Here is an introduction on User Experience:
http://abcofdesign.com/2008/07/user-experience-introduction.html
or more detailed aspects: http://www.montparnas.com/articles/what-is-user-experience-design/

“User experience design is a complex field that is not exactly discrete from all the others mentioned. In essence, user experience draws from each of these fields in order to address the various aspects of a user’s experience. If the user experience is meant to describe the user’s satisfaction with a product, there are a few key elements which need to be addressed. Some of these elements include:
* The fluidity of interactions
o The ability to easily input information
o A quick response time from the system
o An intuitive workflow
* The comprehensibility of the information and features
* A quick and easy progression to feeling comfortable with the system (short learning curve)
* The accuracy of the information presented (correct computational output and proper conveyance)
* The pleasing appearance of the interface

Each of these elements makes up a large part of the user experience. Each is made effective due to the design contributions from each of the following fields:
1. Interaction design
2. Information architecture
3. Usability
4. Human computer interaction
5. Human factors engineering
6. User interface design

User experience is the culmination of all of these parts into one field. Although, user experience design does not wholly contain these fields (that is to say, some research and practices in each of these fields falls outside the realm of the user experience) it does serve to unite many of the principles so as to improve each of the facets of the user experience.”

Another aspect comes into my mind.
The human being is sometimes paradoxal (not to say everytime!).
One wants one thing and the contrary in a next minute.
Some people want to have simple things to use but sometimes they want complex products to manage so that they can “offer” a good image of themselves to the audience, developing specific skills and expertise. It’s the social value of any functionality of a product/service.
I discuss about Home Joule with David Rose last week and he told me that people wanted simple and intuitive things to deal with, especially in energy monitoring (these “enchanted objects”!)..
But on the other side, I recently learnt that in a focus group the same product was not assessed as technical enough in relation of the values of the company which had technical innovation, technical expertise is its brand DNA!

ease of use and intuitivity is another context-influenced aspect.
First it’s a question of space/time influence. We don’t want to be bothered by complex things in the morning when you wake up! You can be more flexible when it happens at the workplace.
Second among other context aspects, the way the product/service is designed is highly influenced by the values of the company that sells it. You cannot imagine a “simple thing” sold my Microsoft (LOL!) or a very un-intuitive service sold by Apple (please no!!!).

Life is neither black nor white, it’s the yin and the yang!

But to conclude, yes, I do agree, if the “web of things” takes its DNA in the internet world, it has to be as simple and intuitive as a browser!! The IPSO
Unfortunately there is a second current of thinking coming from WSN which is not known as being an “human centered field”, especially with all these awful names of protocols!!!

We will see what the future is preparing for the people!

Edouard

The idea of the Web of Things, as Lynn mentioned on her blog, is about doing something that people can use and is intuitive. Something that just “works” and is plug and play, not just something that is supposed to be. I just don’t get why there are no products like that out there, and the ones that exist just don’t blend well with others…

What we’re really trying to do, is to reuse as much as possible of easy to use things, and for me the browser is maybe the most understood application out there… And I don’t see why using devices should be much more complex than checking gmail… The “it just works” for everybody has been just neglected. And I think (good) designers are not just enough “used” when it should…

what you are saying about user-friendly applications / engineers’ work (I’m a part of this community!) is a general problem of over-investment on the resolutions of the problem, on the – sometimes useless – willing to do very complex things for the fun of it, thinking that the user is also an expert, and not seing what’s going on out of your office or what the users are waiting for… and finally not answering the right question!!!

It reminds me a television programme I saw today, in which a famous chef Gordon Ramsey is trying to give a “new life” to some restaurants with high potentialities but not going on the good way (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramsay%27s_Kitchen_Nightmares).
One of these restaurants was the Riviera in Scotland was in a bad situation (no clients!) although the cook team was composed by very talented french chefs… coming from France.

The issue was that the team just wanted to make to most exquisite meals, with the most complexe tastes, with 3 lines description of the meals! The “more and more” problem some people are living in some scientific fields.
Their mistake: they didn’t see that the clients couldn’t understand their propositions, in terms of taste but most of all even in terms of the words used in the menu!!!
All the team was highly experimented, taughts in big restaurants, but they forget to think that the clients are not experts!!

