Reading Response 4: What is Interaction Design?

The chapter one "What is interaction design" gives me an extensive definition of this term "interaction design". In order to prevent myself from forgetting those precious tutorials and establish solid foundation of my study , I abstract the essential contents and record them in this response, including reflections toward our group project, which can work as guaidances to make quality interactive products. 

At the beginning, it shows examples of good and bad design, indicating what are the criteria for well designed ones. A lot of factors should be taken into account to design easy, effective and enjoyable products, like who is the target users, how and where they are going to be used. Particularly, understanding users' potential activities when interacting with them and developing appropriate interface is crucial to optimize interactive experience.

Then, it answers the question of what is interaction design and the definition is "about creating user experiences that enhance and augment the way people work, communicate, and interact". But the explanation that actually solves my puzzle is the vivd analogy of how architects and civil engineers differ from each other, thus I get to know I am designing the features of a house, not the technicians to build it, namely, designers come up with creative, usable blueprint of a product, then make it realized by professinoals in technical areas. This section is illustracted in three parts, components, who involved, consultants. Through reading it,  I understand most design is done by multidisciplinary team, as it needs a wide range of skill sets to accomplish the task and consultancies have been established to meet the increasing demand of excellent designs, hoping I can find a job in one of those enterprises.

Next, it stresses the central importance of user experience. Obviously, whether users enjoy the product is the determining factor of its success or failure. I like this sentence, "It is important to point out that one can not design a user experience, only design for a user experience". So designers must consider users' likes and dislikes to get satisfying impression about the overall products, even the specific components of them.

Futhermore, it articulates the process of  interaction design, addressing users' role again by providing various ways of  how to conduct user-centered approach, like filling in questionnaires, testing the product and codesigning. In addition, being aware of expectations of distinctive age groups, peoples' sensitivities and cultural differences is the essential part for getting good feedback.

The part of "usability goals" informs me to think over effectivess, efficiency, safety, utility, learnability, memorability about our group project "Classroom Anti-distracion System". I can not help asking myself questions like does it require much effort to get used to and operate it skilly from both students' and teachers' perspective. We should keep an eye on applying  the core design principles, such as visibility, feedback, constraints, consistency, and affordances into practice, making a difference to our group project.

Reading Response 3: Creative Ideas of Perfect Webpages

World Wide Web has been leading an indispensable role in our everyday life. I always appreciate its multi-functionality that brings me wonders, ample resources and entertainment. I have never known how many detailed things should be taken into consideration and done by website designers until I read the Chpater 2: Optimizing the User Experience. The content of chapter 2 leads me into a world of creative ideas about how to establish user-friendly websites. I also come up with my own perspectives of making webpage designs consistent with pepole actually want.

1.  Eliminate or diminish some forms of advertising, especially the floating ones. Those floating advertisemens often float upon the area where you are reading, so you must wait for their leave, which terribly annoys,  wastes time and challenges patience. I hope webpages can provide people with a free, relaxed  environment for surfing, not disturbed by those troublesome advertisements.

2. Display time in accordance with where you are. For example, I use Qzone (a kind of blog) to share my colorful living experience in Canada with my parents and friends in China. But when I see comments they posted or messages left on my Qzone, the system display the Beijing Time, not the Calgary Time, which often confuses me and sometimes makes mistakes. Concequently, I hope webpages should show users the accurate time on the basis of where they are.

3. Memorize information before time outs. Some pages are designed to 'time out' automatically due to security reasons, but I regard it not convenient. When I bought my airline ticket from Beijing to Calgary on the aircanada website, the 'time out' system really bothers me. Because I had to choose flight, preferable seat, and fill in a lot of information within limited time, if I had to be apart for minutes without finishing it, the session would expire without storing what I input so that I had to repeat the same steps unfortunately. I think it is greatly helpful to memorize information users input, such as forms before 'time out'. In this way, we will not spend unnecessarily extra time repeating the process. 

4. Print the section you like. Designers should develop a kind of printing system available for various browsers, which enables you to print the part of webpage you are interested in, not the whole page with irrelevant content.

Although World Wide Web is already incredibly amazing, it still has points to improve. Designers should conduct a survey to know what users desire to successfully complete the task of optimizing the user experience, meanwhile users should have an eye on the deficits to help design process.

Reading Response 2：Hiding Beautiful Views Enhance Greater?

I was puzzled by the "Pattern 134: Zen View",which illustrates that building huge windows that look onto the beautiful view incessantly may spoil the sight and architects should put the windows on the places where the scenery can only be glimpsed at a certain time. As a universal design principle, it is based on the concern that human brain usually adapts to repeated experiences and responds again when something new is presented. That is to say people get used to the beauty they see every day and no longer have passions for it, only when the chances to see the view are restrained can it stays alive forever. But I doubt whether this principle is really useful and appropriate for all of us.

I think this principle has little practical use. Human beings have desires that continually change and can never be fully satisfied. When I was a undergraduate student, I lived in a small dormitory equipped with simple appliances. At that period of time I missed my large bedroom so much, but when I came home I missed my warm and lovely dormitory. Does any architect have the magic to integrate my bedroom and dormitory into a dreamland that can change its style according to my variable needs? The answer is actually impossible. So pepole may think hiding beautiful views enhance greater today, then believe enjoying it ceaselessly values greater tomorrow.

I think the best solution is to be diverse, like putting huge windows on different places in one house, one on the transition places—along paths, on stairs, one in the room where people spend most of their time—bedroom,dining room. Using this method, "Buddist monks" can appreciate restrained views while most of us who are unable to resist the temptation to envolve ourselves in such beauty can stare at it for 24 hours a day if they like.

This principle can be applied to the teaching field. Educators should provide enough teaching and learning materials, multiple teaching equipment such as PPT, flash,  movies to enrich the class so that students can choose the one suitable to their taste.