Project Guidelines

Spring 1995

Guidelines

An essential part of the course will be a class project. This will involve designing and prototyping an interface for a software system, using some of the available software tools. The system might be a part of an ongoing research project they are involved in, or might be new. Finally, the students will be asked to evaluate their prototype and perform some small scale usability studies. Students should work in groups of 2 or 4. We will also periodically ask the groups to present their current work to the class, for general discussion and suggestions.

We expect the projects will be done on a variety of platforms, using a variety of systems. Some will involve constructing working interfaces to an existing system, while others may involve constructing prototypes only in a system such as Macromind or Hypercard.

Please Note:

We do not want to over-constrain these projects. Almost anything is acceptable as long as it shows a reasonable application of techniques and skills learned during the quarter. The project should include and show evidence of extensive brainstorming, storyboarding, domain analysis, experimentation, paper mockup development before beginning any coding. After an initial prototype has been developed, we expect to see extensive user testing and analysis of these tests. The purpose of this project is not to develop a working product, but rather to experience and practice the HCI design cycle. In a sense, we would prefer that you not to invest too much of yourselves into the finished product, because we want you to be able to be critical and realistic about what you have accomplished and how it could be improved. A prototype with limited functionality which shows evidence of solid design and evaluation practices is far preferrable to a snazzy, but poorly designed project.

Deliverables:

We'd like to see a demo of your project, as well as hear a short spiel (the length will depend upon the time available and the number of groups we have) about the history of your project. Specifically, we'd like to hear answers to questions like: Finally, we'd like you to turn in a short paper describing the project history in a little more detail.