SISAT

School of Information Systems & Technology

Faculty of Informatics

                                                                                                                                                              

CSCI324 Human Computer Interface Subject Outline

Autumn Session 2007

                                                                                                                                                              

Head of School –Assoc Professor Peter Hyland, Student Resource Centre, Tel: (02) 4221 3606

 

General Information

 

Subject Coordinator

Mr Omar Garcia

Telephone Number:

4221 5290

Email:

omar@uow.edu.au

Location:

40.252

 

Mr Garcia’s Consultation Times During Session


Day

Time

Monday

Tuesday

9:30 a.m.-11:30 am

9:30 a.m.-11:30 am

 


Subject Organisation

Session:

Autumn Session, Wollongong Campus

Credit Points

6 credit points

Contact hours per week:

2 hours lectures,1 hour tutorial, 1 hour lab

Lecture Times & Location:

Thursday  10:30 – 12:30    38.G01

Tutorial Day, Time and Location can be found at:

http://www.uow.edu.au/student/sols/timetables/index.html

 


 

Students should check the subject’s web site regularly as important information, including details of unavoidable changes in assessment requirements will be posted from time to time.  Any information posted to the web site is deemed to have been notified to all students.

 
Content

 

This subject examines the design evaluation and implementation of interactive computing systems for human use (HCI) and the major phenomena surrounding them. Also considered are joint performance of tasks by humans and machines, structure of human machine communication, social and organisational interactions with machine design, human capabilities to use machines including their learnability as well as algorithms and programming of the interface itself, engineering concerns that arise in designing interfaces, the process of specification design and implementation of interfaces and design tradeoffs..

 

Objectives

 

At the completion of this subject, students should be able to:

i)                     describe & justify HCI principles;

ii)                   apply the principles of designing HCI;

iii)                  design a HCI for a specific application and implement a prototype.


 

Lecture Schedule (subject to minor changes)

Week

Topics

Comments

1

Introduction

No Tutorials in Week 1

2

The human and Usability Engineering

 

3

Usability Engineering(cont) and Everyday design

 

4

The Interaction and Use cases /HTAs

 

5

Prototype and early evaluation

 

6

Interactions, WIMP and Widgets

 

7

Task Analysis and Dialogs

 

8

Design Rational and Evaluation

 

9

User testing

 

10

Guidelines

 

11

Computer Support for Collaborative Work (CSCW)

 

12

Non Traditional Interfaces

 

13

Review and Final Exam Preparation

 

 

Attendance Requirements

It is the responsibility of students to attend all lectures/tutorials/labs/seminars/practical work for subjects for which you are enrolled.

 

It should be noted that according to Course Rule 003{Interpretation Point 2 (t)} each credit point for a single session subject has the value of about two hours per week including class attendance.  Therefore, the amount of time spent on each 6 credit point subject should be at least 12 hours per week, which includes lectures/tutorials/labs etc


 

Satisfactory attendance is deemed to be attendance at approximately 80%* of the allocated contact hours. Attendance rolls may be kept for lectures, TUTORIALS and laboratories. If you are present for less than 80%* you need to apply for special consideration, otherwise a fail grade may be recorded.

 

Students MUST attend their allocated tutorial unless they have the written permission of the subject coordinator.


Method of Presentation

Tutorials and Assignments will relate to the lecture topics.  Satisfactory attendance at lectures, tutorials and seminars is a requirement for the successful completion of this course. 

 

Students should check the subject's web site, available via UOW e-Learning, regularly as important information, including details of unavoidable changes in assessment requirements will be posted from time to time.  Any information posted to the web site is deemed to have been notified to all students

 

Subject Materials 

 

Textbook

Human Computer Interaction, Dix, Finlay, Abowd, Beale, Second Edition, Prentice Hall Europe or

Preece Rogers, and Sharp  Interaction Design second edition, Wiley & Sons, 2002

 

 

References

Donald Norman, The Design of Everyday Things, MIT, 1998

Terry Winograd, Bringing Design to Software, Addison- Wesley, c1996

Draper and Norman, User-Centered System Design, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1986

Jacko and Sears, The Human-Computer Interaction Handbook, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2003

Don Norman, Emotional Design, Basic Books, 2004

 


These readings/references are recommended only and are not intended to be an exhaustive list.  Students are encouraged to use the library catalogue and databases to locate additional readings

 


Assessment

This subject has the following assessment components.

