Design and Development of Interactive Systems

Aim

Related to design of interactive systems, after completing the course the students should be able to:

• Plan, carry out, analyse, and communicate the results of user studies and usability tests, as well as based on this be able to define, prioritise, communication and evaluate design goals.
• Create, analyse, evaluate, and argue for a certain design solution, among alternative solutions, with respect to different perspectives such as design goals based on user studies, psychological factors and limitations, e.g., human factors in a security perspective, as well as diversity, gender, and accessibility.
• Construct and evaluate prototypes of a design solution.
• Communicate and motivate user studies, design, and usability test results both orally and in writing.

Related to development of interactive systems, with focus on user interfaces, after completing the course the students should be able to:

• Describe some current languages, environments/tools, and libraries for programming interactive systems.
• Construct and describe the architecture of an event-based system with graphical components.
• Use a few different programming languages and class libraries for programming interactive systems.
• Create their own interaction components.
• Apply design patterns for interaction techniques in their architecture and program dynamic interaction techniques.
• Describe the connection between class libraries for programming interactive systems and principles for user interface design.
• Plan and carry out a development project, and communicate and motivate the choices made.
• Individually describe and motivate the program code that has been developed.

Related to the student's role in a project group and a PBL-group, after completing the course the students should be able to:

• Independently and in a group, identify learning needs in relation to given problems related to the courses of this semester.
• Collaborate with colleagues both in learning and problem solving, and lead technical problem solving situations related to the courses of this semester.
• Contribute to discussions and results in a PBL-group.
• Contribute to planning and execution in a project group.
• Critically analyse their own role in the group, as well as the group as a whole, e.g., from a diversity and gender perspective.

Content

The course is focused on development of interactive systems with good usability and a satisfactory user experience. Human-computer interaction is a central area of knowledge and practice in development of interactive systems. In an organisation developing interactive systems, or using systems, human-computer interaction is relevant for all roles, in different ways. This course provides the foundation for further studies and understanding of these roles, such as project leader, product owner, customer, interaction programmer, etc., based on how to perform human-centred development of interactive systems.

The course introduces an industry perspective on usability and interface development, through e.g. guest lecturers or other industry-related elements."

In addition, the course provides basic knowledge and skills in developing an interactive system based on a design, which meets the requirements of the target group of users, especially regarding the user interface.

The course also allows the students to practice project work and performing a development project in a group, as well as being the course connecting all the remaining courses of semester 3 of the IT-program, including to allow students to practice PBL group work with problems from all courses.

The course covers, related to design of interactive systems:

• Development of interactive systems that meet the needs of a target group of users.
• Basic concepts of human-computer interaction.
• Principles and methods for design and development of graphical user interfaces.
• User-centred system development.
• Basics concepts of cognitive psychology, related to design and usability.

The course covers, relatied to basic interaction programming:

• Architectures for event-based systems (e.g., using widgets).
• Class libraries for user interfaces.
• Interaction programming and design principles for gaphical user interfaces, e.g., how class libraries can support implementing conventions and interaction paradigms.
• Design patterns for interaction programming (e.g., MVC, Observer, Command, Decorator).
• Redesign and implementation of graphical user interfaces based on known usability issues.