#198 H-Point: The Fundamentals of Car Design & Packaging

This book is one of my most recent reads and for sheer amounts of pure information this is one of the most informative sources of information I am going to be using in my dissertation writing. It outlines basically every single aspect of a vehicle in terms of design, function, drivetrain with the main focus being on how cars are to be packaged or more specifically, each component or necessary component are to be incorporated into the design of the car.

To give you an idea of what subjects are covered in this extensive book, the chapters are: Functions and Segments, Package Ideation, Size and Proportion, Occupant Packaging, Interiors and Cargo,  Powertrains, Wheels and Tyres, Suspension and Chassis, Bodies, Mobility and finally Design Exercises. Each of these chapters also incorporates sub chapters too.

It goes into a bigger amount of detail than the last automotive book I reviewed, How To Design Cars Like a Pro, and it achieves this by quite some margin although this is at the expense of readability. There are a few points in this where you are reading it and you don’t want to continue which probably suggests this is more a book that you would use for reference rather than to sit down and read, but in reference terms, this is not the best way for me to carry out my research.

Each of the pieces of information is accompanied by a plethora of graphics that have been extremely well executed and portray the information across excellently. The majority of the vehicles also depict fictional vehicles rather than ones currently on the road though there are some that make it through the generic net, such as the Austin Mini, Ferrari Enzo and the VW Beetle.

One of the sections in How To Design Cars Like A Pro that I took most notes on or about was the T25 by Gordon Murray, a car designer famed for work in Formula One and for the Mclaren F1 super car in the nineties. He has written a foreword for this book, and the thinking throughout it all mirrors his way of thinking and working. Trying to get the best possible outcome from what he has available. Packaging all the components and occupants in the vehicle in the best way possible. His most notable way of packaging was to put three abreast seating in the Mclaren F1, a layout he transferred to the T25 microcar. The only other designer that I can think of that strives for efficient packaging as much as Gordon Murray in the automotive segment (albeit in motorsport) is Adrian Newey, and in the Product Design world, that would have to be the designers at Apple.

I am confident that this book will be able to help provide some information for my dissertation. It will likely be able to back up points made about needing to put the amount of technology that there is in cars on the steering wheel or why some things have to stay the same, hindering the development of the interiors. Either way, it is a very good book, and if you are wondering what H-Point means, it is the datum point on a manikin that is the equivalent of the hip point.

 

#196 Thoughtless Acts? A Review

Continuing on with my university dissertation book reading and basic reviewing to get the information embedded in my head has led me to this next book Thoughtless Acts? by Jane Fulton Suri & IDEO. It is a book that was brought to my attention early in the Product Design course, more specifically in first year whilst in design studies. It isn’t exactly a very wordy book with the majority of the text taking up only ten or so pages near the end of the book along with captions for the images, again found at the end of the book rather than with the images themselves.

The images in the book depict people basically inadvertently interacting or behaving with or around objects or in spaces in a way that was either designed in to them, or somehow have characteristics that make people use them in a specific, non formal way. Additionally, it looks at how people take existing objects and modify them to meet their needs, but it isn’t necessarily modify their appearance or overall function, but instead using them for something they were not really designed for. For example one of the photographs in the book depicts a woman using a pencil to hold her hair together in a bun. The pencil generally is not meant to be used for this purpose, it should be used for writing or drawing on a medium rather than being used as a device to hold hair together.

Another good example from the book is how if there is a line on the floor or on the ground, whether it be paint or how tiles or bricks are laid, instead of walking either side of it, some will walk along the line. It shows that people interact with the environment without even realising it. This example of the lines could be extrapolated out towards the wider world where drivers tend to stick to their side of the road thanks to the lines painted on it. They feel obliged to follow the lines or stay between them in the case of on the road, but they are being influenced nonetheless.

On the face of it, this book may seem like a glorified picture book, with about 90% of it taken up with pictures. I was hesitant to buy this book for use as research as I would be hard pushed to justify it to someone else how it may provide information to the future of interactions within automobiles. However, once the pictures are studied and some time has been spend letting the information sink in, analysing what was actually going on in each of the photographs, this book is probably more useful than I realised. I will definitely be able to link back to it in some form or another in my second draft.

