“Maintaining awareness of the whereabouts of young active children" project is intended for parents who feel the need to track the whereabouts of their children. Such device gives some peace of mind to anxious parents, especially since children tend not to answer their phone straight away. Such devices can also be useful if you’ve momentarily lost a child in a mall, park or other public places. Knowing that their parents can locate them at any given time, such device can also be reassuring for the children, particularly if they get lost in crowded places such as fairs.
Such devices are usually designed for kids age 3 plus.
Such design problem was chosen as kids usually don’t want their parents to know what they are up to. If they decide to switch it off, the user or system application cannot track location. A solution would be for the device to be with a non-removable battery.
They can switch on and off their location sharing when they feel like it and hence the device cannot be allocated
A solution would be for the tracking device to use a combination of WiFi, cellular networks, GPS and Bluetooth. In such a case, the device will be no reliant on WiFi, which can be a problem in crowded areas where there is an overloaded WiFi network and therefore the WiFi signals are weak.
Another solution would be for the device to allow the account administrator only to change any family locator setting.
Question 1: Design context: areas to explore
Table 2.1 identifies the areas on which to focus and potential questions to answer when establishing requirements. Focus on the ‘Activity’ and ‘Physical environment’ rows in the table.
Describe aspects of the user activity and physical environment that need to be considered in order to establish the requirements for your particular interactive product, justifying your answer for each aspect you identify.
TABLE 2.1 DESIGN CONTEXT (ACTIVITY AND ENVIRONMENT) QUESTIONS
Activity • What are the key activities the interactive product is meant to support?
• What kind of activities? Simple? Complex?
• Is the scope of the activities constrained? How might the scope vary? How much variation must be accommodated?
• Is the activity safety critical (e.g. driving or flying a fighter plane)? Is it normally conducted in a context that might divert attention (e.g. climbing a mountain, working in a factory, troubleshooting on the flight deck, using medical instruments)?
• Do the products assume anything about the characteristics of the user?
• What are the likely different user perspectives?
Physical environment • Is the physical environment constraining (e.g. weather, noise, danger)?
• Is the physical environment stable or variable (e.g. on a train)?
• What about the physical environment may change (e.g. people, objects, conditions)?
• Does the physical environment require or assume interaction with other tools and resources?
Question: 2 Methods for requirements gathering
Identify at least TWO methods that you could use in order to explore the issues you identified in Question 1 and to gather the requirements.
a. Explain briefly how you would use each method.
b. Describe what kind of data you would collect.
c. Discuss what you might gain from using more than one method. Consider how the data from the different methods might differ, and how it might be combined to provide understanding of the design requirements.
Write between 300 and 400 words in total.
Question 3: Planning an interview
Plan a 30-minute (approx.) interview that you will carry out with a representative from your user group. Address each of the following questions, which will help you to form an interview plan.
a. Briefly describe the user you will interview and explain why you chose them.
b. Prepare and include a copy of the consent form that you will use.
c. Explain where you will conduct the interview, including the set-up, and why.
d. List the main questions you will ask.
Write between 300 and 500 words, excluding the consent form.
Question 4: Establishing requirements
NOTE: you must answer this question only AFTER you have completed the interview.
Based on the notes you took during and after the interview:
a. Describe an activity that the interviewee currently carries out, or would like to carry out, for which your interactive design project could provide support. Discuss any challenges they encounter in conducting the activity and explain why they consider it to be problematic (if indeed they do).
b. Identify three requirements that emerge from the interview.
c. Write (or draw and annotate) a scenario, which summarises how the interviewee currently carries out the activity and which represents and clarifies the requirements you have identified.
d. Having written or drawn the scenario, state two questions that you would ask to better understand one of the three requirements you have identified.
Write between 300 and 500 words (less if your answer to c is drawn rather than written).