<p>När vi inledde vårt uppsatsskrivande var Landstinget i Värmland i färd med att införa ett nytt standardsystem för vårdinformatik. Systemet var Cambio Cosmic, och vi fick uppdraget att utvärdera dess användbarhet.</p><p>Syftet med uppsatsen är att undersöka om användarna anser att systemet är anpassat till dem. Vi ville även se om systemet Cambio Cosmic brister i användbarheten ur teoretisk synpunkt, samt om några förändringar skulle kunna göras för att förbättra dessa eventuella brister.</p><p>Utvärderingen utfördes i två steg. Först genomfördes en heuristisk utvärdering av systemet, under vilken vi själva utvärderade Cambio Cosmic enligt elva på förhand fastställda användbarhetsprinciper. Med den heuristiska utvärderingens resultat som bas, utformade vi sedan ett användningstest som genomfördes med sex testpersoner. Resultaten från användningstesterna och den heuristiska utvärderingen ställdes sedan mot varandra för att kunna fastställa huruvida Cambio Cosmic hade brister i användbarheten eller inte.</p><p>Utvärderingen gav två bilder av Cambio Cosmic. Ur heuristisk synpunkt visade sig systemet brista i användbarheten. Dock gav användningstesterna en annorlunda bild av systemet. Testpersonerna var positivt inställda till systemet, och hade överseende med de brister som de stötte på. De förändringar som skulle kunna göras i Cambio Cosmic för en ökad användbarhet rör framförallt enhetlighet och misstagsförhindrande, då främst i modulen Tidbok.</p> / <p>In 2005, Landstinget in Värmland was about to implement a new system for healthcare administration. The system was Cambio Cosmic, and we were assigned to evaluate its usability.</p><p>The purpose of this essay is to study whether the users consider the system to be adapted to them. We also wanted to see if Cambio Cosmic had any usability deficiencies from a theoretic point of view and, if so, what could be done to correct those flaws.</p><p>The evaluation consisted of two steps. First, a heuristic evaluation was carried out, during which we ourselves evaluated the system based on eleven principals for usability. From the result of the heuristic evaluation, we designed usability tests that were carried out using six test users. We compared the results from the two evaluations in order to determine whether Cambio Cosmic had usability deficiencies or not.</p><p>The evaluation gave two images of Cambio Cosmic. From a heuristic point of view, the system clearly had usability deficiencies. The usability tests, however, presented a different view. The test users were sympathetic towards the system, and showed indulgence for deficiencies they encountered. The changes that could be made for an increased usability are mainly regarding consistency and standards and error prevention.</p>

Loosely coupled workgroups are common in the real world, and workers in these groups are autonomous and weakly interdependent. They have patterns of work and collaboration that distinguish them from other types of groups, and groupware systems that are designed to support loose coupling must address these differences. However, they have not been studied in detail in Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW), and the design process for these groups is currently underspecified. This forces designers to start from scratch each time they develop a system for loosely coupled groups, and they must approach new work settings with little information about how work practices are organized. <br><br> In this dissertation, I present a design framework to improve the groupware design process for loosely coupled workgroups. The framework has three main parts that add a new layer of support to each of the three stages in the general groupware design process: data collection about the target work setting, analysis of the data, and system design based on the analysis results. The framework was developed to provide designers with support during each of these stages so that they can consider important characteristics of loosely coupled work practice while carrying out design for the target group. The design framework is based on information from CSCW and organizational research, and on real-world design experiences with one type of loosely coupled workgrouphome care treatment teams. <br><br> The framework was evaluated using observations, interviews, and field trials that were carried out with multidisciplinary home care treatment teams in Saskatoon Health Region. A series of field observations and interviews were carried out with team members from each of the home care disciplines. The framework was then used to develop Mohoc, a groupware system that supports work in home care. Two field trials were carried out where the system was used by teams to support their daily activities. Results were analyzed to determine how well each part of the design framework performed in the design process. The results suggest that the framework was able to fill its role in specializing the general CSCW design process for loosely coupled groups by adding consideration for work and collaboration patterns that are seen in loosely coupled settings. However, further research is needed to determine whether these findings generalize to other loosely coupled workgroups.

