This project focused on designing a system of interaction for the One Laptop Per Child XO Laptop with limited input methods.

Along with mentors Mentors Eben Eliason and Marco Gritti, Alessandro Vona, student of Science in Communications, analyzed different handheld interaction models to come up with an interaction design for the XO Laptop handheld mode.

Read on for Alessandro’s project report:

Analysis

The “Handheld-Mode Interface for the OLPC XO Laptops” project started with an accurate analysis of the Handheld Device and its input system, already in use and in the past.

Four classes of device have been identified:

• Mediacenter TV/PC,
• Mobile (telephone, PDA, smart phone),
• Ultra Mobile,
• Handheld Game Console.

The most interesting typology was Media Center. The Media Center and Handheld game console - even if their characteristics are quite different from the OLPC Laptop - are similar to the laptop taken in exam, because the navigation occurs with a limited set of buttons.

When the analysis was finished, we tried to identify a navigation system able to go deep, but avoiding long menus and misleading modalities.

Sketches

The second Task was to sketch a number of potential solutions for interaction methods. Before doing this we analyzed the main meta actions of OLPC, trying to rebuild the main navigation path. After that we had to ask ourselves which type of system we wanted to build. We found three possibilities:

1. A new system (full redesign);
2. A new interaction system (using the same graphics but repositioning the objects);
3. The same interaction system and graphics as the desktop mode.

We chose the third solution for a good reason, that is because the child already knows and is used to interact with that navigation structure.

User Research

The third task was user research. A lot of observations and editings were required. We worked on the graphic and created several mockups which are guidelines to the system specifications.
We analyzed the best way to navigation, to selection and to change activities. Our work has been focused on the main OLPC HandHeld mode meta-actions.
We also analyzed the activities work area structure which is still open for discussion.

Featured Mockups

This project was mentored by: