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I'm taking an online HCI class over at https://www.coursera.org/ Our first assignment is a "needfinding" assignment, where I'm supposed to observe people and come up with an idea of how technology can help solve a problem or fill a gap that I notice. Ultimately, I will be designing a web app.

I'm having a really hard time coming up with ideas. It's probably that I'm inexperienced in this realm, but I wonder if anyone can give me tips or ideas on how they go about this.

I need to observe an activity and comes up with ideas on how to fix problems I see around that activity related to (1) person or social change OR (2) redesigning a dashboard to fit our needs - think an iPhone home screen OR (3) how we experience/interact with time.

I'd like to go through the course, completing the assignments so I get a better idea of how all of this works. But, like I already said, I'm having a hard time coming up with ideas. More generally, I'm having a hard time coming up with ideas for how to observe people using something / doing something that can be improved or fixed with a web app. How should I approach and think about this?

Help?

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This looks like an odd question here, but never the less interesting. I'd tune down the course assignment thing and focus more on observing user needs, to get more valid answers and minimize the threat of this question being closed. You could also browse the questions on User Behaviour tag + test, and see if you can find some ideas there ux.stackexchange.com/… – Benny Skogberg Sep 27 '12 at 13:44
Thanks, I will look through this. – Mark Bubel Sep 27 '12 at 13:51
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And if you have more assignments like this in the future just think "In my regular life, where do I get frustrated" and go from there :D – Bryan Robinson Sep 27 '12 at 14:12

2 Answers

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Some potential places/activities to watch:

Grocery shopping -- there are probably plenty of ways to improve that

Mass transit -- If you've got abundant mass transit in your town

Office workflow -- If you're currently employed in an office

Starbucks -- watch how people interact at a coffee shop and try to improve that in some way

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After watching them, then figure out pain points: did anyone have odd questions for baristas at starbucks? Were people confused which subway stop to take? How did the cashiers at the grocery store handle produce that wasn't labeled? – Bryan Robinson Sep 27 '12 at 13:48
Thanks. This gave me more ideas, especially your comment about grocery stores. – Mark Bubel Sep 27 '12 at 13:54
I'm accepting this as my answer because it sparked some good ideas, but thanks to everyone else that commented / will comment. – Mark Bubel Sep 27 '12 at 14:18
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Imagine doing a search in iTunes for an app using search terms based on the context. Imagine there are three results. Give these apps names. Now ask yourself, if I were to install these apps, what would I expect they would do?

Edward De Bono's books outline many techniques for creative thinking, you might consider some of his books on the subject of creative idea generation. One simple technique is to associate a random word from the dictionary with a problem, which often makes for surprising conclusions.

Another thing to consider is, once you choose a topic, identify the goals that cause activity. Break the activity into sub-activities, and identify which activities introduce friction or distraction from the goals that initiate that activity.

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