There is a fair amount of thinking in this book that was featured in the DVD Objectified, in part this was because Jane Fulton Suri and various other people from IDEO were interviewed, but it shows that the way in which designers think, even across many different disciplines is unified and has been developed over many years. Hopefully this research that I have been carrying out will aid me in becoming a better designer, not just for my final year at university, but also once I have graduated and have entered the big wide world.

#195 Objectified: Yes, Third Review In a Row

As the title of this post suggests, this is yet another review, but instead of a book this time, it is of the DVD Objectified. My book readings are on hold at the current moment in time due to waiting for a couple more to be delivered, and one of the books I have yet to read but have on hand at the moment looks very unappealing.

Objectified has been part of my relatively small DVD collection for about two years now. I preordered it in 2009 as it seemed like a very good watch and it was related to my course at university, which if you don’t already know, is product design. It’s director, Gary Hustwit, had previously made the documentary-film about the font Helvetica entitled Helvetica. Objectified is considered the second film in the series with Helvetica being the first and the yet to be released Urbanised being the third, and as far as I am aware, the last.

The number of times I have watched this film has been quite high regardless of it being a documentary rather than a fictional thing, but I like it. It is also one of the reasons that I liked Love the Beast so much, a documentary-film storytelling the relationship Australian actor, Eric Bana, has with his beloved 1970′s Ford Falcon Coupé.

The amount of information portrayed in little over an hour and a quarter is quite astonishing. This is enforced with interviewing many key product designers such as Dieter Rams of Braun, Jonathan Ive of Apple, Chris Bangle, Marc Newson, Tony Dunne and Fiona Raby. There is no one person narrating, instead, it is told by the designers. The story being told is that of the relationship that people have with products, and the people behind them. Wonderful cinematography accompanies the interviews, often giving glimpses into how products are made, whether it be an injection moulding process of a chair, establishing shots that reinforce what the designer is talking about at that one time or a product being used.

In terms of usefulness towards my dissertation, upon watching this again today, it wasn’t as helpful as I thought it was going to be. It did feature a fair few designers that were included in the Designing Interactions book such as Jane Fulton Suri along with the books author, Bill Moggridge, but very little of the information was new to me in terms of what I could use or I had heard it all before from the book. I haven’t delved into the DVD that was included in Designing Interactions yet as I know it is portions of the interviews carried out with designers that were put into the book.

Back to Objectified, one of the parts I knew could have been wholeheartedly useful was the part with the then head of design at BMW, Chris Bangle. Instead of him talking about what I thought it would have been better to talk about he rambled on about something different and evidently my opinion of him continues to decline. I admired the big risk at what he took at the helm of design at BMW. He produced some of the most controversial automotive designs to date shaking the whole automotive design world. But I can’t help but feel that there would have been another car designer that would have been a better choice to have interviewed. Just my opinion.

In conclusion, I still consider this film to be very good and a strong alternative to any other film if I am sitting down to watch one, but in terms of using it for a source of information or analysis for my dissertation it was quite disappointing. In all the other sources I have used, I have managed to take away a different perspective of my topic, giving me greater depth for which I can think or write about, but this in a way seemed to barely scratch the surface. It is as though it was made for people who know little about the subject. Maybe I am being a little too harsh there, but it doesn’t mean it is a bad film.

#193 Designing Interactions: A Review of Sorts

My writing for my dissertation was done in a somewhat unorthodox manner and one which I know my adviser will not be too chuffed about to say the least, but I think it works. Instead of going straight into reading books and taking time to read through numerous ones before I put pen to paper, or in the case nowadays, fingers to keyboard, I took my proposal, which was already aiming straight and true in the direction that I was wanting to write about, took parts of it, and in a way, expanded them. Alongside, I would use all the internet based references found in the proposal along with others that I had bookmarked along the way, and wrote what I could call a first draft. Six thousand plus words in about a week, or if it is compressed into time of writing, about four days.

Now that the first draft is written using about fifty percent of the material I was hoping to use (alongside a rudimentary email based interview with a lecturer on Automotive design at Coventry University) I have started to read all the physical material that I hope to fully cement details and information in my writing. For most of the books, it is not the first time I have read them. For my proposal drafts, I read certain chapters of books in order to harvest the information I needed there and then, and it was more often than not, information regarding to the topic I was reading. Now, when I am going through the books again, I am reading it all, cover to cover, even if the information is not directly related to what I am writing about.

