NASA Challenge: Astronaut Smartwatch App Interface Design
Product Strategy, Human Factors, Ergonomics, Prototyping
Task Description:
We (NASA) are interested in the emerging world of smartwatch technology and are looking to leverage this technology to create a smartwatch app that could be helpful to astronauts . The challenge is to design the general user interface for smart watch applications for use on the International Space Station.
Requirements and Guidelines: - Use the Samsung Gear S as a hardware reference for your design - Deliverables should be picture (PNG or JPEG) wireframes highlighting the unique design’s navigation, interaction, layout, look, feel, etc. - This design will be used for some of the following application.
Requirements and Guidelines: - Use the Samsung Gear S as a hardware reference for your design - Deliverables should be picture (PNG or JPEG) wireframes highlighting the unique design’s navigation, interaction, layout, look, feel, etc. - This design will be used for some of the following application.
1. Crew Timeline application - Will display an agenda view of the timeline as well as a way to easily navigate to another day in the past or future. Currently viewed on Laptop or iPad.
2. Caution & Warnings application - Will display color coded cautions and warnings
3. Communication Status application - Will display whether or not the vehicle is currently able to communicate with the ground through either voice/video
4. Timers application - Will be able to set timers for procedures or until next activity
2. Caution & Warnings application - Will display color coded cautions and warnings
3. Communication Status application - Will display whether or not the vehicle is currently able to communicate with the ground through either voice/video
4. Timers application - Will be able to set timers for procedures or until next activity
Why This Challenge Interested Me
- Space is cool, not only because of the unknown but also because of its potential regarding humanity. Humans haven't yet corrupted it, it's a blank slate where we can focus on bringing our best.
- Space exploration is the epitome of human capability and is where utmost reliability and predictability are necessary for success. It can be life or death.
- Human factors involvement is extensive, both from a micro interaction level such as with this watch app, to the macro level interactions that drive the design and operation of a space mission from launch, to living, to completing the mission.
My Design Focus
- Human factors first; I wanted to be sure commonly accessed information and tasks could be done with gloved hands or potentially injured hands. I also wanted to lean on multi-modal alerts due to the unpredictable noise and lighting conditions in a space craft or space environment. Finally, I wanted some whimsy, in the shape of the human touch. The users are astronauts, they're people like you and I, and they have concerns and connections beyond space and their mission at hand - like family, friends, Earth.
- Sexiness comes second; I'm not bitter for not winning, but I went with a low-fidelity, low frills presentation so that the mechanics could speak for themselves, not sexy renders or gradients (which in fact got the win).
- Lean on the device's capabilities to increase utility; this included considering haptic vibrations, capacitive touchscreens, gyroscope for gesture interactions, alerts etc.
The design pitch, to the powers that be at NASA
The home screen. After a period of inactivity, when the watch was awoken by movement or tap, it'd return to this state. Note the use of haptic vibrations as an added mode of interactivity, as well as colors to provide quick glance status context.
Alerts. User color-coding and ordering to emphasize importance and priority. This is also combined with haptic vibrations.
The human touch. Tracking the time in their home town down on the Blue Planet. This could be extended to include local weather or news/social media/feeds.
Comms management. Simple interactions to switch options, up-down taps or swipes, no typing/keyboards.
Task tracking. Gesture based interactions, swipe-centric, like Tinder. In retrospect I'd lean more on colors and add an mission elapsed timer to help keep the timeline in perspective. This may be anxiety inducing, so it could be hidden in Settings.
What I Learned
- Mobile device especially smart devices provide a plethora of new modalities for interaction and conveying information. With more advanced devices that track sleep patterns and other bio-signatures opens the door to even more exciting applications that could further extend the utility of this app.
- With integration of local AI processing capabilities, contextual alerts and virtual assistants could add more touchless/sightless interactions. I think having real-time voice translations for multi-national crews would be an interesting capability to explore too.
- The human factors decisions used in this project could be similarly applied to defense and warfighter applications.
