The data hungry home

It's said that the pleasure is in the giving, not the receiving. This belief is validated by how humans interact with their family, friends and society as well as their gardens, homes, and pets. Yet for ubiquitous devices, this dynamic is reversed with devices as the donors and owners as the recipients. This paper explores an alternative paradigm where these devices are elevated, becoming members of Data Hungry Homes, allowing us to build relationships with them using the principles that we apply to family, pets or houseplants. These devices are developed to fit into a new concept of the home, can symbiotically interact with us and possess needs and traits that yield unexpected positive or negative outcomes from interacting with them. Such relationships could enrich our lives through our endeavours to “feed” our Data Hungry Homes, possibly leading us to explore new avenues and interactions outside and inside the home

Iterative design process for robots with personality

Previous research has shown that autonomous robots tend to induce the perception of a personality through their behavior and appearance. It has therefore been suggested that the personality of a robot can be used as a design guideline. A welldefined and clearly communicated personality can serve as a mental model of the robot and facilitate the interaction. From design perspective, this raises the question what kind of personality to design for a robot and how to express this personality? In this paper, we describe a process to design and evaluate personality and expressions for products. We applied this to design the personality and expressions in the behavior of a domestic robot

Towards a Design Method for Expressive Robots

Autonomous robots tend to induce the perception of a personality through their behavior and appearance. It has been suggested that the personality of a robot can be used as a design guideline and as a mental model of the robot. We propose a method to design and evaluate personality and expressions for domestic robots

The influence of robot personality on perceived and preferred level of user control

This paper describes the design and evaluation of a personality for the robotic user interface "iCat". An application was developed that helps users find a TV-programme that fits their interests. Two experiments were conducted to investigate what personality users prefer for the robotic TV-assistant, what level of control they prefer (i.e. how autonomous the robot should behave), and how personality and the level of control relate to each other. The first experiment demonstrated that it is possible to create convincing personalities of the TV-assistant by applying various social cues. The results of the second experiment showed that an extravert and agreeable TV-assistant was preferred over a more introvert and formal one. Overall, the most preferred combination was an extravert and friendly personality with low user control. Additionally, it was found that perceived level of control was influenced by the robot's personality. This suggests that the robot's personality can be used as a means to increase the amount of control that users perceive

The role of ambient intelligence in future lighting systems - Summary of the workshop

LED-based lighting systems have introduced radically new possibilities in the area of artificial lighting. Being physically small the LED can be positioned or embedded into luminaires, materials and even the very fabric of a building or environment. Hundreds of LEDs can be used in a single luminaire or space, of which could also have different light output properties. The light switch therefore in many situations will need to be enhanced or fully replaced by intelligent controls and smart environments that are sensitive to the context and responsive to the people in the environment. Future lighting systems will become a part of the Ambient Intelligence (AmI). In this workshop, we explored how the vision and principles of the AmI paradigm can be applied to future lighting systems that are capable of creating a large range of functional, decorative, and ambient light effects. This paper summarizes the workshop paper contributions and the outcome of our discussion on the key design and research challenges for the field of Interactive Ambient Lighting systems

The role of ambient intelligence in future lighting systems - Summary of the workshop

\u3cp\u3eLED-based lighting systems have introduced radically new possibilities in the area of artificial lighting. Being physically small the LED can be positioned or embedded into luminaires, materials and even the very fabric of a building or environment. Hundreds of LEDs can be used in a single luminaire or space, of which could also have different light output properties. The light switch therefore in many situations will need to be enhanced or fully replaced by intelligent controls and smart environments that are sensitive to the context and responsive to the people in the environment. Future lighting systems will become a part of the Ambient Intelligence (AmI). In this workshop, we explored how the vision and principles of the AmI paradigm can be applied to future lighting systems that are capable of creating a large range of functional, decorative, and ambient light effects. This paper summarizes the workshop paper contributions and the outcome of our discussion on the key design and research challenges for the field of Interactive Ambient Lighting systems.\u3c/p\u3

Automated blinds with light feedback to increase occupant satisfaction and energy saving

With the increase of building automation in the work environment, there is a risk that occupants lose their sense of control when decisions on environmental aspects such as temperature, electric lighting, and daylight are made by technology. This paper reports two experiments in which we investigated the effect of the level automation and the type of system expressiveness on users’ satisfaction with an automated blinds system installed on a virtual window. An expressive interface was designed to communicate the status and intentions of the blinds system to the building occupants. The results show that the addition of the expressive interface increased user satisfaction compared to the original\u3cbr/\u3esystem. Moreover, users made less corrections after automatic blind adjustments and adherence to the system suggestions increased. These results demonstrate the potential of expressive interfaces to increase user’s acceptance of automated blinds and thereby realizing the anticipated energy savings