scholarly journals The Interactive Urban Robot: User-centered development and final field trial of a direction requesting robot

Author(s):  
Astrid Weiss ◽  
Nicole Mirnig ◽  
Ulrike Bruckenberger ◽  
Ewald Strasser ◽  
Manfred Tscheligi ◽  
...  

AbstractIn this article, we present the user-centered development of the service robot IURO. IURO’s goal is to find the way to a designated place in town without any previous map knowledge, just by retrieving information from asking pedestrians for directions. We present the 3-years development process,which involved a series of studies on its appearance, communication model, feedback modalities, and social navigation mechanisms. Our main contribution lies within the final field trial.With the autonomous IURO platform, we performed a series of six way-finding runs (over 24 hours of run-time in total) in the city center of Munich, Germany. The robot interacted with approximately 100 pedestrians of which 36 interactions included a full route dialogue. A variety of empirical methods was used to explore reactions of primary users (pedestrians who actually interacted with the robot) and secondary users (bystanders who observed others interacting). The gathered data provides insights into usability, user experience, and acceptance of IURO and allowed us deriving recommendations for the development of other socially interactive robots.

Author(s):  
Regina Bernhaupt

Usability and user experience are two important factors in the development of mass-customizable personalized products. A broad range of evaluation methods is available to improve products during an user-centered development process. This chapter gives an overview on these methods and how to apply them to achieve easy-to-use, efficient and effective personalized products that are additionally fun to use. A case study on the development of a new interaction technique for interactive TV helps to understand how to set up a mix of evaluation methods to cope with some of the limitations of current usability and user experience evaluation methods. The chapter concludes with some guidelines of how to change organizations to focus on usability and user experience.


PANALUNGTIK ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 41-60
Author(s):  
Nanang Saptono

The capital of Ciamis Regency has experienced several displacements. During the reign of Raden Adipati Aria Kusumadiningrat the development of the capital was encouraged to develop into a city. After the kulturstelsel era, many European capitalists invested in Ciamis. At the beginning of the 20th century economic infrastructure, especially the means of distribution of commodities is much needed. Building economic facilities have sprung up in several locations in Ciamis. Such conditions result in the development of the city. This study aims to get a picture of the spatial layout of Ciamis and the city development process. The research method applied descriptive research. Data collection is done through direct observation in the field and accompanied by the utilization of instrument in the form of ancient maps. In the area of Ciamis City there are still some old building objects that can be used as a spatial bookmark of the city. At a glance the city's development spontaneously, but visible on the basis of existing infrastructure, in the 20th century the city of Ciamis showed a planned city. The growth of Ciamis city is of course influenced by several factors including economic and geographical factors.Keywords: city, layout, planned, industrial area


2012 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 439-455 ◽  
Author(s):  
Saburo SAITO ◽  
Tran Ngoc HUY ◽  
Masakuni IWAMI ◽  
Takahiro SATO ◽  
Kosuke YAMASHIRO ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Omar S. Asfour ◽  
Samar Abu Ghali

City centers worldwide are perceived as essential parts of the city, where city memories are preserved and its identity is expressed. They are planned to satisfy the functional requirements and pleasurable qualities of the city. Under the accelerating urbanization of the modern city, several challenges face these centers including demographic, economic, and environmental challenges. This requires a continuous and incremental urban development process based on clear strategy and action plans. Thus, this study focuses on urban development strategies of city centers, with a focus on Rafah city located in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian Territories. The geographic location of this city near the Palestinian-Egyptian borders makes it a promising commercial city at local and regional levels. Thus, the current situation of Rafah city center has been analyzed, and several development strategies have been proposed. This has been done through a field survey based on observation and a questionnaire directed to city center users. It has been found that there is a great potential of Rafah city center to be developed as a commercial center. In this regard, several strategies and required actions have been proposed in the fields of transportation, environmental quality, shopping activities, investment opportunities, and visual perception.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Iris A.G.M. Geerts ◽  
Liselore J.A.E Snaphaan ◽  
Inge M.B. Bongers

