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CS 3724 - Human Computer Interaction - Summer 2005 -- Pardha S. Pyla

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Project 1: Topic, Client, and Product Concept Statement

Due as per class calendar.

Overview

In this project assignment you get started by establishing a client, a target system that you will work on for the client, and a product concept statement.

NOTE: Becuase of the short duration of the summer semester, each project phase has been scaled down and the deliverables are made considerably shorter. Also, instead of the students finding a "real" project by themselves, I have assigned a generic project for all teams for this semester.

As a semester long project you will be building the user interface for a ticket despensing kiosk that can be used at train stations, bus stations, entertainment locations, etc. So, in the description below all references to a client should be treated as a person who owns or manages a travel location or an entertainment location based on your choice of the type of kiosk. For certain phases in the projects, I will be pretending to be your client and I will be imposing constraints that real projects have.

What To Do

  1. Establish a client for your project.
  2. Establish a client application system for which you will develop the user interaction design (read NOTE above).
  3. Write and refine (several times) a product concept statement for your target system.

How To Do It

  1. Pick an imaginary client for a ticket despensing kiosk. Select a name for your client organization. Be creative.
  2. Choose the type of kiosk (travel ticket kiosk, entertainment ticket kiosk, etc.). Have reasonable assumptions as to the complexity of the kiosk.
  3. Write a product concept statement

  1. Your product concept statement is to be a short and sweet (absolutely not more than 75 words) summary of your project, to be used as a synopsis or "boilerplate" description of your project in all of the deliverables. This is a high-level mission statement of your project. Include the name of the system, name of client organization, kinds of users, brief statement of what users can do with it, and why it's useful (what problems it solves). Your audience for the product concept statement is broader than that of the rest of your project documentation. The audience here includes your manager, your manager's manager, potential investors, and the general public.

    The product of this stage (product concept statement) is a much broader description of the system than you will actually develop in subsequent stages of the project for this course. To get started, we want you to take a broad view of the system and in later stages you will select a few key parts (subset) of the overall system.
    The 75 words (or fewer) you write here will be the most important words in the whole project; they should be highly polished. That means you should spend a disproportionate amount of time and energy thinking about, writing, reading, editing, discussing and rewriting it. If you don't know how to do this, ask in class. Don't wait until you get the graded deliverable back to find out.

    In your product concept statement, be efficient with words; chop out "empty" words that don't say anything new. On the other hand, be as specific as possible within the word limit; do not be vague and try to communicate by implication. I.e., don't leave it to the reader to fill in the blanks. You should use positive statements about what will be done. This point is best made by example.

    EXAMPLE: "This information system allows user to keep track of which products are currently products in stock at the store." This (by implication) seems to be an inventory system (more specific than "information system"). Plus, doesn't it help keep track of the products that should be ordered, too? If so, say so.

    EXAMPLE: "The goal is for the XYZ System to be easy to use." It's more specific to say how you expect it to be easier to use, such as "Sales clerks on the floor will be able to update inventory as a routine part of sales."

    EXAMPLE: "The XYZ System handles accounting information and allows the accounting people to post results." What does "handles accounting information" mean? Those words are to vague. What kind of accounting information? What operations are implied by "handles"? Is it used by all accounting people? There could be lots of different kinds of accounting people and only some are users. What does "final results" mean? That is the most vague term of all here. What does "posting" mean? Are they posted in accounting statements, or on the Web? Are they printed and put on a bulletin board?

Deliverables

Get a binder to hold all deliverables for the semester. The best type of binder to use is an Accopress or a Duo-Tang, both available at any office supply place or the bookstore. The kind we want has two metal tangs each about three inches long. You put these tangs through the top and bottom holes of 3-hole punched paper. You then fold the metal tangs over and slide a little metal collar over them to hold them in place. Do not use a regular 3-ring binder; they are too bulky for us to carry for the whole class. Also please don't use one of those slippery plastic binders.

You will add to this binder the deliverables for each stage of the project as it comes due. Punch and bind your project deliverables in this binder. Put a label on the outside of the binder with (in this order, please):

  • Your team number
  • Your overall project name (e.g., Acme Pizza Inventory System)
  • Name of client organization
  • One-line overall project description (e.g., New inventory system, including point-of-sale inventory adjustment and wireless "terminals" for verifying inventory on shelves)
  • The names of all team members
  • "CS 3724– <current semester, year>"

Inside the binder, create a "tabbed" section labeled "Project 1", containing its own separate cover page with (mostly the same as on the front of the binder):

  • "Project 1: Topic, Client, and Product Concept Statement"
  • Team number
  • Project name
  • Name of client organization
  • One-line description of project
  • Team member names
  • "CS3724 – <current semester, year>"

Contents of Project 1 section (please number and label your items per this list):

  • Begin after the tab for this section, with a blank printed grading form for this deliverable.
  • Then include a Table of Contents for this particular deliverable (not the whole folder).
  • Then follow with these items, numbered as they are here:
  1. Name of client organization and name of client contact person (name, phone and/or e-mail). Write a brief description of the group or subgroup who will serve specifically as your client.
  2. Product concept statement, high-level conceptual description of your system. The product concept statement should not be more than 75 words. The audience for this part is very broad, including vice presidents, high-level managers, stockholders, investors, and the general public. Read carefully the "Write a Product Concept Statement" section, under "How to Do It" above.
  3. A more detailed (half page, up to one page) technical summary of your target application system. You can further motivate usefulness and capabilities in terms of what users can do. Make it clear if the system exists or not. This is a proposal, so use the future tense and state capabilities in terms of what users can do. For example, say, "This system will allow such-and-such a kind of user to do . . ." If the system itself does exist, make it clear what you will do to improve it, distinguishing what is new and what is not. This description should be more technical and more complete than the product concept statement in part 2 above. The audience for this part is me (your boss, the project manager).

Grading

Read what you write, because someone else will! Work on writing as a team. This is the time to really get the spirit of this project and nail this assignment! Beyond trying to assess objectively whether all requirements are met, we try to assess subjectively how well requirements are met. This is based on our own knowledge and can sometimes be somewhat relative among the projects of the class. Your grade is based on our perception of how much you put into it and how well you understood, interpreted, and applied the material covered in class to your project. You can be sure this is done is the fairest way possible. Please don't expect us to just skim each deliverable and hand out all high grades.

Iteration

Because of the importance of the product concept statement to each successive project deliverable, it is essential that we work together, as needed, to get it just right. This might require iteration between your team and me (outside the calendar of deliverables). In such cases, I will ask you to rewrite (one or more times) your product concept statement and hand it in, again.

Audience for All Reports

The audience for all your project reports (except the product concept statement above) is your technical manager, who is not involved in the day-to-day development activities and is not highly knowledgeable about the usability engineering process, but wants to be kept up to date. Use clear, plain English. Don't use esoteric, domain-dependent terminology, jargon, or acronyms.