Information technology is transforming the way people interact between themselves and with objects around them. Today’s focus is rather not on the computers and technology itself, but more on the user. The aim is to make computers simple and transparen to the user. The user shoud not feel the control of compuers in the process of communicating, using the system is going to be simple and native.
We are going to experinece
- The increase of richness and completeness of human-computer interaction
- The relevant role of mobility
- The pervasive diffusion of intelligence in the space around us
The merging of these trends allows the emergence of a new vision, the Ambient Intelligence (AmI) – a pervasive and unobtrusive intelligence in the surrounding environment supporting the activities and interactions of the users.
According to the AmI metaphor, people will live in enriched environments in which the technology is sensitive to people’s needs, personalized to their requirements, anticipatory of their behavior and responsive to their presence (Riva 2005).
“Seen in this light, Ambient Intelligence is the limit of a process which introduces the technology into people’s lives in such a way that the introduction never feels like a conscious learning curve: no special interface is needed because human experience is already a rich ‘Manual’ of ways of interfacing to changing systems and services. Somehow, we need to create technology that leverages this powerful human resource rather than trying to suppress it by requiring humans to participate in inflexible interaction protocols of the sort supported by current call centre technology.”
An effective AmI system is able to identify the characteristics (affordances and constrains) of the situation in which the activity happens. If an AmI system does not recognize the characteristics of the situation in which the user acts – at least at a general level – it will be not able to support the activity effectively.
On one side we have optimal experiences. According to Csikszentmihalyi, users engage in actions followed with a positive, complex and rewarding state of mind, defined “optimal experience” or “flow”. Flow is the result of the link between the highest level of presence-as-feeling, with a positive emotional state.
An effective AmI system is able to induce a feeling of presence in the activity it is supporting: The less is the level of presence-as-feeling, the more are the breakdowns, the less is the quality of experience and the transparency of the AmI system.
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Posted in: thesis
Posted on March 28, 2010
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