BACKGROUND Despite the potential value of assistive technology to support people with dementia (PWD) in everyday activities, use of these technologies is still limited. To ensure that assistive technologies better address the specific needs and daily context of PWD and their informal caregivers, it is particularly important to involve them in all different phases of assistive technology development. The literature rarely describes the involvement of PWD throughout the development process of assistive technologies, which makes it difficult to further reflect on and improve active involvement of PWD. OBJECTIVE This two-part study aimed to gather insights on the user-centered design (UCD) applied in the development process of the alpha prototype of the serious game PLAYTIME by describing the methods and procedures of the UCD as well as evaluating the UCD from the perspective of all involved stakeholders. METHODS The first three phases of the user-driven Living Lab of Innovate Dementia 2.0 were applied to directly involve PWD and their informal caregivers through qualitative research methods, including focus groups and a context-field study, in the development of the alpha prototype of PLAYTIME from exploration to design to testing. After the testing phase, a total number of 18 semi-structured interviews were conducted with PWD, their informal caregivers and the project members of PLAYTIME to evaluate the applied UCD from the perspective of all involved stakeholders. The interviews addressed five of the principles for successful UCD and the appropriateness of the different methods used in the focus groups and context-field study. RESULTS Results of the interviews focused, amongst others, on the level of involvement of PWD and their informal caregivers in the development process, the input provided by PWD and their informal caregivers, the value of early prototyping, continuous iterations of design solutions and in-context testing, the role of dementia care professionals in the multidisciplinary project team, and the appropriateness of open- and closed-ended questions for obtaining input from PWD and their informal caregivers. CONCLUSIONS The description and evaluation of the UCD applied in the development process of the alpha prototype of PLAYTIME resulted in several insights on the relevance of UCD for all involved stakeholders as well as how PWD can be involved in the subsequent phases of usable and meaningful assistive technology development.


Author(s):  
Baxter Shandobil ◽  
Ty Lazarchik ◽  
Kelly Clifton

There is increasing evidence that ridehailing and other private-for-hire (PfH) services such as taxis and limousines are diverting trips from transit services. One question that arises is where and when PfH services are filling gaps in transit services and where they are competing with transit services that are publicly subsidized. Using weekday trip-level information for trips originating in or destined for the city center of Portland, OR from PfH transportation services (taxis, transportation network companies, limousines) and transit trip data collected from OpenTripPlanner, this study investigated the temporal and spatial differences in travel durations between actual PfH trips and comparable transit trips (the same origin–destination and time of day). This paper contributes to this question and to a growing body of research about the use of ridehailing and other on-demand services. Specifically, it provides a spatial and temporal analysis of the demand for PfH transportation using an actual census of trips for a given 2 week period. The comparison of trip durations of actual PfH trips to hypothetical transit trips for the same origin–destination pairs into or out of the central city gives insights for policy making around pricing and other regulatory frameworks that could be implemented in time and space.


2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yanan Liu ◽  
Dujuan Yang ◽  
Harry J. P. Timmermans ◽  
Bauke de Vries

AbstractIn urban renewal processes, metro line systems are widely used to accommodate the massive traffic needs and stimulate the redevelopment of the local area. The route choice of pedestrians, emanating from or going to the metro stations, is influenced by the street-scale built environment. Many renewal processes involve the improvement of the street-level built environment and thus influence pedestrian flows. To assess the effects of urban design on pedestrian flows, this article presents the results of a simulation model of pedestrian route choice behavior around Yingkoudao metro station in the city center of Tianjin, China. Simulated pedestrian flows based on 4 scenarios of changes in street-scale built environment characteristics are compared. Results indicate that the main streets are disproportionally more affected than smaller streets. The promotion of an intensified land use mix does not lead to a high increase in the number of pedestrians who choose the involved route when traveling from/to the metro station, assuming fixed destination choice.


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