The first book that I have fully completed, and made basic notes about/from, is Designing Interactions by Bill Moggridge. It is not an easy book to start with either at almost eight hundred pages. It is a retrospective of interacting with computers from the early days of Douglas Engelbart working at the Stanford Research Institute where he invented the computer mouse, leading through the process in the eighties of the creation of the subject of Interaction Design, right up until modern day technology and beyond. It details many different designers and showcases a lot of varied pieces of work that have in one way or another influenced the face of interaction design and even design in general.

Whilst there were small mentions about vehicles scattered throughout the book, the parts which I found most interesting were in the early chapters of the book. The early days of humans interacting with machines. It was in these chapters that I ended up making most notes about. The notes were, I should point out, basically a page number, where on the page the piece of information was that I found interesting, and a quick note to jog my memory when I look through them. Even though these chapters do not relate directly to what I am writing about, or even relate at all, I can make comparisons. Comparisons using examples that people can relate to themselves was a hint that I was told would help make my final dissertation stand out against everyone else’s.

One of the chapters I found least influential as I read through the book, and this came as a surprise to me, as I was very tempted to skip this chapter completely was about the future interactions, or to give it the name in the book: Futures and Alternative Nows. I couldn’t really connect to the information that was written on the page. Some of the designers interviewed spoke about projects that I couldn’t find interesting even if I tried, and I am being honest there. Even though I know who they are, as in I have had exposure to some of their work previously, I couldn’t help fell that their work was, in my opinion, going in a direction that I didn’t believe in. I am saying this even though they were not designers who design products to go on sale, but instead, designers who produce things for the purpose of being in an exhibition and to get people thinking.

Reading this book highlights many problems that are wrong with so many products today in terms of user interfaces or physical design as a result. It lets you wonder what the future will be like without obviously pointing out that computers will be squeezed into everything. The thought crossed my mind many times as I read this, that the Product Design course I am on really should be an Interaction Design course or dare I say it, an electronics course. Looking back over my previous three years, it is clear that an emphasis has been on electronics and less about design. You will get marked down for electronics not working and not so much marked up for justifying design decisions made along the way.

To end on a positive, I feel that reading this book will evidently help me in my final year on my main project as well as my dissertation, not only by providing some insightful information about different products, their history and problems encountered, but just the sheer amount of knowledge it provides. It isn’t an encyclopaedia type book, or glossary so it isn’t quite one that you could just have on your shelf and look up when needed but it is useful nonetheless.

#174 Dissertation Progress

A few months into the summer and I have good news. The first draft of the dissertation is almost complete. The main body of text is pretty much there and the introduction and conclusion are in progress. I still have a bit more research to do in regards to some of the chapters and try and speak to a few more people about it, but it is taking shape quite nicely.

Without spoiling too much, some people I have spoken to/waiting for a reply from include designers at Jaguar Land Rover, Volvo and Coventry University’s Automotive design course. If I can keep this momentum up, it will hopefully turn out quite well.

If you cannot remember what the subject is from when I last mentioned it, it is looking at the future of human interactions in the car. The screenshot below proves that I have started it and how many words there are, though take 1000 off the total to get the number of words I have written, the extra 1000 are from sources I have been putting at the end of each chapter so I know where I got all information from when it comes to reference everything. I didn’t to that in the writing process as it would give a false indication of word count and it would take too long if I was in a writing groove.

 

#162 Dropbox: The Dissertation Saviour

This post is by no means me just finding out about Dropbox, it is just having found an even more useful application for it in context with everything else I have been doing. At the moment I am writing my dissertation. No big problem you might point out. I have one of my external hard drives plugged into my iMac all of the time to do do Time Machine backups so if I lose it or make a mistake with it and want to go back I can. Again not a problem. The problem is that I have 2 computers, my iMac is the one I use most of the time if I am doing work, because the screen is bigger and I can immerse myself in what I am doing easier, and my other computer is my ageing, 4 year old MacBook which is still just as capable of doing high intensity Photoshop work etc but I tend to avoid using it for anything major apart from work in University in the studio or light browsing.

