CMSC 434 - Spring 2006
Prof Guimbretiere

Introduction to Human-Computer Interaction


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Homework #1: Brainstorming and Storyboarding (100 points)
(Due 02/09/05)

Consider the following scenarios:

  • Digital shopping assistant. After watching the video describing the IDEO shopping cart of the future, you want to design a digital shopping assistant. The module is attached on the side of the cart, and lets people find the products they wish to buy and speeds up the checkout process. How will your system work?

  • Voting machine. It is election day and millions are going to vote using your new digital voting machine. How will your system work?

For each of the mentioned scenarios:

  1. (5 points) List and rank at least 5 user goals while performing the task. Briefly explain each goals and its rank (It might be useful to first interview a couple of potential users before answering this question).

  2. (15 points) For each of the first 2 goals in your list, provide at least 10 possible ways to help users reaching this goal. Explain each way briefly.

  3. (10 points) Pick the most interesting and practical solution (e.g. each piece of underlying technology must exist, the cost must be reasonable, and the solution should not be too far away from current social conventions) and then explain your choice.

  4. (20 points) Storyboard a typical user interaction for your system (using a 8 frames layout). Include a script explaining what is going on for each frame.

Note: Examples of how to pick-out good goals, can be found in the reading for Feb 7th: "About Faces 2.0", (page 63-67)


Clarification addendum: You should turn in two sets of work: one on the Digital shopping assistant, the other on the Voting machine. Answer all four questions for each set.