Richer Reachability through "interviewing the field"

Mobile technology makes it possible to be reachable for people or technical systems when out of the office or the control room. Regarding design, appliances i.e. one function or a narrow set of functionality devices, opens up for exciting possibilities to combine new artefacts with the phone as a communication core. We have conducted an ethnographic study of everyday mobility in a municipality. In this paper we will focus on a design issue that is based on our overall understanding of building-maintenance workers’ work practices. Based on the understanding of how SMS alarms are used today we will discuss design issues regarding what we have chosen to call richer reachability. We use the metaphor of “interviewing the field” when addressing issues about making opaque information transparent. We find that an SMS alarm contains valuable information in the work of the building-maintenance worker, when at the field. The possibility to interview the field would offer a choice to access additional information that would be useful in determining the priority and do a second evaluation on the priority of the alarm when out of the control room