If I need to exchange files between my two computers, I would either use a USB drive or external hard drive and manually move the files between them (dubbed Sneakernet by Phil Schiller) or I will hook them up together with my Ethernet cable for larger files I want to copy, such as merging Aperture libraries so it takes seconds instead of hours. You might ask now why I don’t just use that instead of going to the hassle of downloading and installing dropbox. The reason is simple.

I still have my computer back up every hour, again that isn’t a problem. I still have my dissertation and file of other things in a folder on my computer, another non-problem. I want my dissertation on 2 computers without the need of ‘Sneakernet’. Problem. When Dropbox is installed, it puts a folder on your computer which is uploaded to the ‘cloud’ and subsequent changes are then uploaded too. I installed Dropbox on both of my computers, put the dissertation folder into the folder that is uploaded and hey presto, it does the job as advertised on the tin. I go to my dissertation folder, open the Pages document as normal, and as soon as I press the save button it is uploaded. I want to go somewhere else and work on my dissertation, I take my laptop, and away I go, the dissertation is downloaded and I can work on it. I am not too bothered with incremental backups not being saved on my laptop with Time Machine or similar because I know the majority of the work will be done on my iMac. Simple as that.

#161 Miscellaneous Workings

A small update. This is something I have just started to do in my spare time from writing my dissertation over the summer. It’s a BTCC Honda Civic. I don’t know what I am going to do with it in the long run, but I’m hoping it will turn out quite well.

#134 HT30007 Dissertation Proposal Part 2

Here is my part 2 for my dissertation proposal. I am finding the dissertation related things some of the most interesting things that I am doing at the moment, and am currently speaking with a few designers at Jaguar and Volvo in regards to my topic which is rather exciting. Though with only a week and a half left until the Easter break, I am rather glad that we will get a bit of time off soon despite the work load slowly winding down.

Title:

The future of computers and interactions in Automobiles

Summary:

Computers are playing an ever increasing role in the world. One of the main areas they are being used in, and have been used in for many years is in the automotive industry. Starting out in the 1970’s, their main function was related to ignition timing (Laurens, 2009). Ever since that point they have seen exponential growth in their use, with their function addressing and overlooking almost every aspect of a vehicle.

Today, computers located in cars are responsible for keeping the occupants safe and entertained, it ensures the engine is running efficiently and it keeps the car on the road. But what role does the computer have in the future of motoring, and how will we, as humans operating cars, end up interacting with them?

One direction the automotive world may head in, is the truly autonomous vehicle. Driverless cars, filling the roads letting the user carry out other tasks. This has been a dream for many for decades, and is only just becoming reality thanks to computers. The DARPA Grand Challenge (approximately 135 miles over desert), subsequently followed by the DARPA Urban Challenge (roughly 60 miles in a closed suburban environment with all the usual perils of town driving) has pioneered part of this dream with it’s quest for driverless cars, albeit with the United States military specifically in mind (DARPA 2004).

Certain aspects of driverless cars are already in operation today in many forms. Some manufacturers have developed adaptive cruise control systems where the speed of the vehicle is not fully based on driver input but instead, on the traffic surrounding it. Speeding up and slowing down as needs be in the ebb and flow of modern driving. Other cars have a system which keeps the vehicle in between the lines on the road, preventing lane drifting and potentially serious accidents by moving into another lane with a car in the drivers blind spot. One of the more useful automatic features some new cars have (specifically Volvos), is pedestrian safety technology, which detects if a pedestrian steps out in front of the driver and if no input is detected to avoid a collision, it applies the brakes automatically (Volvo Cars 2011).

What if the direction taken is completely different? What if cars do not become driverless and humans remain fully in control of vehicles? This is a possibility, where people fight against the increasing amount of technology and do not want a piece of silicone deciding where and what the car goes and does. Social factors such as this will play a massive part in the future of the world and not just the automation of cars. Forcing people to accept new technology in something as potentially lethal as driving could go either way. Granted, it has been achieved many times in the past, though in a less deadly form, with technology such DVD’s, Blu-Rays, and even ATM’s.