With the rise of mobile computing and an ever-growing variety of ubiquitous sensors, computers are becoming increasingly context-aware. A revolutionary step in this process that has seen much progress will be user-awareness: the ability of a computing device to infer its user's emotions. This research project attempts to study the effectiveness of enabling a computer to adapt its visual interface to counter user frustration. A two-group experiment was designed to engage participants in a goal-oriented task disguised as a simple usability study with a performance incentive. Five frustrating stimuli were triggered throughout a single 15-minute task in the form of complete system unresponsiveness or delay. An algorithm was implemented to attempt to detect sudden rises in user arousal measured via a skin conductance sensor. Following a successful detection, or otherwise a maximum of a 10-second delay, the application resumed responsiveness. In the control condition, participants were exposed to a “please wait” pop-up near the end of the delay whereas those in the adaption condition were exposed to an additional visual transition to a user interface with calming colours and larger touch targets. This proposed adaptive condition was hypothesized to reduce the recovery time associated with the frustration response. The experiment was successfully able to induce frustration (via measurable skin conductance responses) in the majority of trials. The mean recovery half-time of participants in the first trial adaptive condition was significantly longer than that of the control. This was attributed to a possibility of a large chromatic difference between the adaptive and control colour schemes, habituation and prediction, causal association of adaptation to the frustrating stimulus, as well as insufficient subtlety in the transition and visual look of the adaptive interface. The study produced findings and guidelines that will be crucial in the future design of adaptive affective user interfaces.

The smarter homes of tomorrow promise to increase comfort, aid elderly and disabled people, and help inhabitants save energy. Unfortunately, smart homes today are far from this vision – people who already live in such a home struggle with complicated user interfaces, inflexible home configurations, and difficult installation procedures. Under these circumstances, smart homes are not ready for mass adoption. This dissertation addresses these issues by proposing two smart assistants for smart homes. The first assistant is a recommender system that suggests useful services (i.e actions that the home can perform for the user). The recommended services are fitted to the user’s current situation, habits, and preferences. With these recommendations it is possible to build much simpler user interfaces that highlight the most interesting choices currently available. Configuration becomes much more flexible: since the recommender system automatically learns user habits, user routines no longer have to be manually described. Evaluations with two smart home datasets show that the correct service is included in the top five recommendations in 90% of all cases. The second assistant addresses the difficult installation procedures. The unique feature of this assistant is that it removes the need for manually describing device functionalities (such descriptions are needed by the recommender system). Instead, users can simply plug in a new device, begin using it, and let the installation assistant identify what the device is doing. The installation assistant has minimal requirements for manufacturers of smart home devices and was successfully integrated with an existing smart home. Evaluations performed with this smart home show that the assistant can quickly and reliably learn device functionalities. / <p>QC 20130924</p>

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Sammanfattning: Det är minst lika många människor som besöker arrangemang och gudstjänster i kyrkor som besöker idrottsevenemang. Det behövs studiogudstjänster dock sänds det allt färre Tv-gudstjänster direkt från kyrkor och medlen för att göra detta är också på väg att minskas. Många som ser dessa gudstjänster har av olika orsaker inte möjlighet att besöka en kyrka. Detta kan t ex bero på funktionshinder och sjukdom men också att många äldre har svårt att förflytta sig och se gudstjänster live. Ett sätt för kyrkorna att nå ut på bredare front skulle kunna vara att använda sig av Internet som media. Syftet med uppsatsen är att genom intervjuer, användningstestning och slutligen prototyptestning, ta fram en lösning för digital överföring av ljud och bild från ett ställe till ett annat via ett IP-nätverk och finna en avvägning mellan det tekniska och användbarheten då användaren har begränsad teknisk kunskap. Vid datainsamlingen användes en kvalitativ forskningsprocess med intervjuer och observation som insamlingstekniker. Vid användningstesterna användes observation som metod och testpersonerna uppmanades att tänka högt. Analysen av testerna visade vikten av att minimera inblandning av för mycket teknik i lösningarna då områdeskunskapen hos användare varierar kraftigt.

