Thursday, 29 January

Please sit with your group, as on Tuesday, preferably with your team in your group

Ergonomics, Affordances, Signifiers, Constraints, Don Norman, Smart Design

According to Don Norman, "Error Messages are Evil"

What's wrong with this picture?

Reiterate Project 1 Assignment 

Use of Video:

Identify next interim steps:

1. Read the materials provided on Affordances and Constraints in the Resources section below and review your notes from class.
2. Look, as a team, at a variety of designed situations that meet the criteria set out above. Do a preliminary analysis of your interaction with them using the affordance/constraint framework. Document these interactions in images (still and, if you wish, moving), and words). 
3. Choose the richest example you found and analyze the affordances and constraints you find, noting how successful or not they were at supporting the intended activity. 
4. Document your findings either by neatly annotating printed photographs by hand, scanning them on a flatbed scanner and importing them into your document or by importing your photos into a program like Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator and annotating the images digitally. You can, additionally, do a video in which you “walk through” what you found in terms of affordances and constraints through your analysis. You might also consider doing a comparative table summarizing the good and bad affordances and constraints.

Student Groups to Present Their Preliminary Work:

• Dieter Rams - Jeremy Crawford, Sean Davis, Andrew Denta 
• Brian Eno - Grant Muterspaugh, Sheunopa Mugobogobo, Bryant Mehay 
• IDEO - Danielle Zigulech, Clay Wilkerson, Sarah Thompson
• IDEO - Thomas Torbik, Ellay Williams

Tom's Blog on Affordances, Constraints, and Mapping

Meet with your team

1. Review your examples and identify the pair of examples you are going to use to illustrate the definitions in your project
2. Choose the subject of your case study
3. Begin articulating, in words and images, how to explain the effectiveness of your affordances and constraints.

In-class writing assignment: list the pair of examples for your definitions and the choice of your case study, and why. note your plan of action for the next class.

Please indicate in your in-class writing if you're willing to present your interim work on Tuesday, 3 February for extra credit.

Homework for Tuesday, 3 February at 12:01 am through Oncourse Assignments:

Continue work on Project 1

Read from Universal Principles of Design “Affordances” and “Constraints” (PDFs linked to Project Brief) and UXD pp. 104 – 105 and answer the following questions:

1. What is an “affordance”? What are the aspects of an affordance? Cite an example of an effective affordance from your own experience.
2. What is a “constraint”? What are the aspects of a constraint? Cite an example of an effective constraint from your own experience. 
3. What problems result from poorly designed constraints? Cite an example of a poorly designed constraint from your experience interacting with IT.