Ethnography Idea

The Ethnography I am going to do is my idea of seeing who will recycle papers on campus versus simply throwing it in the trash.  The process is simple:

1.  Create many sheets of paper (a set amount, just a large number) with sayings such as "Do you hate people handing out papers on campus?  Would you prefer more recycling bins on campus? Go to this website for further information ... (website goes here) ... or simply recycle or throw away this piece of paper."

or perhaps just something like:  "Please recycle me or throw me away!"


2.  Borrow a large trash can and a large paper recycling bin.

3.  Place recycling bin and trash can next to each other in an intersection with heavy foot traffic.

4.  Stand with papers created in (1) near trash can and recycling bin.

5.  Hand papers out to random people as they walk toward me and the trash can/recycling bin.

6.  After all papers are handed out simply pick up the trash can and recycling bin and count up the papers inside each.

7.  Having a website link to a simple survey where the user can enter nominal information such as, "Do you prefer to recycle or toss things in the garbage?" with answers like, "whatever is closest" or "recycling if I can find one"

This would not only account for papers that were not gathered at the end of the user study, but would also allow for extra information to be gathered in the process.

Results are pretty easy to achieve!

Currently I am the only one I know of working on this ethnography, but I know Jill asked me in class so she might be in my group as well.  Feel free to join!  (It's easier than the other ones, you know you want to do it)

Augmenting Interactive Tables with Mice & Keyboards

My Comments on other blogs:
Brett Hlavinka
Chris Aikens


This paper was written by Björn Hartmann from the Stanford University HCI Group and Meredith Ringel Morris, Hrvoje Benko, and Andrew D. Wilson from Microsoft Research.  This paper explores the idea of having not only touch as input on multi-touch tables but keeping the standard mouse and keyboard  as well.  It is common for multi-touch technology to attempt to "do away with" the standardized mouse and keyboard, but it is shown that despite the oddity of the two, they are crucial for direct input to a computer.  The keyboard is almost irreplaceable as a form of text input because on-screen keyboards have such a slow response time associated with them.  Mice are equally important because it brings not only precision, but a form of "hand extension" to reach far away widgets.  In this paper a scenario of a group of students working on a research paper is presented to help introduce how this technology could be effectively used.

I enjoyed this paper more than I thought I would at first glance.  I originally thought that there was no need for mice and keyboards with multi-touch systems because the ability to provide multiple inputs should take care of the need for this norm.  When I thought of this, I neglected to realize the fact that current multi-touch technology has a "lag" when things are inputted.  This immediately corrected my thinking about having keyboards as a needed peripheral but I will still wary of the mouse.  Currently, most multi-touch devices are fairly small so the thought of a mouse as a natural "arm extension" seems plausible.  Also after looking at FTIR readings from hand input, I realize that the input is actually a "blob" not the "perfect point" that a mouse delivers.  This definitely raises some support from me for the mouse.  While I am altogether not sold on the mouse being absolutely necessary (a stylus is a much more natural method of precision and could replace the mouse easily), I find that the keyboard being a temporarily necessary device intriguing.  Once technology advances to where multi-touch keyboards are just as fast as the peripheral, I think it will begin to fade out of our daily lives.

User Guided Audio Selection from Complex Sound Mixtures

My comments on other blogs:
Chris Aikens

It is common among music to record multiple tracks and combine them into one waveform track.  Another common function that is yet to be refined is to extract one of these tracks from the complete waveform track and be able to edit it separately.  In this paper written by Paris Smaragdis from Adobe Systems, an algorithm is discussed that is able to extract a single overlaid track from a waveform track.  Through the use of an "assisted sound" such as a voice, whistle, or instrument as a model for what is to be extracted, the algorithm is able to distinguish what part of the sound to extract.  The user studies conducted to test their algorithm have been shown to be somewhat promising.  By using the exact sound originally mixed in (the perfect scenario), the algorithm successfully extracts the track.  Tests were performed with different sounds, genders, and instruments to try and perform this task and it was found that pitch along with pattern is essential to extracting the data.

As a musician myself, I find this algorithm intriguing.  It would be handy to be able to extract specific parts of a song and to change/edit them at my whim.  To improve upon this algorithm I would suggest adding a set of prerecorded sounds/pitches/lengths to a library.  The user tries to mimic the sound they hear in the music and it first gets converted into the sound pattern formed from the library.  Then the program would attempt to map this sound pattern with different instruments to the original track.  Perhaps adding in the allowance for a small deviation from the converted sound pattern would be helpful as well.

TapSongs: Tapping Rhythm-Based Passwords on a Single Binary Sensor

This paper presents a new authentication system that reads in a rhythmic beat as input, analyzes it, and if successful will authenticate the user.  It uses a binary sensor (one input at a time) to collect the password.  In the study of the software TapSongs, successful logins returned an 83.2% rate while false positives returned a 10.7% rate.  The claim of the paper is that this type of login is just as good as text based authentication.

When I first read this paper I was positive that this software would not be able to stand up to any sort of false positive test.  I assumed that tapping would be clearly audible to surrounding people and I knew that beats are easily remembered.  By looking at their statistics I can conclude that this is not necessarily the case.  Many people are not musically adept and would have trouble even recognizing a beat.  However, if they remember the beat, it seems easier to "hack" into a piece of hardware if they had time to do multiple attempts.  I would suggest a mixture of the text based authentication with the beat system because most people have a certain "beat" while they type in their passwords and this would surely increase both methods of authentication.

A Practical Pressure Sensitive Computer Keyboard

My comments on other blogs:
Justin Kern
Brett Hlavinka

This paper shares a new possible technology for keyboards with pressure sensitive keys.  This technology has never been introduced before because it could not be mass produced in a cost effective manner.  The process with which this paper presents this idea only slightly changes the already existing line of keyboards and is easily implementable.  In order to achieve the pressure sensitivity, multiple contact points were placed under each key.  The more conductivity generated, the higher the pressure.  Some of the stated uses for this are for gaming, musical keyboard simulation, more accurate typing, and emotional instant messaging.

Personally, I can see the use for musical keyboard simulation as it would allow for fairly accurate note lengths.  I also see the added benefit for more accurate typing, however small the increase.  (Having the keys pressed placed into a queue based on when the pressure peaked seems a small improvement for fast typers)  I do not see a use of emotional instant messaging.  I could see someone wanting to try it out, but I find the results more difficult to read.  Example:

I can see how if the keyboard was offered at no additional cost it would of use, however, I would never pay extra for a pressure sensitive keyboard.

Introduction