Human-Computer Interaction Introduction © Brian Whitworth

2 What is this course about? (pick one) How to make whizz-bang impressions How to make movies with your computer How to create artistic pictures How to be musical online How to get girls with cool computer effects How to transcend your mundane life How to make information systems fit people 

© Brian Whitworth3 What do you have to do? Understand how people process vs how computers process (theory lectures => exam) Apply simple computing techniques (HTML) in practice (practice => assignments) Combine theory and practice - choose examples from the world wide web and create your own design (each person does this differently)

© Brian Whitworth4 What you do (given) Human theory Computer techniques Connecting these (you do individually and uniquely)

© Brian Whitworth5 Your goal is to avoid this … Isn’t it great! Movies! Animation! Flash! Its got everything!!! Ugh! What’s that? I hate it !!! The Web You certainly spent a lot of time on it All that flashes is not great

© Brian Whitworth6 How is this course assessed? By your ability to –Remember key HCI facts and principles –Produce practical results on the computer –Understand principles and apply them in practice Answer? ALL OF THE ABOVE

© Brian Whitworth7 Course Outline This is the course“rules” Read it carefully! Do I have to read it all? Gives you all the links you need. Do all these rules really apply? But do they all really apply to me? What if I don’t understand them? YES THEY STILL APPLY Read what applies to you

© Brian Whitworth8 Your instructors goal is that? Everyone passes a “cakewalk” course We all have a good, happy, happy-good time To do as little work as possible (zzzzz) You learn something useful and get a fair grade This is a busy course! You will have to work hard to get an A We are disappointed only if you don’t feel you learned anything useful 

© Brian Whitworth9 Why learn about how people work? 1970s - computers were “number crunchers” 1980s - the Personal Computer (PC) began to interact with people 1990s – It became the basis of human communication by 2000s – The rise of online groups and social systems The trend? Computing is more and more about people and groups

© Brian Whitworth10 Example You have to review a web site for its creator and recommend changes If you give valid reasons –your changes will be accepted –They will work –You will be paid Reasons give people confidence The best reasons for web design are based on human nature as the mind as an information processor

© Brian Whitworth11 Why learn HTML? Why not use HTML generators? The answer is flexibility –There are things you cant do in the generator –Generators get tangled and must be fixed in the source code –Generators bloat code, direct HTML is simple, small and hence loads much faster –You understand what is possible from the source –You end up back in the source code in the end Companies like IBM expect all work to be done directly in HTML for these reasons

© Brian Whitworth12 Course Overview 1.Brain vs Computer – the whole course in one lesson 2.Attention – to see anything one must notice it 3.Perception – low level processing (e.g. color) 4.Recognition – carrying knowledge forward by patterns 5.Space & Movement – mental models of space 6.Integration – combining the senses 7.Interactivity – driving the feedback loop 8.Learning – changing how we process