The direction in which the technology is most likely to take is somewhere between complete automation and having the driver in control. This would give the driver an option of whether or not they are in complete control one day, enjoying the thrill of driving, or the next day, letting the car do the driving whilst the driver catches up on some work.

If the interactions in vehicles is looked at from a different view point future cars could lead to somewhat of an uprising in many different disciplines. In the late 1990’s, the head of Ford’s design department, J Mays, enrolled the help of renowned product designer, Marc Newson and created the Ford 021C (Argyriades, 2009). A car that was designed more from a product design point of view rather than an automotive design one. It was applauded form the product designers as it was thought to increase the usability and functionality of certain amounts of the cars features. From an automotive design point of view it was, in short, slated. Many thought it looked far too much like a toy car, that was far too simple and didn’t adhere to the unwritten ‘rules’ that were set out in the field.

Trying to take into consideration the past and present forays of interactions and computers in cars, where is the future of this field headed? Will it be awash with self driving vehicles or will it be a technical tour de force with computers allowing drivers to achieve things they only dreamed would be reality in the past? In essence there are only a few directions technology could lead the design and innovation, but the outcome could be massively different to what we experience now, in our cars that have not really changed much technically in the last century.

Aims:

• Explore the future of interactions in the automotive sector by looking at the possible directions this area may head into.
• The Social aspects of new technologies and implications they may have
• Interactions are often a key part of product design so looking at this would help with my design practice to some extent
• To uncover of direction car manufacturers are taking in terms of technology being included within their vehicles
• To look at current interactions to show what needs to be improved, in detail which would be useful for the wider audience to try and take note and compensate for such inadequacies.

Objectives:

• Review the relevant secondary sources of information and provide a comprehensive analysis of the sources
• A report of opinions from people in the automotive industry providing they are able to disclose such information relevant to the topic. Initially these opinions would be gathered using email but later on in the research process, a phone conversation would be more appropriate to get a deeper understanding of the subject.
• Discuss whether or not the current interfaces in cars are adequate in what their function is, and if they are in fact distracting the driver
• Collate opinions from people about current interactions in vehicles and what they think the next steps should be and additionally what they would like to see to make their driving lives better

Keywords:

