Scores and grades (as of 3/24):

Links to team projects:

• Digillusion

Teaching Staff

• Instructor: Dan Frost frost@ics.uci.edu Office: CS-406A (949) 824-1588 (Why UCI? 1 Luv!). Office hours Tuesdays 10:30 - 12:00
• Teaching Assistant: Judy Chen judychen@ics.uci.edu Office hour: Thursdays, 2:30 - 3:30 in the TA Office in the ICS trailer.
  

About the course: ICS 105 is a project course in which students, working on teams, will design and implement new software systems, paying particular attention to human computer interface issues.

Prerequisites: ICS 104 absolutely; ICS 121, ICS 131, ICS 141 slightly negotiable.

Textbook: Designing the User Interface (third edition or later) by Ben Shneiderman; or a similar textbook assigned in any ICS 104.

Course requirements and grading: Grades will be based 70% on the team project and 30% on individual assignments. There will be no exams.

• Team project. Students will work in teams of three or four. Each team will specify, design, and partially implement an e-commerce system. Most time will be spent on the design / prototyping phase, which will focus on human-computer interaction and user interface design, and which will be refined through several iterations. The team deliverables are:
  1. Requirements Document. Since you will not be interviewing a user, this is not a traditional requirements document, but more of a statement of intended functionality. The document should describe the intended system's capabilities, special features, treatment of security and privacy issues, and handling of error or anomalous situations. Give a good sense of the product line that will be available and how different products interact or can be combined. It is not necessary at this point to exhaustively catalog all products and prices. Define the targeted audience for this system. (Although a complete e-commerce system has many audiences, including company staff, partners and affiliates, and suppliers, this document should focus on the customer audience.) The document should discuss the desired "user experience," meaning the process through which the user interacts with the system, and how the system communicates the company's goals and mission. Should be 15 to 25 double-spaced pages.
     Due via Checkmate (just one team member should submit) at 11:59 pm Feb. 2.
  2. In-class presentation. Each team will have 15 minutes to present an overview of their system and its functionality to the class. Teams K, L, M, and Q: Thursday, Jan. 27. Teams N, P, R, S, and T: Tuesday, Feb. 1.
  3. Design Document. The design document will focus on the design of the human-computer interaction, not on the technical design of the program code (although that will be a part). This document should address three aspects of planning the system:
     1. Design bible. To ensure consistency throughout the site, it is necessary to articulate principles and guidelines for designing the interface. The bible should specify standards for navigation, terminology, action sequences, color, page layout, capitalization, fonts, exceptions and error handling, search, sound, artwork and logos, and anything else that is visible to the user. Some interesting links:
        • Usable GUI Design
        • Shneiderman's "Eight Golden Rules of Interface Design
        • Interface Hall of Shame
     2. Task profiles. Identify and describe 8 to 10 tasks that users will commonly perform. Try to make these tasks fairly specific to your system. For example, prefer "Select a bouquet of flowers in a specified price range" over "Purchase product." (You don't want to be too specific, such as "Purchase $24.95 bouquet of spring flowers." However, for an on-line florist, "Buy a dozen roses" would be appropriate.) Typical tasks will deal with finding and comparing products, navigating the system, and purchasing products. The descriptions should not be tied to details of the user interface -- focus on the task and how the user interacts with the computer. Talk about lists, options, and selecting instead of tables, drop down menus, and clicking on buttons. In selecting the task profiles to describe, try to cover a wide range of your system's functionality, as well as focusing on the most important tasks.
     3. Technical preview. In the last few weeks of the quarter you will implement a subset of your system. Define that subset, refering to the task profiles. Specify software and languages you plan to use.
     The design document is due (via Checkmate) at 11:59 pm on March 4. It will probably be 15 to 20 pages long, double-spaced. It should have a brief introduction that describes your system.
  4. Paper prototypes. Each team will bring paper prototypes of its system's screens to class on Tuesday, Feb. 15 and again, revised, on Tuesday, Feb. 22.
  5. Executable system. Teams will demo their running systems, tentatively on Thursday, March 17 ("reading day").
• Individual assignments.
  1. A paper, three to five pages long and double-spaced, analyzing one of the following according to principles specified in your ICS 104 textbook:
     1. The Florida presidential ballot from 2000.
     2. The web site www.shareourselves.org.
     3. The web site www.ics.uci.edu
     4. The web site Google Suggest. (You may find this Slashdot posting helpful.)
     Your analysis should both discuss the current interface and interactions, and suggest some specific improvements, with particular focus on the various users and their capabilities and interests. Due Tuesday, January 18, noon through Checkmate.
  2. A paper, three to five pages long and double-spaced, comparing and constrasting two web-based e-commerce sites. Try to find one site which is excellent, and one which is deficient, according to one or more principles stated in your ICS 104 textbook. Due date to be determined.
  3. (Optional) A 20-minute oral presentation to the class. Due Week 7 or 8.
  4. Regular class attendance and participation.
  5. The most important individual assignment, which will count for 15% of the course grade, is to act as an expert reviewer for another team. In this capacity you will meet several times throughout the quarter with the other team, carefully review its designs, and offer thoughtful analysis and criticism.

Special Accommodations: Any student who feels he or she may need an accommodation based on the impact of a disability should contact me privately to discuss his or her specific needs. Also contact the Disability Services Center at (949) 824-7494 as soon as possible to better ensure that such accommodations are implemented in a timely fashion.

Schedule for final presentations:

Time	Team
Fri. March 18 1:00 pm	Team S
Mon. March 21 2:00 pm	open
Mon. March 21 2:30 pm	open
Mon. March 21 3:00 pm	open
Mon. March 21 3:30 pm	open
Mon. March 21 4:00 pm	open
Mon. March 21 4:30 pm	open
Tue. March 22 9:00 am	Team N
Tue. March 22 9:30 am	Team P
Tue. March 22 10:00 am	Team L
Tue. March 22 10:30 am	Team M
Tue. March 22 1:30 pm	Team T
Tue. March 22 3:00 pm	closed
Tue. March 22 3:30 pm	Team R
Tue. March 22 4:00 pm	Team K
Tue. March 22 4:30 pm	Team Q