Glasgow's first main project in Equator was City, an investigation into the design of a shared experience of a city that combined streets, buildings, signs and so forth with digital representation such as live maps, hypertexts, photos etc. While these have been traditionally seen as separate representations (physical and digital) the Glasgow group has used its experience in both areas to create a computer-based system where both representations work together to generate one unified experience. Versions of the system have been successfully trialled with museum visitors and with tourists investigating a city square. Taking this one stage further, the City software was transposed to an environmental science context, where the digital information includes details of current and historic air quality. This eGS system lets people on the street look at digital representations of current carbon monoxide levels and historical records of CO, collaborating in real-time with scientists indoors using heavyweight data visualisation hardware. More recent projects look at revealing and exploiting the limits, gaps and variability of digital systems, for example gaps in mobile phone availability. The Seamful Games project investigates the concept of seamful design through the design of multiplayer mobile games. We are experimenting with a number of games that explore technical issues such as revealing and exploiting wi-fi coverage around the city, using peer-to-peer ad hoc networks and epidemic algorithms to share information and code modules, recording such games and replaying them to players, and using textiles as sensors and displays. Current members of the Glasgow group are Louise Barkhuus, Marek Bell, Barry Brown, Matthew Chalmers (Principal Investigator), Areti Galani, Malcolm Hall, Alexander Hubmann, Alistair Morrison, Steve North, Paul Rudman, Scott Sherwood and Paul Tennent. Alumni include David Browning, Ian MacColl and Martin Ritchie. Also involved are academic staff members Steve Brewster, Steve Draper, Phil Gray and Chris Johnson, a number of local partners such as The Lighthouse - Scotland's Centre for Architecture, Design and the City, the Hunterian Museum and Gallery, and the Glasgow Science Centre. Other collaborations Intel, who donated a Wireless Research Lab to the Equator group, and Microsoft Research.
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