Computer, car, future, interaction, interface

Bibliography

• Argyriades, M. Ten years later // FORD 021C by Marc Newson. yatzer, [online] 01 October 2009. Available at: <http://www.yatzer.com/Ten-years-later-FORD-021C-by-Marc-Newson> [Accessed 07 March 2011]
• BBC, 2009. Top Driver Distractions Revealed. BBC News, [online] 27 September 2009. Available at: <http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/8277436.stm> [Accessed 24 November 2010].
• BBC, 2008. The future of interaction?. BBC Click, [online]17 October 2008. Available at: <http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/7676552.stm> [Accessed 24 November 2010]
• Bisaik, P. and Womack, A., 2004. Computers in Cars. [online] Available at: <http://www.uri.edu/personal2/pbisiak/computers_in_automobiles.htm> [Accessed 24 November 2010]
• DARPA, 2004. Grand Challenge 2005: DARPA Schedules Autonomous Robotic Ground Vehicles Event. [press release], 08 June 2004, Available at: <http://archive.darpa.mil/grandchallenge05/InitialPressRelease.pdf&gt; [Accessed 09 March 2011]
• Diem, R.. 2009. DARPA Events Inspire 2011 Autonomous-Vehicle Challenge. [ONLINE] Available at: http://wardsauto.com/ar/darpa_2011_challenge_091125/. [Accessed 04 March 11].
• DiTullo, M. 2011. Car of the Future. Designophile, [online] 31 January 2011. Available at: <http://designmind.frogdesign.com/blog/car-of-the-future.html> [Accessed 5 March 2011]
• Gizmag, 2004. The future of the human-computer interface. [online] Available at: <http://www.gizmag.com/go/3519/> [Accessed 24 November 2010]
• Kim, K. and Ramakrishna, R.S., 1999, Vision-Based Eye-Gazing for Human Computer Interface, 2, pp.324-29
• Eyben, F. et al., 2010, Emotion on the Road – Necessity, Acceptance, and Feasibility of Affective Computing in the Car, Volume 2010, pp.1-17
• Gordh, M. Dissertation Help Enquiry. Email to: D. Wood. 28 February 2011 [28 February 2011.] Personal communication.
• Horrell, P. 2007. Behold the all-seeing, self-parking, safety-enforcing, networked car. CNN Technology, [online] 15 March 2007. Available at: <http://edition.cnn.com/2007/TECH/03/09/cars.intelligence.popsci/index.html> [Accessed 5 March 2011]
• Humphreys, M. Dissertation Help Enquiry. Email to: D. Wood. 28 February 2011 [28 February 2011.] Personal communication.
• Laurens, R.. 2009. Car Computer History. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.ehow.com/about_5082250_car-computer-history.html. [Accessed 04 March 11].
• Lewin, T. and Borroff, R. (2010). How To Design Cars Like A Pro. New Edition. ed. Minneapolis: MBI Publishing Company.
• Macey, S., 2009. H-Point: The fundamentals of car design & packaging, Design Studio Press
• Moggridge, B., 2007, Designing Interactions. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
• Norman, D.A., 1988, The Design of Everyday Things. New York: Basic Books
• Objectified, 2009, [DVD] Directed by Gary Hustwit
• Patrick W. Jordan, 2000. Designing Pleasurable Products: An Introduction to the New Human Factors. 1 Edition. CRC Press.
• Preece, J.and Sharp, H., 2007. Interaction Design: Beyond Human-Computer Interaction. 2nd ed. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons
• Shahmanesh-Banks, N. (2011). Cabin Fever. Esquire. 1, Issue March 2011, pp.80-81.
• Stanford Racing Team, 2007. Enter “Junior”: Stanford team’s next-generation robot joins DARPA Urban Challenge. [press release], 17 February 2007, Available at: <http://www-cs.stanford.edu/group/roadrunner/pdfs/final_SRTrelease_junior.pdf> [Accessed 5 March 2011]
• Volvo Cars, 2010, Tests within the development of safe road train technology soon ready for takeoff. Press Release, 24 November 2010
• Volvo Cars, 2010. VOLVO UNVEILS INNOVATIVE SAFETY TECHNOLOGY – PEDESTRAIN DETECTION WITH FULL AUTO BRAKE DEBUTS ON THE ALL-NEW VOLVO S60. [press release], 02 March 2010, Available at: <https://www.media.volvocars.com/us/enhanced/en-us/Media/Preview.aspx?mediaid=31773> [Accessed 09 March 2011]
• Whelan, A. Dissertation Help Enquiry. Email to: D. Wood. 28 February 2011 [28 February 2011.] Personal communication.
• Wishnow, 2006. TED: Jeff Han (2006) Ideas Worth Sharing. Available at: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JcSu7h-I40&feature=player_embedded> [Accessed 24 November 2010]

 

 

#94 Two 500 Words HT30007 – Assignment 4

1. 500 words about the journal “Emotion on the Road”

The main purpose of this article is to discuss the main research development in automobiles in the near future regarding driver assistance and natural driver-car communication. It provides an overview on work related to influence many aspects of car use such as comfort, automatic recognition, and improvement of in-car interfaces through the use of case scenarios.

The key question in which the author is addressing is whether or not the incorporation of computers in cars are necessary, affective and feasible in current situations.

The most important information in this article is that interacting with different (non primary) functions of the car whilst driving can be distracting to the driver and hence dangerous. This can be counteracted by computers sensing different moods the driver is in and delaying certain functions. New interactions for automobiles are tested thoroughly in order to determine the difficulty of operation in certain driving conditions and scenarios. Emotions are the key issue in general human computer interaction and also in the in-car communication. Looking at the short and long term memories of the driver or occupants of the vehicle is also important for the technology being implemented in vehicles, testing this can help to possibly predict the drivers state based on driving and head tracking. The technology included in cars is very much user driven. The person driving the car may want a certain interaction to make their job a little bit easier. If there are enough requests for this and it can be safely implemented after testing it with a high fidelity prototype, the chances of it going into production are very high. The interactions need to ensure they work with the driver and not against as this could lead to frustration and hence possible danger. The interfaces definitely influence the driver and passengers emotional states. Angry drivers can be calmed down. Tired drivers can be prevented from falling asleep at the wheel. Confused drivers or drivers unaware of oncoming obstructions can be warned in advance and can then plan a different route. For a system to be accepted by the user, it is widely accepted that the user should be able to have full control over the technology and be able to turn it off or mute it at any time they want. This would make the user feel more comfortable in the car because they would feel that they had complete control of it.

