IM Power Project Summer 2007 Raye Gomez April Wensel Heather Tomko Jen Mankoff (mentor) Anind Dey

Goals  Motivation reduce the amount of idle time to decrease carbon emissions (i.e. ecological footprint)  Determine Average user idle time Reasons for idle time How to cause user reduce idle time

Set-Up  Subjects Completed two week monitoring: 50 Laptop users: 40 Desktop users: 10 Completed study:  ~30 laptop users  desktop users TBA

Set-Up (cont.)  Randomly chosen for interview: 15 so far: 8 laptop users, desktop users TBA  8 laptop interviewees also gave preliminary opinions on feedback devices  All subjects Bot diary on last day Daily survey each night before logging off

Daily Survey  Were you logged onto primary your computer while online today? If not, at what times?  How many hours did you spend using the computer?  What was the shortest/longest amount of time that you stayed online?  How long was your computer performing assigned tasks requiring no input (i.e. virus scan)? How long was it not?  What power mode was your computer in today?  Describe all the times that you went idle and why.  What programs were you running today?

Bot Diary Every time a user came back from idle on last day:  Hello, it looks like you just returned from being idle. What were you just doing just now? What was your computer doing this time?

Information We Were Looking For  Time of status changes  Frequency and duration of idle times  User awareness when they were idle what their power settings were what programs they were running.  Interviews to get more in-depth information about reasons for idle time

Our Findings - General Surveys  95% of users run their computer on AC.  Biggest motivators for energy saving Money Altruism  About half of users use automatic standby/sleep setting

Our Findings - Interviews (Daily Surveys and Logs)  Most idle time for short periods (i.e. eating, cooking, bathroom, phone, etc.)  The average user believes turning the computer off extends the life of the machine leaves their computer on for easy access  Most common running programs: web browser, followed by the client  Most users run a screen saver, but only about half run anti-virus software

Suggestions For those running nothing while idle: roughly 85%  "Consider turning your computer off when you won't be using it for 30 minutes or more." (roughly 50%)  "Turn off your computer when you go to sleep." (less than 5%)  "Program your settings to automatically put your computer to sleep after 10 minutes of being idle." (roughly 10%) **The percentage of users in this category that ALWAYS leave their computer in full power mode is about 60%.

Initial Technology  AIM bot Built with AIM SDK in Java Keeps subjects in Buddy List Records status changes of all subjects Accepts commands from experimenter  diary study  survey reminders

Additional Technology  Sensor In Java Records processes, CPU usage, TCP usage Updates database every minute  Logger In Ruby Provides access to database through URL, e.g. :timestamp/:eventid/:eventname/:notes

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables  Modalities  Content

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables guilt vs. reward awareness vs. suggestions frequency of feedback historic vs. real time information  Modalities  Content

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables guilt vs. reward awareness vs. suggestions frequency of feedback historic vs. real time information  Modalities  Content

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables  Modalities window (constant or pop-up) instant message tray icon cell phone text message audio screen saver  Content

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables  Modalities window (constant or pop-up) instant message tray icon cell phone text message audio screen saver  Content

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables  Modalities  Content kwh of energy dollars pounds of co2 trees hours

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables  Modalities  Content kwh of energy dollars pounds of co2 trees hours

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables  Modalities  Content kwh of energy dollars pounds of co2 trees hours

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables  Modalities  Content kwh of energy dollars pounds of co2 trees hours

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables  Modalities  Content kwh of energy dollars pounds of co2 trees hours

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables  Modalities  Content kwh of energy dollars pounds of co2 trees hours

Phase II – Behavior Change Choices  Variables  Modalities  Content kwh of energy dollars pounds of co2 trees hours

Tentative Plans  Study effect of personalized suggestions on behavior change  Hypothesis Personalized suggestions will cause greater change than awareness alone  Measure Energy saving attitudes  Surveys, interviews Idle behavior  Bot, sensor

Tentative Plans  60 participants  1 week baseline  2 weeks with feedback  3 groups Idle cost Idle cost + generic suggestions Idle cost + personalized updates + opportunity

Three Feedback Types  Group 1 No suggestions.  Group 2 Turn your computer off at night.  Group 3 Instead of downloading at night, download over lunch and turn your computer off at night.

Components  AIM bot Sends info to logger about user status changes whenever they happen Sends suggestion to database when user comes off of idle  Feedback program  Logger  Database

Components  AIM bot  Feedback program Installed on client machines Sends CPU/TCP usage Retrieves idle time, suggestions, status Window  Logger  Database

Components  AIM bot  Feedback program  Logger Provides access to database via URLs as before  Database

Components  AIM bot  Feedback program  Logger  Database Stores AIM status and CPU/TCP data

Suggestions  Hand generated for each user after baseline  AIM bot chooses best Priority during current time period When same suggestion was last sent  Displayed in window

Window Projected annual cost based on today Change from baseline projection Change from yesterday’s projection Suggestion when user comes back from being idle