Designing Tangible Interaction - Reaction

When designing tangible interaction, you must follow rules of principled design which is making a decision based on some kind of collective wisdom about design rather than personal preference. Next the article talks about material that can be used in the design of tangible interaction. Some things that can be used are complex sensor based data collection, conductive fabrics, mechanical devices and physical computing. It also talks about Interactive Spaces which is cool because the interaction in certain spaces can track and record data on the movement and behaviors of the users. This is possible because we can interact with small objects that we can grab and move around within arms reach and interact with large objects within a large space and therefore need to move around with our whole body. Some applications that interactive spaces can bring us include learning and education, domestic appliances, games, interactive music installations or instruments, museum installations, tools to support planning and decision making and, increasingly, health and fitness and more. There are four major design principles to make all this work which are tangibility and materiality, physical embodiment of data, bodily interaction, and embeddedness in real spaces and contexts. This article also listed some really good question to ask yourself or group members for a tangible interactive design. Some of them are How can the human body relate with the space? Can you create a meaningful place with atmosphere? Does shifting stuff around have meaning? Can everybody see and follow what happening? Can you hand over control anytime and fluidly share an activity? Does the representation build on users experience and connect with their skills? What is the entry threshold for interaction? These are all really good questions which I think was the most important thing to take out of this article.