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* One paragraph per point, 6 points, ~250 wordsper paragraph
* POINTS
** People prefer computers that conform to then rather that conforming to computers (natural interacting) [Sharon]
=Essay Draft=
'''Intro'''
Ubiquitous computing is a post desktop model of human computer interaction in which the information processing is part of people’s day-to-day activities and operation. Computers are getting faster, smaller, more efficient, and cheaper which is resulting with computers in everything. This is already happening, and as it grows computers will become invisible, embedded in everything, and connected together. As this develops, computers will have to become more intelligent and aware of their surroundings. One of the main key points of ubiquitous computing is to make the machine adjust to the human world; to make machines a part of daily life without people noticing it. Some of the devices that we use with the ubiquitous computing model are cell phones, music players, GPS’s, and interactive whiteboards. These are great examples that demonstrate the ubiquitous computing model. People use all of these devices daily. However, they don’t think about the fact that those are actually computers. They have been integrated in our lives.
There is a shift in the sense that technology is being integrated into our daily lives in a manner that encourages human/machine interaction. A lot of the technology that people take for granted is seldom even considered as something separate but rather as an extension of ourselves. Also people place a great level of trust in technology; often without thinking they are doing so. Whether it is a GPS directional system, a self-parking car, an iPad with important information on it, ubiquitous computing is becoming a key factor in our society. The average person does not really consider the computing power of the technology that they incorporate into their daily lives. Rather they seem to simply integrate the technology into their lifestyles. This is a natural human reaction to advances in technology once they become used by everybody and accepted in our environment.
Like in the early 20th century the car was first used and understood by very few people. Now we drive our cars or take the bus without giving it a second thought and usually with very little thought as to how the car operates, aside from the need to put gas into it. The same is happening with tablets, phones, and many other devices. We simply incorporate them into our daily lives and they help us with our routine and they don’t seem amazing anymore, just a natural tools for us to use. Tablets, GPS systems, controller free video games, car interfaces, voice command technology, cell phones have all helped to remove some of the artificial interfaces from traditional technology usage. When we think about it for a moment we see that this technology has become a key part of our daily lives in a way that did not exist even 20 years ago. In both our work and entertainment technology has become a standard part of our daily lives. This trend is continuing and this level of integration is becoming more and more ubiquitous. This essay will elaborate further on ubiquitous computing. Ubiquitous computing is the future of computer products. Moreover, consumers will likely to purchase something that is familiar to them and seems less like a machine. Users are forcing a paradigm shift that demands consumer products to embrace the principles of ubiquitous computing.
'''Natural user interface'''
People prefer computers that conform to them rather than conforming to computers. A natural and easy process in learning how to use a device is crucially important in a product. If the learning process is too complex or takes too much time, the users won’t want to use the product and will search for alternatives for it. User-friendliness and natural input are of key importance in this area. Rather than reading through manual, software devices are designed in such a way as to allow the user to discover the functions of the product, through minimal experimentation. In this sense the technology teaches us how to use it through interaction. Simply exploring the functions of a cellphone or an iPad may serve as an example of this, as do cars that can park themselves. For instance, the technology now exists on the market that allows a computer to park a car by sensing the surrounding area and acting accordingly. The luxury car giant Lexus currently markets such a model and this serves as an excellent example of easy natural user interface. Many north Americans can drive a car, but giving control to a computer to move the car while the person is actually in it, in other words trusting the computer to safely park the car without damage is a strong example of the level of trust that people have placed in technology and how far the paradigm shift has come. In terms of ease of use in this interface, no special training is required to make use of this feature and it is presumed that any driver will be able to make use of this feature in a comfortable way since the car is on the market. This is a good example of a natural user interface since the only skills needed are the ability to drive in the first place a have only the causal acceptance and awareness of technology usage that most people have these days.
'''Context Awareness'''
Ubiquitous computing aims to integrate itself into everyday life, and everyday life is not a single threaded linear event. In the daily lives of an average user, there are many interruptions, stoppages, and unexpected occurrences. Users also need to take breaks during their activities, or even want to put an activity on hold. Sometimes an activity can be put on hold for long durations or permanently. Regardless of the durations or the frequency of interruptions to an activity, the ability to resume an activity after an interruption must exist. Users also expect the service to resume the activity with all previous progresses intact. What this means is that when a service pauses an activity or process it must save all progress done on the activity and any settings that might be created for the activity. When the activity resumes all the saved data must be readily available, and the activity should resume as if no interruption had occurred. Furthermore, when an activity had been paused for a long duration, the user might forget previous progress and the service should be aware of the passage of time, and reacquaint the user with the activity and its progress. In addition, users also require continuously available services, as today’s paradigm move toward the infusion of ubiquitous computing into our everyday lives, the services provided will need to become constantly available, always interrupted and easily resumed. The manner of the service resumption is also paramount in the successful integration of ubiquitous computing. The service must be able to start in one location, paused, resumed at a completely different location with a different interface and a different computer. Only when all of those capabilities are meet, then true integration into ubiquitous computing will be possible, and accepted by the users.
'''Tablets and iPad example'''
Tablets have existed before iPad came along. However, they were not successful. Microsoft came up with a line of Microsoft Tables PC but their clients were mainly business people. In 2010 Apple Inc. released the iPad with major success. The iPad is extremely popular and people find it easy to use. The key element of the iPad’s success lies with its great user interface that people find natural and comfortable to use. Natural interaction on the screen is what made it successful. They are easy to use due to the touch screen technology and iPads are very portable. In some ways they have replaced the paper notebooks that people used to carry around. Handwriting and note taking technology is also available and it’s interesting to note that this copies, in a technical way, the old styles of note taking. Comfort levels are established. The use of an iPad, for example, is learned quickly since the functions are all laid out on a touch screen. The only presumed background knowledge would by previous use of computers such as laptops, etc. which are common in today’s schools and workplaces. The user interface is natural because it removes the need to input information through the traditional keyboard in favor of directly inputting information on the screen, and the way people manipulate the screen. It was this natural interface that made people think of the iPad and of tablets as a new class of device, not merely a netbook or laptop without a keyboard.
'''Conclusion'''
The principles discussed in this essay are becoming more and more expected by users in the technology that they use. People demand that the devices and interfaces they use conform to the human form and ways of doing things, rather than making people conform to the demands of computers. This human centred design requires computers to become more aware of who users are, what they are doing with it, what is going on around in around it, and using these and other contextual information to adapt and to make predictions. Because everyone is different and uses computers differently, one of the ways computers need to adapt is to personalize interfaces and interactions with the computer to the user. And in real life people don’t usually do things in a linear task oriented way like traditional computer interactions. People want to be able to do many things at a time and have computers keep up with their activities and how those activates might affect each other. Furthermore, people don’t want to be limited by time and space. They want to be able to start, stop, and resume activities when and where they like. Computers will need to be able to facilitate to and adapt to how users want to use things, and not make user adapt to computers.
The iPad serves as a good example of what can be accomplished when a product is designed properly and with these principles in mind. Primarily due to the new and innovative way people are naturally able to interact with it, and do so almost immediately without training has made people think of tablets in a new way, as a new class of device. This is essentially the goal of the ubiquitous computing model, not to make people think of computers as computers, but to think of them as an entirely different type of object. Designing computers that accomplish this goal is not easy. It requires designers and developers to think carefully about how people think and behave. That means more time spent focusing of developing these aspect and more time testing with people. This is time well spent because it gives those designers and developers a competitive advantage that is slowly becoming an expectation and requirement as the ubiquitous computing model become more and more prevalent.