392160 Human-Computer Interaction (V) (WiSe 2018/2019)

Half a century ago, computers used to be massive machines that could be operated by specialists only. Fifteen years later, computers became ‘personal’, entered our workplace and our homes, and were used by non-specialists with various levels of training and experience. Today, everyone of us carries a powerful computing device in our pocket and uses it a hundred times a day. Tomorrow computing is said to become ubiquitous: we will live in computers, we will wear computers, computers will flow through our blood vessels, and may even become part of our nervous system and our self.

In each of these stages, computers provide interfaces through which humans can \emph{interact} with them: from punch cards via keyboard, mouse and display, to multitouch screens, to conversational interfaces that use spoken language and gestures. The design of these interfaces, the design of the interactions, and the design of whole \emph{user experiences} is studied in the field called \emph{human–computer interaction} (HCI). HCI research and practice is highly interdisciplinary. It needs the insights of many disciplines in order to create ‘good’ interfaces and interactions: computer science studies their implementation, psychology studies how they are perceived and conceptualised, design studies how they should look and feel like, sociology studies how they are used, and engineering, linguistics, anthropology, and philosophy can contribute as well.

HCI is an important subdiscipline of computer science as it is responsible for the way humans perceive computers beyond computing power and algorithmic capabilities. HCI is in control of whether humans think that computers are helpful and easy to use or whether they think that computers create more problems then they solve and are a hassle to interact with. HCI is also responsible for to the safety of people that rely on computers. Interfaces of nuclear power plants, air planes, and so on should be well designed so that operators make the right choices in safety-critical situations.

This course is an introduction to the field of human–computer interaction that will give students the theoretical foundations as well as practical experience in the design of user interfaces, interactions, and user experiences.

Bibliography

• Dix, A. et al. (2004). Human–Computer Interaction. 3rd Ed. Prentice Hall
• Dourish, P. (2004). Where the action is. MIT Press.
• Johnson, J. (2010). Designing with the mind in mind. Morgan Kaufmann.
• MacKenzie, I.S. (2013). Human–Computer Interaction. An empirical research perspective. Morgan Kaufmann.
• Norman, D. (1988/2013). The Design of Everyday Things. Basic Books.
• Pearl, C. (2017). Designing Voice User Interfaces: Principles of Conversational Experiences. O’Reilly.
• Shneiderman, B et. al (2016). Designing the user interface. (5th Ed.). Pearson.