Towards Design Excellence for Context-Aware Services - The Case of Mobile Navigation Apps

To satisfy service customers and create unique value in a digitized world, companies must strive for exceeding customers’ expectations of e-service experience by establishing high e-service quality. However, an increasing amount of e-services is performed by context-aware mobile technology, which is able to sense and react to changes in the user’s environment. Although these context-aware services are able to address our personal needs and already determine our everyday live, knowledge on how to develop such services is sparse. In our study, we qualitatively compare three mobile navigation apps based on their user reviews in order to elicit first requirements and design approaches for e-service quality oriented design. Results show that well known e-service quality models are not fully applicable to the case of mobile navigation services

Mobile learning application website for educators

PDA’s, mobile phone and smart phone are the example of personal mobile devices that is has the ability to provide educational content. Followed by the transactional distance theory is relevant to the template design in mobile learning application for education through a website. The idea suggested that the transactional distance includes the psychological rather than geographical distance among the educators and students which it is link to the balance of the dialogue, structure (course design), and autonomy of learner (Moore & Kearsley, 2005). This study addresses the suitable design patterns layout for mobile learning application based on the student preferences in the terms of navigation menu, learning contents view, searching method and sorting method, enhance a mobile learning application model and test. The objective of this research was to help the educators creating the mobile learning application through a website. The study of design patterns for mobile learning application template is, by analyze the student preferences with quantitative method survey. Generic design templates for mobile learning application will be develop with the ADDIE model concepts. A working prototype system website will be develop after the findings of the design patterns based on the preferences of students in UTMs' postgraduate master student will be discussed and evaluated

Eliciting Customer Preferences for Shopping Companion Apps: A Service Quality Approach

Shopping companion apps, which assist customers in product search and buying decisions, are an emerging phenomenon in the context of omnichannel retail. These retailer-provided apps link the digital with the physical servicescape of the store, allowing for new forms of online and at the same time physical service. So far, there is no dominant design for this type of information system. Both academia and practice lack empirical information about what customers expect from this kind of mobile app. Drawing from service quality literature as theoretical foundation, we conducted a qualitative content analysis of 1,448 customer reviews of three major shopping companion apps. The analysis yielded 23 aspects that customers expect from shopping companion apps, and that, in turn, can support establishing high mobile service quality. Our results contribute to the knowledge of m-service in retail and quality-driven app design

Engagement towards mobile-ticketing applications: How do North African mobile users build their engagement through perceived service quality?

Purpose: the aim of this study is to examine the determinants of perceived quality of mobile-ticketing and its impact on the engagement of mobile users towards applications of companies in the tertiary sector. Design/methodology/approach: an exploratory qualitative study is conducted among end-users of mobile-ticketing applications. Data includes 21 semi-structured interviews with end-users exclusively from service provider platforms. Findings: this study delimits the determinants of perceived quality for a mobile-ticketing service and their role in the engagement building process towards the Application brand. It shows that engagement is conditioned by the quality of service and satisfaction in a mobile-ticketing context. Originality: this article extends the theory on perceived service quality by integrating different determinants specific to mobile-ticketing. It is one of the first specialized researches in a mobile service domain and that studies a specific branch of mobile marketing, while the majority of studies address electronic service quality

Mobile Learning: location, collaboration and scaffolding inquiry

Critiques of mobile learning pedagogy are concerned with whether such approaches are technology led. This chapter discusses how the particular features of mobile learning can be harnessed to provide new learning opportunities in relation to collaboration, inquiry and location-based learning. Technology supported inquiry learning is a situation rich with possibilities for collaboration. In particular, mobile learning offers new possibilities for scaffolding collaboration together with its other better-known features such as scaffolding the transfer between settings and making learning relevant by making use of the possibilities of location-based learning. These features are considered as part of mobile learning models, in particular mobile collaborative learning models

Mobile App Service Quality Dimensions and Requirements for Mobile Shopping Companion Apps