This paper intends to describe the work and result of the design project Meet App. Meet App lets users interact around their current locations in a direct manner. The user experience is evaluated to get an understanding of the usefulness and interaction with this type of design. The project is related to the context-awareness research field where findings put the project in a greater whole. The result indicates usefulness and enjoyment interacting with the application, but because of the low number of participants the findings cannot be validated.

Loosely coupled workgroups are common in the real world, and workers in these groups are autonomous and weakly interdependent. They have patterns of work and collaboration that distinguish them from other types of groups, and groupware systems that are designed to support loose coupling must address these differences. However, they have not been studied in detail in Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW), and the design process for these groups is currently underspecified. This forces designers to start from scratch each time they develop a system for loosely coupled groups, and they must approach new work settings with little information about how work practices are organized. <br><br> In this dissertation, I present a design framework to improve the groupware design process for loosely coupled workgroups. The framework has three main parts that add a new layer of support to each of the three stages in the general groupware design process: data collection about the target work setting, analysis of the data, and system design based on the analysis results. The framework was developed to provide designers with support during each of these stages so that they can consider important characteristics of loosely coupled work practice while carrying out design for the target group. The design framework is based on information from CSCW and organizational research, and on real-world design experiences with one type of loosely coupled workgrouphome care treatment teams. <br><br> The framework was evaluated using observations, interviews, and field trials that were carried out with multidisciplinary home care treatment teams in Saskatoon Health Region. A series of field observations and interviews were carried out with team members from each of the home care disciplines. The framework was then used to develop Mohoc, a groupware system that supports work in home care. Two field trials were carried out where the system was used by teams to support their daily activities. Results were analyzed to determine how well each part of the design framework performed in the design process. The results suggest that the framework was able to fill its role in specializing the general CSCW design process for loosely coupled groups by adding consideration for work and collaboration patterns that are seen in loosely coupled settings. However, further research is needed to determine whether these findings generalize to other loosely coupled workgroups.

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) for chronic care are increasingly being researched in Human-Computer Interaction. One of the current health management areas where ICTs have been employed is in supporting communications between patients and physicians. This is particularly relevant for patients suffering from chronic diseases since there is evidence that better communication leads to better health outcomes. Researchers are investigating different chronic diseases to design and test technology interventions to promote better chronic disease care. However, few have investigated pediatric asthma as a case study for designing communication technologies. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimated in 2008 that 300 million people suffer from asthma, and that asthma is the most common chronic illness among children. Asthma interferes with breathing by preventing airflow into the lungs. It is difficult to determine the actual cause of asthma and to predict who will have asthma. These unique challenges provide opportunities to investigate pediatric asthma management. To address these challenges, I have conducted a series of studies with pediatric asthma patients, families, and healthcare providers to better understand their needs, challenges and strategies regarding the use of technologies. I have conducted interviews, a focus group, and a technology probe study to create and refine initial technology designs for children with asthma and their caregivers. Based on the Health Belief Model (HBM), patient-provider communications, and my findings in the prior studies, I designed a mobile and web service to increase asthma knowledge and symptom/management awareness in the child for better health outcomes, and to affect the perceived quality of interaction with healthcare providers. I show the results of my two field deployment studies with total 65 patients to learn how the system affected their practices and health outcomes. My contributions come from an increased understanding in three areas: physician-patient communication via a mobile and web services; ubiquitous communication technology designs to improve current pediatric asthma practices; and controlled evaluation of a ubiquitous communication technology, SMS, in the field.