Sticky Spots and Flower Pots: Two Case Studies in Location-Based Home Technology Design

Date
2006-04-11
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Abstract
Ethnographic studies of domestic environments have shown the fundamental role that contextual locations play in helping people understand and manage communication information. Yet it is not clear how this knowledge can be applied to the design of home technologies to effectively support the routines of home inhabitants. For this reason, we present two case studies in home technology design that use the results of previous ethnographic studies on domestic locations to motivate the designs and to make them location-based. The first case is StickySpots a location-based messaging system that allows household members to send short digital messages to various places in their home. The second case is location-dependant information appliances a pair of physical ambient displays that show different information depending on where they are placed within the home. We reflect on these case studies to motivate and discuss an initial set of guidelines for location-based design in the home.
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Computer Science
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