exercises

4. paradigms

EXERCISE 4.1

Choose one of the people mentioned in this chapter, or another important figure in the history of HCI, and create a Web page biography on this individual. Try to get at least one picture of your subject, and find out about their life and work, with particular reference to their contribution to HCI.

answer

open-ended research

 

EXERCISE 4.2

Choose one paradigm of interaction and find three specific examples of it, not included in this chapter. Compare these three - can you identify any general principles of interaction that are embodied in each of your examples (see Chapter 7 for example principles)?

answer available for tutors only

 

EXERCISE 4.3

What new paradigms do you think may be significant in the future of interactive computing?

answer available for tutors only

 

EXERCISE 4.4

A truly ubiquitous computing experience would require the spread of computational capabilities literally everywhere. Another way to achieve ubiquity is to carry all of your computational need with you everywhere, all the time. The field of wearable computing explores this interaction paradigm. How do you think the first-person emphasis of wearable computing compares with the third-person, or environmental, emphasis of ubiquitous computing? What impact would there be on context-aware computing if all of the sensors were attached to the individual instead of embedded in the environment?

answer available for tutors only

Individual exercises

ex.4.1 (open), ex.4.2 (tut), ex.4.3 (tut), ex.4.4 (tut)

Worked exercises in book

  

Discuss the ways in which a full-page word processor is or is not a direct manipulation interface for editing a document using Shneiderman's criteria. What features of a modern word processor break the metaphor of composition with pen (or typewriter) and paper? [page 173]