Telepresence user interface design issues and solutions

The user interface team has been given the role of developing the user interfaces for the Telepresence project. To do this they are working with the social science team and developing interfaces for each of the field trials. They are updating these interfaces based on data gathered in the field trials. The knowledge acquired from their design activities will be used to design a final general flexible interface for Telepresence and to generate recommendations to the coporate members of the Telepresence project on the types of technology that need to be developed underneath to make the interfaces work effectively. A seiondary focus of the user interface team is that of determining effective design and implementation strategies for encouraging the adoption of the telepresence technology. They are also investigating how to apply the information gathered in the social science field studies to the evaluation of the interface designs and the generation of new designs. Human communication is not an area covered by the traditional cognitive psychology approaches to interface design so that the exploration of sociological data as a predictor of design is being examined. This report details the current user interface designs and user studies that have been conducted and lays out the proposed requirements for future designs and user studies that are being planned. It closes with a set of deliverables and a time line for when these deliverables can be expected from the work of this team.Ontario Telepresence Projec