Connecting the Things to the Internet: An Evaluation of Four Configuration Strategies for Wi-Fi Devices with Minimal User Interfaces
Connecting the Things to the Internet: An Evaluation of Four Configuration Strategies for Wi-Fi Devices with Minimal User Interfaces
The availability of low-power Wi-Fi radio modules opens up opportunities to leverage the existing prevalent Wi-Fi infrastructure for large-scale trials and deployments of Ubicomp technology. In this paper we address the challenge of supporting end-users, especially when they are not technical experts, in connecting new low-power, low-cost Wi-Fi devices with very minimal UIs to an existing, secure Wi-Fi infrastructure. We report two usability studies through which 30 participants, with no formal technical training, compared 4 alternative configuration techniques, selected based on cost and consumption constraints, and on adoption in off-the-shelf products. Through an analysis of success rate and causes of failure, our results indicate that two techniques are noticeably more usable than others. These are a web-based configuration mechanism, where users connect to an access point on the Wi-Fi device, and one that makes use of a standard audio cable to connect a smartphone to the device to be configured.
Jewell, Michael O.
efc886bf-b475-4262-9f3b-11f8ce4129c9
Costanza, Enrico
0868f119-c42e-4b5f-905f-fe98c1beeded
Kittley-Davies, Jacob
d8547042-797e-4566-a0e9-1ab5e50f5040
7 September 2015
Jewell, Michael O.
efc886bf-b475-4262-9f3b-11f8ce4129c9
Costanza, Enrico
0868f119-c42e-4b5f-905f-fe98c1beeded
Kittley-Davies, Jacob
d8547042-797e-4566-a0e9-1ab5e50f5040
Jewell, Michael O., Costanza, Enrico and Kittley-Davies, Jacob
(2015)
Connecting the Things to the Internet: An Evaluation of Four Configuration Strategies for Wi-Fi Devices with Minimal User Interfaces.
Ubicomp '15. Proceedings of the 2015 ACM International Joint Conference on Pervasive and Ubiquitous Computing, Osaka, Japan.
07 - 11 Sep 2015.
(doi:10.1145/2750858.2807535).
Record type:
Conference or Workshop Item
(Paper)
Abstract
The availability of low-power Wi-Fi radio modules opens up opportunities to leverage the existing prevalent Wi-Fi infrastructure for large-scale trials and deployments of Ubicomp technology. In this paper we address the challenge of supporting end-users, especially when they are not technical experts, in connecting new low-power, low-cost Wi-Fi devices with very minimal UIs to an existing, secure Wi-Fi infrastructure. We report two usability studies through which 30 participants, with no formal technical training, compared 4 alternative configuration techniques, selected based on cost and consumption constraints, and on adoption in off-the-shelf products. Through an analysis of success rate and causes of failure, our results indicate that two techniques are noticeably more usable than others. These are a web-based configuration mechanism, where users connect to an access point on the Wi-Fi device, and one that makes use of a standard audio cable to connect a smartphone to the device to be configured.
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sensor_study.pdf
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Accepted/In Press date: 24 July 2015
e-pub ahead of print date: 7 September 2015
Published date: 7 September 2015
Venue - Dates:
Ubicomp '15. Proceedings of the 2015 ACM International Joint Conference on Pervasive and Ubiquitous Computing, Osaka, Japan, 2015-09-07 - 2015-09-11
Organisations:
Agents, Interactions & Complexity
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 379702
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/379702
PURE UUID: db45ccd6-232a-4dec-b399-6366719ad3a0
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Date deposited: 28 Jul 2015 15:50
Last modified: 14 Mar 2024 20:46
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Contributors
Author:
Michael O. Jewell
Author:
Enrico Costanza
Author:
Jacob Kittley-Davies
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