Our work focuses on learning through engagements with real end user communities by deploying and adapting technologies and infrastructures 'in the wild'. Through these experiences, we inform the design of novel devices and adaptive infrastructures, and explore new forms of interaction and ethnomethodological technique. In Digital Care, we have developed new ethnomethodological approaches based on Domestic Probes – cameras, diaries, maps, Dictaphones, photo-albums, postcards etc. – in care settings, as a way of eliciting information from the members of user groups that are difficult to research by other means. Based on these requirements and participatory design sessions we have deployed an asynchronous messenger system that provides additional support for communication in a real care environment through SMS based semi-public messenging. This system has been redeveloped using low cost hardware for deployment in care workers' homes. In the Domestic Experience we explore how we might augment everyday artifacts to afford novel interaction with digital environments. Utilising the Smart-Its platform, we augment surfaces with sensing and communication capabilities: load cells augment a table to afford positioning and context sensing capabilities. Importantly, the table retains its intrinsic properties and can still be used conventionally, yet the artifact now has additional digital affordances. Through our partners, this work has led to the Drift Table and the Key Table, which are now being deployed in real homes. In the Infrastructure Challenge we focus on providing enabling technologies to allow non-specialist construction of Equator Experiences. With Smart-Its non-hardware specialists are able to augment experiences and artifacts with sensing capabilities. Using the Equator Construction Kit built upon Elvin, graphic designers are able to build simple Equator mixed reality experiences using familiar graphic design tools (Macromedia Director). |