First Update Summary

Here's a brief summary of our group progress and upcoming tasks. Our first step was brainstorming potential research topics and choosing what we would each like to cover. The chosen topics are:

Troy: systems that support productivity (with a focus on relationship between a physical and electronic)

Becca: satisfaction/pleasure in an interface (with a look at heuristics)

Liz: the history/historical context of PDA's (includes a history of organization schemes and information management)

Next, we met to determine our goals for the two participatory design sessions.

Goal Sheet

Session 1:

• Goal: Through interviews, establish user feelings, opinions and beliefs about personal productivity.
• Goal: Investigate typical user scenarios (i.e., getting a restaurant or car rental receipt).
• Output: Create workflow/process representation that will guide interface design.

Session 2:

• Goal and Output: Test paper prototype with a minimum of two users; capture results; use to drive final design.

Our next actions for the upcoming week include: determining our magic wand interview questions, scheduling our two participatory design sessions, additional user recruitment (two so far) and agenda planning.

Here are some of our initial interview questions:

• What is the worst thing that ever happened to you with receipts?
• How do you feel when you face an accountant at the end of the year?
• If you could choose, would you use an accountant?
• How do you categorize your tax deductions (if you do at all)?
• Where do your receipts end up after you receive them? At the end of the day? At the end of the month?