Secrets Presentation

Secrets to Success and Fatal Flaws: The Design of Large-Display Groupware: 

Secrets to Success and Fatal Flaws: The Design of Large-Display Groupware Huang, Mynatt, Russell, Sue. Computer Graphics & Applications 26(1), p. 37-45, Jan/Feb 2006.

Large-Display Groupware : 

Large-Display Groupware Currently… No killer application No common look and feel No broadly applicable design principles What makes a large-display groupware application successful?

Desktop Groupware Challenges: 

Desktop Groupware Challenges Grudin, 1994… Who does the work vs. who gets the benefit Critical mass and prisoners’ dilemma Social, political, and motivation factors Exception handling in workgroups Designing for infrequently used features Underestimated difficulty of evaluating groupware Breakdown of intuitive decision-making Managing acceptance: a challenge for developers

Large-Display Uniqueness : 

Large-Display Uniqueness Form factor Viewable from a greater distance Multiple simultaneous users Public audience and location Located in shared space More public Outside personal workspace Less willing to publicly explore Group owned Less ownership and responsibility for use and content

Approach: 

Approach Approach… Observation of various large-display applications Open-ended interviews with researchers Interviews with members of workgroups

Notification Collage (U. Calgary): 

Notification Collage (U. Calgary) How it works: Desktop clients are used to post info Success: low effort for use because it starts automatically on desktop Problem: No reason to use large-display

MessyBoard (CMU): 

MessyBoard (CMU) How it works: same as Notification Collage Failure: hard to install, not everyone used it Intense collaboration only needed sporadically Tried to exploit person connections, conducted training sessions, and targeted specific individuals who had greatest need to convey information

Plasma Poster (FX Palo Alto): 

Plasma Poster (FX Palo Alto) How it works: users post items via email or through a web form Success: use climbed after early drop-off, attributed to “strong champions” and use of email interaction

Semi-Public Displays (Ga Tech): 

Semi-Public Displays (Ga Tech) How it works: systems automatically gathers data content from reports Failure: didn’t match group practices and users didn’t feel a sense of ownership so no one turned it on in the morning People did include more help requests and this sparked conversation

BlueBoard (IBM Almaden): 

BlueBoard (IBM Almaden) How it works: Users swiped ID cards and that let them access to their own person data Failure: Proprietary applications, weren’t comfortable standing in front of display to collaborate Was used for presentation and users liked the ability to email files to themselves

MERBoard: 

MERBoard How it works: Users sign into the system and have access to their own data, SolTree application visualizes possible rover actions Success: used by engineers in addition to mission scientists, SolTree was only available on MERboard Clock display caused hesitation to use, for other applications laptops were used for collaborating

Awareness Module (Accenture): 

Awareness Module (Accenture) How it works: Post to display using Web form, swipe badge to have content emailed to them Failure: used infrequently possibly because of need to compose content and to find web form Could read information at their leisure in their personal space rather than on display

Recommendations : 

Recommendations Task specificity and integration Users will spend less time exploring Common mistake: increased screen real estate is not sufficient to motivate user migration Tool flexibility and generality Visibility and exposure to others’ interactions Low barriers to use Users already have to physically move to the display, stand up, deal with display artifacts, etc. Dedicated core group of users

Discussion Questions: 

Discussion Questions Other recommendations? What collaborative tasks might benefit from increased, shared screen real estate? Physically (large display) vs electronically public (website): why/how important is this distinction?