Our research on the User Interface

The User Interface is the part of our platform the end user interacts with. We try to keep our interface as logical, simple and mighty as possible.

We are currently developing a web based interface.

We decided to do so as there are many devices running a web browser like smart phones, television sets or other appliances we find inside a home. With the new Goolge Chrome we see that also the market sees this trend.

Also a web interface running on html contains build in markup features to easily design an interface.

Another advantage is that the interface can get served from central points so we only have to keep them up to date.

Fig. 1: Snapshot of the interface.

For devices with big display we develop an OpenLayer (so map) based approach. It seems a natural interface to place controllable objects on a map. For smaller displays we only show the interaction menus for the specific controllable objects that are close to the user.

We try to address the following three goals:

• Place users in control of the interface (user empowerment).
• Reduce the users' memory load.
• Make the user interface consistent.

So we provide a context sensitive user adaptive and especially intuitive interface to the new cooperative functionality.

Home Network User Interface

In his Final Year Project Alejandro Rodriguez was focussing on the Human-Machine-Interface.

In this project an interface to control elements in a domotic environment has been designed.
The main focus of this project was on researching paradigms for a good interface that fits the differenf devices we find inside the home with their different interaction possibilities (from cellphones with numerical keypad to high definition touchscreens).
The interface wassupposed to be comfortable, fast, transparent, consistent and efficicient for the user.

A prototypical implementation of the interface based on OpenLayers was implemented.

Interaction possibilities of different devices

Implementing the User Interface