Understanding How to Design Awareness Groupware for the Home

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2005-05-09
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Abstract
People naturally maintain an awareness of the location, activities, and emotions of their family and friends. We call this interpersonal awareness: a naturally gained understanding of the social relations of one s social contacts. This awareness is vital in home life for it provides family and friends with: an understanding of how to best move into interaction with one another, knowledge needed to coordinate and plan activities, and feelings of connectedness and comfort. We build on this existing model of interpersonal awareness to articulate a set of design guidelines that describe how groupware should be designed to support interpersonal awareness in the home. Specifically, we show how awareness groupware should be designed as simple and reliable awareness appliances that can provide meaning and interaction by being embodied in everyday domestic routines. We also discuss how designs should support contextual locations within the home while ensuring users maintain adequate control and feedback over awareness information.
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Computer Science
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