Cal Poly SLO CSC 486-W18 Human-Computer Interaction Prof. Franz J. Kurfess
Syllabus
Dr. Franz J. Kurfess, Cal Poly Computer Science & Software Engineering Department (http://www.csc.calpoly.edu/~fkurfess/)
My office hours are tentatively scheduled as follows:
You can find up-to-date information on my online calendar.
The Cal Poly Catalog 2013-15 describes the course as follows:
Application of the theories of human-computer interaction to the task of user-centered design. Survey of techniques for studying and involving users in different aspects of the design process, and demonstration of where and when applicable. Combining of theoretical understanding with practical experience to design solutions to problems facing interactive systems designers. 3 lectures, 1 laboratory.
Prerequisites: Corequisite: CSC/CPE 484 (this means that the two can be taken during the same quarter; they don't have to be.
From CPE/CSC 484, students should be familiar with the following topics:
If necessary, these topics can be reviewed by looking at the lecture notes of the CSC 484-W17 course.
The goal of this course is to examine important problems, challenges, concepts and methods from the field of Human-Computer Interaction. Students will learn how to analyze, design, and program various ways in which human users interact with computers, or computational devices in a broader sense. This includes conventional desktop or laptop computers with a screen, keyboard and pointing device (mouse or trackpad), mobile devices with touch-based interaction, and with gesture-based interaction such as Microsoft’s Kinect or the LeapMotion.
Through this course, students are expected to:
I am planning to cover the topics below. Some adjustments in the sequence and coverage may be made as the quarter progresses.
This course uses the same textbook as in CSC 484. It will serve more as a reference than a textbook; especially for material on the HCI Nugget presentations, other sources will be needed.
For additional references, see also the list in the CSC 484 Course syllabus.
The course Web page at http://www.csc.calpoly.edu/~fkurfess contains the following:
On PolyLearn you’ll find grades and feedback about class work. We’ll use Piazza as a discussion board, in particular for weekly updates on class activities, and the exploration of project topics. We’ll use a Web repository with a Google Docs spreadsheet as entrypoint for team project documents and research activity materials.
The main work in this class consists of a team project, assignments, and a research activity.
Student teams will have several project topics to choose from, with an emphasis on mobile devices. Some of the projects will be done in collaboration with outside partners. The project work should focus on the user interaction with a device or system. The teams are expected to design and implement different versions, ranging from design sketches and storyboards to partial implementations. Much of this work can be coordinated with the assignments. Usually the project outcomes will be shown in a display around the mid-quarter point and one at the end of the quarter. Details will be discussed during the first or second week of the quarter.
Much of the work in the assignments will be done in teams, although some assignments may have individual components.
The assignments are designed to help you understand and examine the way users interact with different types of computational devices. The requirements may include written reports and summaries to be posted on the class web site as well as oral presentation of results and relevant discussion in class. There will be some freedom in the choice of tools, methods, or topics, and you are encouraged to coordinate the work on the assignments with the work on the project.
This course is an advanced course on Human-Computer Interaction, and students are expected to investigate a topic related to important principles and recent work in the field. Traditionally, the results of such research work are delivered in the form of a presentation and research paper. In this class, we will examine alternative approaches to present the outcomes of the research conducted as class work. This can be in the form of an entry to Wikipedia or a similar Web site, a series of blog entries, a video, a podcast, or of course a traditional paper. The activity can be conducted individually, in small groups, or by the same team that works on the project. It is subject to the following expectations:
This class will rely on interactive classroom activities, such as participation in group discussions, presentation of ideas and results (from textbook, class or assignments), providing written summary materials (as web files via Piazza or Moodle), etc.
Success in this class depends on regular attendance, preparation of assigned readings and homework exercises, as well as a level of professionalism in the class presentations and displays. Peer evaluations may be included as part of the grade.I will use the following allocation of scores for the calculation of the grades.
I reserve the right to change the formula used. Please note that the project consists of several parts which will be evaluated separately. The project will be done in teams, and the performance of the team as a whole will be graded unless there is a clear disparity in the contribution of the individual team members. Should this be the case, I might ask for additional documentation like work sheets, email messages, or draft copies of documentation to evaluate individual contributions. For the team grades, feedback through peer evaluations will also be considered (although I will not use it directly in the calculation of the score).
The official final exam dates and times are listed on the schedule. The following activities may be scheduled for this final exam time; details will be discussed in class:
Students are expected to attend all lecture and lab sessions for the class. Except for unforeseeable reasons like illness or accidents, I expect advance notice for anticipated absences and delays in submission of class work.
To maintain uniformity across the student population, I am following university guidelines and will consider the following “excusable” reasons for allowing students to make up missed work and absences:
Much of the graded work in this class depends strongly on presentations and documentation material. Once a team or individual has committed to a date for the presentation, extensions or changes in the dates will only be permitted for the reasons listed above. Such changes may also have to be coordinated with the project contacts at the outside partner.
It is University policy to provide, on a flexible and individualized basis, reasonable accommodations to students who have disabilities that may affect their ability to participate in course activities or to meet course requirements. Students with disabilities are encouraged to contact their instructor to discuss their individual needs for accommodations. If you have a disability for which you are or may be requesting an accommodation, you are encouraged to contact both your instructor and the Disability Resource Center, Building 124, Room 119, at (805) 756-1395, as early as possible in the term.
The expectations below are based on Cal Poly’s Code of Student Conduct.
Academic dishonesty, in particular plagiarism, can be a serious offense. Any instances of cheating or plagiarism may be reported to the department chair and the Office of Student Rights & Responsibilities (OSRR). The Cal Poly rules and policies are listed in the Cal Poly catalog as well as at the OSRR web site. If the rules are unclear or you are unsure of how they apply, ask the instructor beforehand.
For programming assignments, we may use programs or services like Moss to compare assignments within a section, across all current sections of this class, and with old assignments. While such programs are not perfect, they detect suspicious similarities even after replacement of variable names and other identifiers. In general, the use of program libraries is acceptable, but not if they provide functionality whose implementation is the purpose of the lab or assignment. If you use libraries you need to indicate this in the documentation.
Turning in work is presumed to be a claim of authorship unless explicitly stated otherwise. For work created by multiple persons (such as team projects or group presentations), I may ask for documentation on who is responsible for which parts or aspects of the work.