Alexandra Voit

GestureSleeve: using touch sensitive fabrics for gestural input on the forearm for controlling smartwatches

Smartwatches provide quick and easy access to information. Due to their wearable nature, users can perceive the information while being stationary or on the go. The main drawback of smartwatches, however, is the limited input possibility. They use similar input methods as smartphones but thereby suffer from a smaller form factor. To extend the input space of smartwatches, we present GestureSleeve, a sleeve made out of touch enabled textile. It is capable of detecting different gestures such as stroke based gestures or taps. With these gestures, the user can control various smartwatch applications. Exploring the performance of the GestureSleeve approach, we conducted a user study with a running application as use case. In this study, we show that input using the GestureSleeve outperforms touch input on the smartwatch. In the future the GestureSleeve can be integrated into regular clothing and be used for controlling various smart devices.

Design Guidelines for Notifications on Smart TVs

Notifications are among the core mechanisms of most smart devices. Smartphones, smartwatches, tablets and smart glasses all provide similar means to notify the user. For smart TVs, however, no standard notification mechanism has been established. Smart TVs are unlike other smart devices because they are used by multiple people - often at the same time. It is unclear how notifications on smart TVs should be designed and which information users need. From a set of focus groups, we derive a design space for notifications on smart TVs. By further studying selected design alternatives in an online survey and lab study we show, for example, that users demand different information when they are watching TV with others and that privacy is a major concern. We derive according design guidelines for notifications on smart TVs that developers can use to gain the users attention in a meaningful way.

Exploring notifications in smart home environments

Notifications are a core mechanism of current smart devices. They inform about a variety of events including messages, social network comments, and application updates. While users appreciate the awareness that notifications provide, notifications cause distraction, higher cognitive load, and task interruptions. With the increasing importance of smart environments, the number of sensors that could trigger notifications will increase dramatically. A flower with a moisture sensor, for example, could create a notification whenever the flower needs water. We assume that current notification mechanisms will not scale with the increasing number of notifications. We therefore explore notification mechanisms for smart homes. Notifications are shown on smartphones, on displays in the environment, next to the sending objects, or on the users body. In an online survey, we compare the four locations in four scenarios. While different aspects influence the perceived suitability of each notification location, the smartphone generally is rated the best.

UbiTtention: smart & ambient notification and attention management

Users of digital devices are increasingly confronted with a tremendous amount of notifications that appear on multiple devices and screens in their environment. Today many users own different ubiquitous devices such as a smart-phone, a tablet, a notebook and a smartwatch. If an email client is installed on every device an incoming email produces up to four notifications -- one on each device. In the future, we will receive notifications from an increasing number of ubiquitous devices. Therefore, we need smart attention management for incoming notifications as well as novel ways to present and interact with notifications. One way for a less interrupting attention management could be the use of ambient representations of incoming notifications. This workshop brings together researchers and practitioners from academia and industry to explore how the flood of notifications on different computing devices and in smart environments can be managed, to avoid information overload.

Envisioning an ambient smart calendar to support aging in place

The worlds population is aging, and this shift in demographics will place a high burden on the worlds healthcare systems. Smart technology provides a potential method of addressing the demands of these changing demographics. In this paper, we describe the design for a smart calendar that supports elderly people in their daily tasks and activities with the use of ambient notifications. We describe a typical day in the life of a target user, and how the smart calendar system would support the user in living self-sufficiently as she ages. We then discuss design challenges for implementing the persuasive technology. These challenges include correctly detecting a change in behavior and their urgency, the effectiveness of ambient notifications to create health behavior change, and privacy concerns with data collection and sharing.

Towards Notifications in the Era of the Internet of Things

Today, the smartphone is the main device for notifying the user, for example, about incoming messages or upcoming appointments. However, we envision that in the near future Internet of Things (IoT) devices will become an additional source of notifications. The resulting increase in notifications needs to be tackled to allow users to perceive all notifications without overloading them. In this paper, we report on two focus groups exploring how notifications in the era of the Internet of Things could be visualized. We derive design implications from the results of the focus groups which could influence how in the future smart devices notify users.

Understanding User Preferences towards Rule-based Notification Deferral

Mobile devices generate a tremendous number of notifications every day. While some of them are important, a huge number of them are not of particular interest for the user. In this work, we investigate how users manually defer notifications using a rule-based approach. We provide three different types of rules, namely, suppressing, summarizing once a day, and snoozing to a specific point in time. In a user study with 16 participants, we explore how users apply these rules. We report on the usage behavior as well as feedback received during an interview. Last, we derive guidelines that inform future notification deferral systems.

Caloo: an ambient pervasive smart calendar to support aging in place

Many countries are confronted with aging societies. With the increasing need for elder care, it is necessary to investigate how technology can support aging in place. In this paper, we propose an ambient smart calendar system that supports the self-sufficiency and activeness of older adults. We report the results of a survey of older adults on their use of physical and digital calendars. Based on the results, we developed Caloo (Calendar of opportunities) - a prototypical smart wall calendar which supports older users by generating awareness about their daily schedules as well as supporting them in remaining active in their lives through event suggestions. We evaluated Caloo in a study with retired older adults. Overall, we received positive feedback and identified data sources for events, which the smart calendar can suggest to the user. Our results indicate the potential of deploying an ambient and pervasive smart calendar system that supports aging in place.

Posture Sleeve: Using Smart Textiles for Public Display Interactions

Today, public displays are used to display general purpose information or advertisements in many public and urban spaces. In addition to that, research identified novel application scenarios for public displays. These scenarios, however, mainly include gesture- and posture-based interaction mainly relying on optical tracking. Deploying optical tracking systems in the real world is not always possible since real-world deployments have to tackle several challenges. These challenges include changing light conditions or privacy concerns. In this paper, we explore how smart fabric can detect the users posture. We particularly focus on the users arm posture and how this can be used for interacting with public displays. We conduct a preliminary study to record different arm postures, create a model to detect arm postures. Finally, we conduct an evaluation study using a simple game that uses the arm posture as input. We show that smart textiles are suitable to detect arm postures and feasible for this type of application scenarios.

PD Notify: Investigating Personal Content on Public Displays

Public displays are becoming more and more ubiquitous. Current public displays are mainly used as general information displays or to display advertisements. How personal content should be shown is still an important research topic. In this paper, we present PD Notify, a system that mirrors a users pending smartphone notifications on nearby public displays. Notifications are an essential part of current smartphones and inform users about various events, such as new messages, pending updates, personalized news, and upcoming appointments. PD Notify implements privacy settings to control what is shown on the public displays. We conducted an in-situ study in a semi-public work environment for three weeks with seven participants. The results of this first deployment show that displaying personal content on public displays is not only feasible but also valued by users. Participants quickly settled for privacy settings that work for all kinds of content. While they liked the system, they did not want to spend time configuring it.