You can read some descriptions on this post:
http://www.britannia.org/TVArchives/episodedetails/00002511/
I like this sentence: “What’s the BEST RECIPE for a successful restaurant? Top French chefs, the finest ingredients, food fit for a king… Fine dining restaurant La Riviera in Inverness has it all and more. All except one teeny weeny thing… CUSTOMERS. Without them, you don’t stand a CHANCE.”

Now, after trying to “rethink” his work, the french chef managed to set a new menu and new indoor environment and now the restaurant is known as the best restaurant in Scotland!!
http://gordonramsayskitchen.com/ramsays-kitchen-nightmares/season-2/la-riviera/ … and gained a Michelin Star!

There is also a concept which is very interesting and maybe which can be applied in different fields : they set “chefs table” which is installed in the kitchen!
http://www.abstractrestaurant.com/chefs.aspx

I think it’s a good example of how you can try to integrate the customer in the center of your “philosophy” of designing simply by “putting him in the kitchen”!!!
A kind of “restaurant 2.0″!!
The other aspect in this example: the user-experience!!!
I had once the occasion to eat in the kitchen of a good restaurant (not enough places in the main room) and it was the most exquisite experience in my “eater’s life”!!

I don’t know if this post is directly related to the topics but as Vlad said, sometimes the solutions of our engineers’ problem solution is in another field!

The keywords: user-centric approach (more widely people-centric as Fabio Sergio said in LIFT09 conference) / user-experience / less is more (Mies Van der Rohe) / Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication (Leonardo da Vinci) / etc.

Finally, what Usman Haque set is a user-centered approach to design “products/systems” dedicated to designers not for electronicians.

Now we have to design “products/services” on the base of webofthings / hardware and software open sources / … / dedicated to “people” that are not either designers nor engineers. This is our “Holy Grail” !

Edouard SIEKIERSKI

Thanks!

Technology is just a tool, and to solve problems with it, you need to ask the people in the field what their problem really is. I’ve so often a bunch of engineers trying to come up with a solution for a totally different field, making a great product to solve what they thought the problem is, but it was different.

I would especially add a 3rd field to your list which is designers & interaction people, basically all the people in this field that aren’t engineers. They are people in the outside world, who don’t know tech but still use it!

Finally, I find so sad that academia is so hermetic to everything that happens in parralell, but is not directly in academia. I mean, almost nobody in academia knows what processing, nabaztags, or arduinos are. Worse, there is just no dialogue between these two groups and that makes me sad? Why do engineers not look at what artists or hackers or designers do? At least for inspiration, coz I have the feeling these people get really cool things done (not often as products, true), while we struggle with boring discussions that prevent progress.

As an example, just look at pachube.com, for me what Usman and his team did is so much better, useful, modern, and meaningful than what researchers have tried to do for years (senseweb @ msr, GSN @ epfl, …). It just works, it’s sexy, and it feels good and right!

We have so much to learn from outside academia, but we just don’t value enough the ideas of people that do not have a phd and big name in the community… it’s just too bad.

I dont know nothing about the technical aspects of electronics, WSN and web apps, but I know that in terms of “user-centered applications”, there are lots of innovative products/services to design!

The “Webof Things” field is the fruit of 2 differents fields that are not used to work together:
- the internet field which only deal with “virtual” applications, improving the internet platform
- the WSN, hardware field, which only deal with wireless protocols like Wifi, ZigBee, and all these awful words!

Mixing two worlds is very difficult. That recalls me a discussion I had with Christian Vollaire (http://www.ampere-lab.fr/IMG/pdf/Micro-ondes_pdf-2.pdf) who worked on a system that provides energy through microwaves. He told me that he managed to do so by making discuss “the people from the low-frequencies” field and “the people from the high-frequencies”(I can’t tell you why exactly)!

Innovation comes out of mixing fields that are not connected yet! This is the cas in the brain when an good idea emerges (the insight!): it can be explained by the fact taht the 2 different neural systems suddenly are connected! It’s also the case in the “medici effect” that is used in creativity sessions (http://www.themedicieffect.com/speaking/speaking_topics.html).

I wish we can maintain this “cross-cultural” discussion!!

Edouard SIEKIERSKI