Some quotes to capture the IE direction

3 quotes that in some essence capture the research

1 The nature of the problem

"The prevailing computer-human interaction (CHI) model of interface design has been partly responsible for the current state of the desktop computer. The breakthrough on which the field emerged was the admission of psychological principles. The resulting graphical user interface has been the focus of the field of computer-human interaction for nearly 20 years. This interface is a virtual control panel whose design has remained quite technology-centered. -- Malcolm McCullough, Digital Ground, 2004"

This in a way for me is drawing on the reason why the metaphor of the ecology and move towards the information ecology concept is significant - as we need ways in which to re-frame the technology centric view is designed.

2 The software design challenge

"Software design is the act of determining the user's experience with a piece of software. It has nothing to do with how the code works inside, or how big or small the code is. The designer's task is to specify completely and unambiguously the user's whole experience. -- David Liddle, From Bringing Design to Software, edited by Terry Winograd, 1996"

This really captures the nature of the design challenge and from the 1st quote sets how this process must move towards a user centric approach.

3 What the research must accomplish
"Good designers can create normalcy out of chaos; they can clearly communicate ideas through the organizing and manipulating of words and pictures. -- Jeffery Veen, 2000"

The question now of how the information ecology can form the communication to allow for clearer understanding of the environment.

Visualising work postion

A really useful diagram to aid with the background literature review and positioning of the work

From the paper - An Evolving Map of Design Practice and Design Research
Liz Sanders

Abstract

Design research is in a state of flux. The design research landscape has been the focus of a tremendous amount of exploration and growth over the past five to 10 years. It is currently a jumble of approaches that, while competing as well as complementary, nonetheless share a common goal: to drive, inspire, and inform the design development process. Conflict and confusion within the design research space are evident in the turf battles between researchers and designers. Online communities reveal the philosophical differences between the applied psychologists and the applied anthropologists, as well as the general discontent at the borders between disciplines. At the same time, collaboration is evident in the sharing of ideas, tools, methods, and resources in online design research communities. We can also see an increase in the number and quality of global design research events and a growing emphasis on collaborative projects between industry and the universities, particularly in Europe…

One to continue to contemplate....

Where that ACD thing fits ? -http://www.ixda.org/discuss.php?post=35466

I am not sure if such a distinction needs to be made, but if practitioners need clarification then....? An aspect that may be further validated and clarified through the literature review.

The concern at this point and my interest is in that if there is a need for such a distinction then the understanding I aim to provide of activities within the information ecology is an an argument for further justification of the work.

Some thoughts...
I would argue that ACD is more part of the evolution of UCD. Design is about framing problems, and ACD is more of an evolving perspective of UCD to frame problems.

I would agree with following view point made
On 11 Nov 2008, at 02:51, Livia Labate wrote: [snip]Dan Saffer differentiates ACS and UCS in his Designing for Interaction book very similarly/succinctly. His best point is that the PURPOSE of an activity is not necessarily a user goal, meaning looking at a design problem with a user goal in mind may be too esoteric and not necessarily helpful (which is the pro argument for ACD).[trim]

Fundamentally for me ACD for me draws on the principles framework set out in Activity theory and so for this reason I would argue that it is much more that a modern day task analysis to design. At its core activities consist of the tools people use, the subject the people themselves and the material object that can be tangible or totally intangible.

There are also several interesting point made by Josha Porter on the blog post
http://bokardo.com/archives/activity-centered-design/. A particularly interesting point is a point raised by Don Norman in the article ‘Human-Centered Design Considered Harmful’.Norman says:
“Many of the systems that have passed through HCD design phases and usability reviews are superb at the level of the static, individual display, but fail to support the sequential requirements of the underlying tasks and activities. The HCD methods tend to miss this aspect of behavior: Activity-centered methods focus upon it.”

To this I would ask how much of ACD and USD methods differentiate and overlap in design practice?

The notion of the real world....?

Again another great post from Pasta & Vinegar

The notion of “the real” as user research is meant to bring material concerning the real world, what users really do, what are their constraints and needs, and in fine why they do what they do. The literature in HCI, especially about the use of ethnography, has a wide take on this but I was more curious to see what designers have to say about it. Reading User research at IDII: Three case studies, 2002-2004 by Simona Maschi, Laura Polazzi and Jay Melican, I ran across this interesting quote:

“Everything we learn from user studies has the great advantage of being “true” (although not in an absolute way), because it comes from the real world and from real experiences. This makes it somehow believable and graspable for our audience, both within and outside of the design team. In other words user studies provide the design team with “live material” that can be used to share thoughts and ideas and to communicate the project effectively to the world.“

(The document is btw a relevant set of case study and quick description of research methods employed at the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea).

This notion of the “real” as the cornerstone of the exchange between UX research and design was also interestingly tackled at the recent EPIC conference. See for example how this weblog highlight the “real issue” in the discussion about how ethnographers can build and exhibit the authority necessary to be able to sell and provide ethnographic insights:

“Simon Pulman-Jones argued, ethnographers in industry are seeking to establish themselves as an authority on The Real - what it is really like out there in order to commoditize our insights, our epiphanies to help the organisations that we work for and with.
(…)
Ethnographers are indeed ‘brokers of the real‘ - they have themselves attained a sort of gatekeeper role between the designers and the engineers and the real world where real people actually use the products. They help the engineers meet and understand the users, in order to change the way the engineers think and feel about them.

Why blog this?

The writing has particular relevance in the how to understand and bridge from the real world of the science lab to the development/system view.

Is a design ethnographer more of an important gate keeper? In the sense that they hold vital information for the design process.

And as the process of communication is key, what of the ways to clearly communicate the real, to allow the engineers to understand the users, in order to change the way the engineers think and feel about them?

I think this should and I can propose a two way process also, so the design ethnographer can have insight in the engineering process to see how the real world work is reflected technically in the engineers model.

Paper dashboard

Some thoughts taken from the blog post Pasta & Vinegar

A fascinating stack of notes with numbers, additions and corrections encountered recently in a very old-school french grocery store. This awfully nice pile of duct-taped paper looks very pre-computing and surely plays more role than calculations: it’s clearly as dashboard for the salesman as he told me he uses it as a reminder for customer credit “emprunts”.

The importance of paper, again.

Why blog this?

The importance of paper has resonated through the work I have been conducting, this I think again only highlights this importance of paper and the activities it supports.

This is useful in the current the thinking of and understanding activity theory in how paper is able to work and function in the environment (ecology of the french grocery store)

Some initial thinking with this is how the initial 'tests' for the information ecology could be in looking at the ways successful tools/artifacts in the information ecology function.

Could suitable analysis of the ecolgoy expose how and why they are successful?