An investigation of smartphone applications: Exploring usability aspects related to wireless personal area networks, context-awareness, and remote information access

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.In this thesis we look into usability in the context of smartphone applications. We selected three research areas to investigate, namely Wireless Personal Area Networks, Context-awareness, and Remote Information Access. These areas are investigated through a series of experiments, which focuses on important aspects of usability within software applications. Additionally, we mainly use smartphone devices in the experiments. In experiment 1, Multi-Platform Bluetooth Remote Control, we investigated Wireless Personal Area Networks. Specifically, we implemented a system consisting of two clients, which were created for Java ME and Windows Mobile, and integrated with a server application installed on a Bluetooth-enabled laptop. For experiments 2 and 3, Context-aware Meeting Room and PainDroid: an Android Application for Pain Management, we looked closely at the research area of Contextawareness. The Context-aware Meeting Room was created to automatically send meeting participants useful meeting notes during presentations. In experiment 3, we investigated the use of on-device sensors for the Android platform, providing an additional input mechanism for a pain management application, where the accelerometer and magnetometer were used. Finally, the last research area we investigated was Remote Information Access, where we conducted experiment 4, Customised Android Home Screen. We created a system that integrated both a cloud-based server application and a mobile client running on the Android platform. We used the cloud-computing platform to provide context management features, such as the ability to store the user configuration that was automatically pushed to the mobile devices

An investigation of smartphone applications : exploring usability aspects related to wireless personal area networks, context-awareness, and remote information access

In this thesis we look into usability in the context of smartphone applications. We selected three research areas to investigate, namely Wireless Personal Area Networks, Context-awareness, and Remote Information Access. These areas are investigated through a series of experiments, which focuses on important aspects of usability within software applications. Additionally, we mainly use smartphone devices in the experiments. In experiment 1, Multi-Platform Bluetooth Remote Control, we investigated Wireless Personal Area Networks. Specifically, we implemented a system consisting of two clients, which were created for Java ME and Windows Mobile, and integrated with a server application installed on a Bluetooth-enabled laptop. For experiments 2 and 3, Context-aware Meeting Room and PainDroid: an Android Application for Pain Management, we looked closely at the research area of Contextawareness. The Context-aware Meeting Room was created to automatically send meeting participants useful meeting notes during presentations. In experiment 3, we investigated the use of on-device sensors for the Android platform, providing an additional input mechanism for a pain management application, where the accelerometer and magnetometer were used. Finally, the last research area we investigated was Remote Information Access, where we conducted experiment 4, Customised Android Home Screen. We created a system that integrated both a cloud-based server application and a mobile client running on the Android platform. We used the cloud-computing platform to provide context management features, such as the ability to store the user configuration that was automatically pushed to the mobile devices.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

An investigation of smartphone applications : exploring usability aspects related to wireless personal area networks, context-awareness, and remote information access

In this thesis we look into usability in the context of smartphone applications. We selected three research areas to investigate, namely Wireless Personal Area Networks, Context-awareness, and Remote Information Access. These areas are investigated through a series of experiments, which focuses on important aspects of usability within software applications. Additionally, we mainly use smartphone devices in the experiments. In experiment 1, Multi-Platform Bluetooth Remote Control, we investigated Wireless Personal Area Networks. Specifically, we implemented a system consisting of two clients, which were created for Java ME and Windows Mobile, and integrated with a server application installed on a Bluetooth-enabled laptop. For experiments 2 and 3, Context-aware Meeting Room and PainDroid: an Android Application for Pain Management, we looked closely at the research area of Contextawareness. The Context-aware Meeting Room was created to automatically send meeting participants useful meeting notes during presentations. In experiment 3, we investigated the use of on-device sensors for the Android platform, providing an additional input mechanism for a pain management application, where the accelerometer and magnetometer were used. Finally, the last research area we investigated was Remote Information Access, where we conducted experiment 4, Customised Android Home Screen. We created a system that integrated both a cloud-based server application and a mobile client running on the Android platform. We used the cloud-computing platform to provide context management features, such as the ability to store the user configuration that was automatically pushed to the mobile devices.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Collaborative Quality Controlled Collection and Semantic Integration of Spatial Data

In den vergangenen Jahren ist die Verbreitung von mobilen Geräten mit integrierter Lokalisierungstechnologie (z.B. GPS) stark gestiegen. Jeder, der ein solches Gerät besitzt, kann zum Datenlieferanten werden und in einem Netzwerk von Freiwilligen, die Rolle eines Datensensors übernehmen. In der vorliegenden Dissertation werde ich zwei Problemstellungen näher betrachten, die im Kontext von raumbezogenen Daten, erhoben von Gemeinschaften aus fachlich (hier: geowissenschaftlich) nicht geschulten Nutzern, noch ungelöst sind: Wie können geowissenschaftliche Laien motiviert werden, freiwillig qualitätsgesicherte raumbezogene Daten zu erheben? Der erste Beitrag meiner Dissertation liefert eine Antwort auf diese Frage. Er beinhaltet ein Framework zum Design von ortsbezogenen Spielen, die geowissenschaftliche Laien motivieren, raumbezogene Daten qualitätsgesichert in spielerischer Art und Weise zu sammeln. Um es mit den Worten von Peltola et al. (2006) auszudrücken: ”game play is a natural motivator to participate in something that is not necessary or beneficial. [...] By controlling game events and perhaps game logics and rules, the agencies that ultimately use the gathered data, can steer players to do tasks supporting their needs“. Wie kann die Qualität von Sammlungen semantisch angereicherter raumbezogener Daten verbessert werden? Eine wichtige Eigenschaft von ortsbezogenen Spielen zur Datenerhebung ist die wiederholte Spielbarkeit. Im Gegensatz zu anderen Domänen ist nämlich die Erstellung redundanter Daten im raumbezogenen Kontext sogar erwünscht. Das Zusammenführen von Daten mehrerer Nutzer kann man als Mehrfachmessung auffassen, die sich dazu nutzen lässt, die Qualität von Lokalisierung (Wo?) und Kategorisierung (Was?) zu verbessern. Der zweite Beitrag meiner Dissertation gibt eine Antwort auf die Fragestellung und besteht in einem Ansatz zur semantischen Integration der gesammelten raumbezogenen Daten.In recent years, the proliferation of mobile devices capable of recording GPS coordinates has increased rapidly. Everyone owning such a device has the potential to be a ”voluntary sensor” (Goodchild, 2007) and as such provide useful information about his everyday environment. In my PhD thesis I want to investigate two research problems in the context of spatial data collected by these voluntary non-experts that are not solved yet: How can non-experts be motivated to collect quality controlled spatial data voluntarily? Therefore the first contribution of my PhD thesis is a framework to design location-based games that motivate voluntary non-experts to collect quality controlled spatial data in an entertaining way. To say it with Peltola et al. (2006): ”game play is a natural motivator to participate in something that is not necessary or beneficial. [...] By controlling game events and perhaps game logics and rules, the agencies that ultimately use the gathered data, can steer players to do tasks supporting their needs”. How can the quality of collections of semantically enhanced spatial data be improved? An important feature of location-based games for data collection is their replay ability. In contrast to other domains the redundant creation of data is very welcome in the context of spatial data. The integration of data from different users can be used to improve the quality of the localization (where?) and the categorization (what?) of such data. The second contribution of my PhD thesis is an approach to semantically integrate the collected spatial data