Assessment Items & Format

Percentage of Final Mark

Due Date


1. Interface Evaluation report

10%

Lecture time Week 4

2. Project Plan

10%

Lecture time Week 6

3. Project-Low fidelity prototype

10%

Tutorial time Week 8

4. Project-Evaluation report

10%

Lecture time Week 10

5. Project-High Fidelity prototype

10%

Tutorial time Week 13

6.  Final Examination

50%

Exam Period


 

Notes on Assessment

 

Scaling

Final results in this subject may be scaled. The scaling method that will be used in this subject is as follows.

If E is the student exam mark, and A is the student assignment mark, the student final mark will be determined as follows:

 

if E >= 40% of the maximum exam mark: then student final mark is E + A;

       if E < 40% of the maximum exam mark: then student final mark is minimum (E+A, 47)

                 if E < 35% of the maximum exam mark: then student: final mark is /min/{E+A, 42};

 

Additional Information

 

Students must refer to the Faculty Handbook or online references which contains a range of policies on educational issues and student matters.


 

Supplementary Exams

 

While the School normally grants supplementary exams when the student does not sit the standard exam for an acceptable reason, each case will be assessed on its own merit and there is no guarantee a supplementary exam will be granted. If a supplementary exam is granted the date will be determined by the University via ARD.  You will be notified via SOLS Mail the time and date of this supplementary exam. You must follow the instructions given in the email message.

 

Please note that if this is your last session and you are granted a supplementary exam, be aware that your results will not be processed in time to meet the graduation deadline.

 

Plagiarism

 

When you submit an assessment task, you are declaring the following

1.        It is your own work and you did not collaborate with or copy from others.

2.        You have read and understand your responsibilities under the University of Wollongong's policy on plagiarism.

3.        You have not plagiarised from published work (including the internet). Where you have used the work from others, you have referenced it in the text and provided a reference list at the end ot the assignment.

4.        Plagiarism will not be tolerated.

5.        Students are responsible for submitting original work for assessment, without plagiarising or cheating, abiding by the University’s policies on Plagiarism as set out in the Calendar under University Policies, and in Faculty handbooks and subject guides. Plagiarism has led to the expulsion from the University.


 

This outline should be read in conjunction with the following documents:

 

Code of Practice - Teaching and Assessment

http://www.uow.edu.au/handbook/codesofprac/teaching_code.html

Key Dates

http://www.uow.edu.au/student/dates.html

Code of Practice - Students

http://www.uow.edu.au/handbook/codesofprac/cop_students.html

Information Literacies Introduction Program

http://www.library.uow.edu.au/helptraining/workshops/ilip/

Acknowledgement Practice Plagiarism will not be tolerated

http://www.uow.edu.au/handbook/courserules/plagiarism.html

Student Academic Grievance Policy

http://www.uow.edu.au/handbook/codesofprac/cop_supervision.html#8

Special Consideration Policy

http://www.uow.edu.au/handbook/courserules/specialconsideration.html

Code of Practice-Honours

http://www.uow.edu.au/handbook/honourscode.html

Non-Discriminatory Language Practice and Presentation

http://staff.uow.edu.au/eeo/nondiscrimlanguage.html

Intellectual Property Policy

http://www.uow.edu.au/research/researchmanagement/1998IP.html

Occupational Health and Safety

http://staff.uow.edu.au/ohs/commitment/OHS039-ohspolicy.pdf

SISAT Internet Access & Student Resource Centre

http://www.sitacs.uow.edu.au/info/current/internet_access_and_resource.shtml

SISAT Computer Usage Rules

http://www.itacs.uow.edu.au/info/current/support/labs/rules.shtml

SISAT Style Guide for Footnotes, Documentation, Essay and Report Writing

http://www.sitacs.uow.edu.au/info/current/styleguide.pdf

SISAT Student Guide

http://www.itacs.uow.edu.au/info/current/regulations.shtml

Informatics Faculty Librarian, Ms Annette Meldrum, phone: 4221 4637,ameldrum@uow.edu.au

SISAT Subject Outlines

http://www.itacs.uow.edu.au/info/current/subject_outlines/