Reflections

Brandon Hardy

Anas Salah

Rafael Brennand

It always bugged me when I bought a new product that I had to read a manual to understand how it worked. I really like the idea that if you have to explain a design to someone, you're not doing it properly.

UCD really helped me to understand the actual designing process and how to properly design something not for your use but the actual user. No matter how much you think you know about the user, nothing beats actually talking to them and getting feedback from initial ideas and prototypes.

This was definitely the most applicable class I have ever taken and I would recommend to everyone, even if you're not an engineering major.

The UCD final project was a great opportunity in this semester. I learned a lot

from it. When Dr. D. assigned the project, I was slightly hesitant about the

project and I also felt that it was somewhat of complicated. However, when we started

with the project, everything was going smoothly and nicely. One of the major lessons that I learnt in this project is how to interact with users. Interacting with users is not as simple of a procedure as it may sound. When conducting interviews with them, one should gradually build the interview, and also not ask yes and no questions. The way one words a question makes a huge difference with the interviewee’ responses. Another useful and important technique in making interviews is to make a strategy of all the small details such as, the interview questions, the place, and dividing the work equally. Working with my team members was really helpful; each one of us had strengths and weaknesses, so we cooperated to make the project successful.

I believe that the final design project was an extremely fitful simulation of what an R&D engineer's process is. Like an engineer in the R&D phase, this project instills the user design process to students by having students gather information by interviewing, iterating prototypes multiple times, and conduct user testing. Additionally, with this project, students will analyze desired affordances and implement them with signifiers. This is a key aspect in design creation. Finally, the design project further aids students in their team work skills, an important part of working as an engineer.

Overall, I thought this project was quite rewarding in its' experience.