The increasing utilization of mobile apps for shopping leads retailers to provide customers with dedicated mobile shopping companion apps to create an omni-channel shopping experience involving traditional brick-and-mortar, electronic and mobile business. Mobile shopping companion apps extend the traditional and electronic services of brick-and-mortar retailers by an additional mobile channel providing the customer with a digital companion supporting the shopping within and outside the stores using mobile technology. A twofold approach is pursued in this thesis. Firstly, a structured literature review is conducted to identify candidate dimensions for developing a scale for measuring the service quality of mobile shopping companion apps. Secondly, design requirements for improving the service quality of these mobile apps are deduced from online customer reviews of three exemplary mobile shopping companion apps applying a qualitative content analysis. The mobile app service quality of mobile shopping companion apps can be measured using a hierarchical and multi-dimensional scale consisting of three primary dimensions, seven secondary dimensions and 22 related items. The primary dimensions interaction quality, environment quality and outcome quality structure the secondary dimensions responsiveness, information, security and privacy, design, performance, technical reliability and valence. Based on these dimensions, 22 implementation guidelines and 14 service design requirements are derived as potential areas for optimizing the mobile app service quality of mobile shopping companion apps and achieving a high overall service quality. A mobile shopping companion app should include a set of features consisting of 16 features from three different areas. Results show that measuring the service quality of mobile shopping companion apps require for a tailored measurement scale. Equally, design requirements are proposed for this particular category of mobile apps. Retailers should provide a single mobile shopping companion app providing all features and mobile services to the customer. Keywords: mobile service; mobile commerce; shopping companion; service quality

CommuniSense: Crowdsourcing Road Hazards in Nairobi

Nairobi is one of the fastest growing metropolitan cities and a major business and technology powerhouse in Africa. However, Nairobi currently lacks monitoring technologies to obtain reliable data on traffic and road infrastructure conditions. In this paper, we investigate the use of mobile crowdsourcing as means to gather and document Nairobi's road quality information. We first present the key findings of a city-wide road quality survey about the perception of existing road quality conditions in Nairobi. Based on the survey's findings, we then developed a mobile crowdsourcing application, called CommuniSense, to collect road quality data. The application serves as a tool for users to locate, describe, and photograph road hazards. We tested our application through a two-week field study amongst 30 participants to document various forms of road hazards from different areas in Nairobi. To verify the authenticity of user-contributed reports from our field study, we proposed to use online crowdsourcing using Amazon's Mechanical Turk (MTurk) to verify whether submitted reports indeed depict road hazards. We found 92% of user-submitted reports to match the MTurkers judgements. While our prototype was designed and tested on a specific city, our methodology is applicable to other developing cities.Comment: In Proceedings of 17th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction with Mobile Devices and Services (MobileHCI 2015

Project SAM: Developing an app to provide self-help for anxiety

An interdisciplinary team at the University of the West of England (UWE) was commissioned and funded to develop a mobile phone app which would provide self-help options for the management of mild to moderate anxiety. The completed app would extend the range and availability of psychological support for student well-being at UWE and other higher education institutions.The project team consisted of two computer scientists and one psychologist who were responsible for the technical, functional and clinical specification of the app. A local mobile app development company was appointed and the teams collaborated on the design, build and evaluation of the app. The self-help structure and components were developed in consultation with therapeutic practitioners, in and out of UWE. The developer team advised on and constructed multi-media features to realise the self-help aims of the app.The UWE project team promoted an iterative approach to development, evaluating each stage of development through trials with expert users, practitioners and students. The app, named SAM (Self-help for Anxiety Management), was developed for Apple and Android operating systems, to be usable on smartphones and tablets. SAM was launched in the app stores in July 2013, globally available and free to download for the first year of operation. It was promoted to students, educational institutions, mental health organisations and charities as well as a range of professional and informal contacts. A UWE-based Advisory Board was convened to oversee the maintenance and development of the university’s investment in SAM. Members include the project team, researchers, therapists and other staff with an interest in its use to support student well-being. Three key tasks of the Board are to ensure SAM’s financial sustainability, to oversee developments in its usability and self-help components, and to obtain funding for the evaluation of its therapeutic impact

Quality Assessment for E-learning: a Benchmarking Approach (Third edition)

The primary purpose of this manual is to provide a set of benchmarks, quality criteria and notes for guidance against which e-learning programmes and their support systems may be judged. The manual should therefore be seen primarily as a reference tool for the assessment or review of e-learning programmes and the systems which support them. However, the manual should also prove to be useful to staff in institutions concerned with the design, development, teaching, assessment and support of e-learning programmes. It is hoped that course developers, teachers and other stakeholders will see the manual as a useful development and/or improvement tool for incorporation in their own institutional systems of monitoring, evaluation and enhancement