ASSIGNMENT BRIEF
Smart Home System
This assignment enables you to apply the Human Computer Interaction design and evaluation
techniques learned in this module. For this assignment, you are appointed as Systems Designer
in developing an efficient system interface layout for the Smart Home system.
Your task is to design an interactive system, to provide precise information for the home users to
monitor and manage their work tasks using technology. The interactive environment allows users
to interact with the system's features. You do not need to build a working system, but you can
use low fidelity prototyping to evaluate the likely effectiveness and usability of this sort of
interaction.
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A smart home or building is a home or building, usually a new one that is equipped with special
structured wiring to enable occupants to remotely control or program an array of automated
home electronic devices remotely.
Your high-tech home starts with a backbone for your telephones and TV's. From there you can
add controls for Internet access, intercom, whole house audio, home theatre, video, surveillance,
automation and much more.
For example, a homeowner can use their phone from inside the home to control domestic
'systems', but even better, when at work or on vacation they can also use the smartphone 'app' to
arm a home security system, check CC TV, control central heating / air conditioning thermostats,
switch appliances on or off, control lighting, program a home theatre or entertainment system,
and perform many other tasks.
There are two aspects to this system, a controller application running on a computer based in the
home, and a smartphone 'app'. In this assignment I'd like you to focus on the day to day use of
the smartphone app.
The reference above gives you some initial ideas of the probable functionality. However, you
can further add your own imagination and creativity to make your Smart Home system to be
more attractive and usable.
NOTE:
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The above scenario is intentionally brief, to enable students to produce a sensible draft set of
requirements based on the level of understanding. In reality, more information may be needed to
establish a clear set of requirements. You may make your own assumptions to make the
presentation attractive.
ASSIGNMENT TASKS
1. Detailed Requirements Study / Analysis of the System
(a) Produce a user profile that describes the general characteristics of the users that you
might expect to be using this system. Also create at least one persona. You should
consider user factors that are likely to have an impact on the usability of the system.
You should identify in your discussion of the profile why you believe the aspects you
identified may have an impact on the usability of the product for different people.
[15 marks]
[TOTAL: 15 MARKS]
2. Systems Design
(a) Produce a simple paper prototype of a design of your own Smart Home system.
Make sure that this prototype at least demonstrates system functionality and how the
users will interact with the new system to perform the task. The screens should be
annotated with interface specification and include 5 usability principles applied in the
system design. You should discuss with your facilitator the way paper prototypes can
be constructed, and used in evaluation.
[15 marks]
(b) Discuss the selection of the 5 usability principles applied in the screen design and
justify the selection in relation to the system requirements and the user type. You
should be able to say why you believe your design is likely to make the system
usable.
[10 marks]
(c) Use Hierarchical Task Analysis (HTA) to develop a task analysis for one task that
you think still may be difficult to perform, or which you feel may cause usability
problems in your own design.
[15 marks]
[TOTAL: 40 MARKS]
3. User Evaluation
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Comment: Systems are usually not perfect in their initial designs; therefore, the purpose of
formative evaluation is NOT to prove that the design is usable, but to identify the parts of
the design that can be improved. A good evaluation is one that finds areas of the design
that can be fixed and improved.
You will need to collect data from at least one potential user, using a simple prototype (for
example a paper prototype or a VERY SIMPLE non functional software prototype).
(a) Procedure
Describe the process of evaluation. The plan should describe each step you intend to
take, how you introduce the prototype to the user, how data is collected during the
interaction, and how you intend to analyse the data you collect.
Data Collection Plan
Develop a plan of the data that will be collected to evaluate the system. Provide a
simple analysis or summary of the data you have collected, and the original data
(where possible) in an appendix to the coursework. You will need to prepare
information for your user about the nature and purpose of the evaluation, (NOT a
user guide). Include these documents with your coursework. Don’t forget to consider
alternative techniques such as verbal protocols, questionnaires and eye-tracking, and
provide some justification for the method that you choose.
[15 marks]
(b) Evaluation
Evaluate with at least one user using your paper prototype, the task described in
Q1 (b). Collect and include some data from at least one user (we have chosen a
system where very little additional knowledge is required to use the system so you
can collect data from almost anyone, but do consider all the available options).
[15 marks]
(c) Sketch a new interface design based on the findings of the evaluation (you may find
it easiest to produce a new paper prototype or to annotate existing screens to show
where changes have been made). You must use an evidence based approach, where
you explicitly use the findings from the evaluation to support your proposed changes.
Justify your changes with some bullet points. (It is extremely unusual for a system to
be perfectly usable in its original form, so we would expect that you will usually be
able to identify areas where the system can be improved.)
[15 marks]
[TOTAL: 45 MARKS]
The submissions should be in MS-Word format to a word count of 2000 words for the main
report excluding the appendix references. Preferred font is Times New Roman 12. Paragraphing
and subheadings are to be used wherever appropriate.
[TOTAL MARKS: 100 MARKS]
ADDITIONAL INSTRUCTIONS / INFORMATION TO THE STUDENTS
(a) Submission to turnitin.com
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You MUST submit the plagiarism report from turnitin.com with your coursework to the
Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). If you do not submit the plagiarism report, your
coursework will NOT be marked.
Work must be submitted by the stated deadlines in order not to incur a penalty.
(b) Assessment Criteria
You are expected to achieve the following in order to attain higher marks:
A clear and effective synthesis of theory and practice.
A high quality of analysis of activities of your design.
A thorough evaluation of the system.
You are expected to deliver a coherent report and not a set of ‘discrete /
disconnected’ mini-reports.
Read the marking guidelines carefully before attempting the assignment so that you can
tailor your answers to get the maximum points.
(c) Suggested Format of your Report
1. Declaration Page
2. Table of Contents
3. System Analysis
4. System Design
5. System Evaluation
6. List of References
7. Plagiarism Report (from turnitin.com)