence in a subtle way without an obliged effort. If one uses his pillow, the pillow of the other becomes warmer and vice versa. I will focus upon the communication tools market. The market will have a need for my product, since it communicates family presence without an obligation and current communication tools require an obligation and effort, which people do not like when communicating with their family like having to call, as to my user research. I want to express to the market the importance of family presence and contact, but that there is no obliged effort needed. The internet will be a good medium to use to contact the target group of relatives living apart, since the younger generations uses it a lot. And I try to reach people who live apart from each other, so an internet service which sends one pillow to each of the relatives is a good way to sell the WeTouch Pillow. Also because an internet connection is needed for the pillows to connect…”

 

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Art across Realities: helping painters to generate more profit by selling their painting process

Final Bachelor Project by Ruben Hekkens. Report: [PDF, 4M]

Art Across Realities
Art Across Realities
Professional traditional painters find it very hard to generate a proper living from their painting activities. Some do a job on the side. The web offers new opportunities for generating exposure and income, for instance via Youtube or a personal website. However, it is hard for painters to exploit these possibilities, as they have few finances and insufficient IT-knowledge to do so. In this project, I explore a new product service-system for painters, which helps them generate extra money while still keeping interaction with the user very simple.

R. Hekkens, Art across Realities: helping painters to generate more profit by selling their painting process, Final Bachelor Project Report, Department of Industrial Design, Eindhoven University of Technology, 2009.
FULLTEXT: PDF
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Collaboratory: working together over a distance

Final USI project by Li Li. Report: [PDF, 1.8M]

The Collaboratory software system at FEI Company allows customers to work together with an electron microscope over a distance, and to share the instruments, microscopy expertise and services. It originally has been developed from the results of the Collaboratory.nl project.

Continue reading Collaboratory: working together over a distance