The key secondary sources consist mainly of journals looking at both driving in general but also the psychological mindset behind both driving and operating computers such as Accident Analysis and Prevention and Proceedings of the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI ’05). Both texts would be useful to look into further. A multitude of texts relating to artificial intelligence, speech, signals and robotics are also present but not in the same sort of numbers as that of the others mentioned previously.

There does not appear to be many if at any primary resources in the article. At the start of the paper, it stated that it was a giving an extensive literary overview, suggesting that most of the research done on the paper was secondary research.

If we were to ignore what the author is saying in the article about the increasing technologies in cars and safety, the world may very well become a much more dangerous place, especially on the roads. Everyone needs to pay attention and only use the technology when it is safe to do so.

 

2. 500 words about “Futures and Alternative Nows” from “Designing Interactions”

The main purpose of this article is discussing the futures of interactions, or as the article states, alternative nows. It interviews a number of current designers and they give examples of products or projects they like or have had a role in producing.

The author is addressing the question of what the future holds for interaction design, and pitching that towards designers such as Tony Dunne and Fiona Raby. The main point which is put across in the interview with Dunne and Raby is that it is not necessarily futures that people think about when discussing the future of interaction design or design in general, but the alternative nows, in other words, what would happen to a product such as a television if we had different values.

The research done in this article is almost all primary research. Bill Moggridge, when writing this book, went out and interviewed all of the designers himself to gauge their opinion of the topic(s) which were being discussed. Secondary research would have been carried out by the designers for the pieces they talked about such as John Maeda talking about some of the projects he carried out at MIT.

Maeda hints at the notion that designing for the future takes a lot of planning well in advance and uses Apple as an example. He states that when Apple launched the iDisk, he thought they were making a wrong move because no one would use information servers, which are used to store peoples personal data, an idea or service commonly referred to as the cloud today, but without the planning of iDisk, Apples later offerings of services such as iTunes would not have been successful as they have been.

Another point which Maeda states is that technology doesn’t necessarily make things better for the user. When he went to do product design in Japan in 1991, there were not computers and if he made a mistake he couldn’t easily undo it so it made him a better designer.

The final designer interviewed was Jun Rekimoto, who works on the interfaces of the future working in the Interaction Laboratory in Sony. One of the first things he worked on at Sony and the thing which is one of the most interesting for the future, is Augmented reality. This area of technology is making steps forward all the time and it is only a matter of time before it is more commonly used.

Rekimoto talks about gestural interfaces, and how they are likely to become the most preferred form of input in computing. Products such as the iPhone or iPad are key examples of this with their pinch to zoom and swipe to scroll gestures already being used on millions of products worldwide. He finishes with the opinion that in the future, or near future as he puts it, everyone will carry some sort of sensor which carries all of the users personal preferences and messages, making it easier for them to sit down at another computer rather than their own and carry on with their work, or have all of their data right there in front of them.

Due to the nature of this topic discussing the future of interaction design, there aren’t any implications of what would happen if we were to ignore the author. Everything that is being said about the future is still speculation as no one is able to predict the future, only make paths towards a certain future.

#87 Dissertation Workshop

As mentioned in post 85, on the morning of Wednesday the 27th of October, we had a dissertation workshop, which aimed to get us in the mindset for planning and thinking about our dissertation. Held in the Union, we were all told to go into each of our respective groups and to go through a number of tasks.

Task 1 was the initial ideas of our dissertation topic, where we had to break it down into themes then to write out the main theme. Task 2 was to think about 6 main things to think about whilst writing a dissertation such as time management and will the subject challenge you? The third task was looking at what sort of questions you would ask or discuss and the final task was the starting of the planning stage.

Hopefully the work done so far on it will be beneficial and I can continue on with my desired topic, The Divergence of the Human Computer Interface in Automobiles, or at least something along the lines of the future of Human Computer Interactions.