Safe and Sound

12 Brainstorm Ideas 

- Brainstormed with Victoria Shi

Security App

• Installed outside your house/work
• You can create black and white list
• • upload pictures, face recognition of people you allow to enter your house/be around your house
  • if the app sees someone on the black list - call police right away
  • if the app sees someone unfamiliar lurking outside - sends you message with image via phone

• Works with security cameras/preinstalled security software
• Can be motion censored too
• Good for
• • if you have a restraining order against someone/a stalker
  • home security when you’re away
  • for security guards

• Can also have sensor on doors and alerts you when they are opened

Universal Remote

• Using your phone can control any tv device instead of switching remotes
• Your phone is usually on you so you don’t have to look for your remote
• Can install on all your family’s phones with each new device
• • just add a new “remote” on the same app
  • Charge phone instead of looking for batteries

Refrigerator Checker

• Can see what’s left in the fridge so if you’re shopping and forget what you need you can check this on your phone and literally see what you need
• Can monitor freshness of things
• • knows when you put your produce in
  • alerts you to throw things away when it is expired
  • creates grocery list for you that can be accessed via phone/smartwatch because it will know what is expired

• works with your fridge
• also change temperature of your fridge - can monitor this as well

Parental Controls

• Works your home computer
• Can check kid’s activity on computer
• Can blacklist Facebook, Youtube, etc.
• Notifies you of “unusual” or undesired activity
• • sends notification to your phone

Light Control App

• Can set automatic dimming of lights
• Different lights for different rooms (e.g. maybe set kids’ rooms light to dim earlier, etc)
• Change to yellow/orange light before sleeping to help with falling asleep
• Can be on your phone/watch so you don’t have to get up to adjust/turn off or on
• Mood Lighting

Dog Collar

• Tracking device
• • like the track your iPhone app but for your dog/pet
  • you put it on your dog’s collar and it monitors where he/she is
  • • Notifies your phone if the dog leaves a certain radius

• Can also be used to track your dog’s activity - how much they exercise

Instruments

• Wood instruments need monitoring - ie. in the winter if you play cello you have to make sure to keep it moisturized otherwise the wood might crack
• • Mostly for those expensive instruments
  • This concept can be expanded to other expensive items that require upkeep as well

• Track temperature
• • Warns you if temperature is bad, too dry, etc

Car Tracker

• Notifies you of car repairs

• Theft prevention
• • if phone is with you and car is move will notify you and track your car

• Travel/personal record
• • automatically creates “trip summary” so if you go on a road trip or want to remember what was the path you took to a location you can look it up

Laundry Machine

• Notifies you if machine is free or if machine is out of order
• And when it’s done - gives you 5 minutes alert/notification before it’s done
• If there person before did not take your clothes even though it’s done being washed, you can ping the previous person using this app

Keys

• Keeps you from forgetting keys
• • if you leave your keys on the door or if you drop your keys outside the house

• Location based, if you are close to door and key is far away, send you a head’s up
• • you can set this radius

• Or your keys can just be via this app so instead of carrying a real physical key you can just bump your phone against your doorknob

Tracking People (Your Boss)

• By crowdsourcing or face recognition/gait recognition or algorithm
• • Algorithm - if he walks the same path everyday, can figure this out
  • Crowdsourcing - like on Waze, other workers can post updates about boss location
  • Notifies you if boss is near - on your floor, near your cubicle

• Phone tracks his location and automatically minimizes computer screens (ie. Facebook) when your boss is near
• • sends you push alert on your phone or slight vibrate

Time Management

• Time driving, on computer time spent at various tasks, in kitchen, running errands, etc.
• Would have to connect to many devices
• Let you see where you have been/what have you been doing through the day

Why I chose #1

I am choosing to do a lo-fi prototype of number 1. From my interview for Design 1.1, I talked to security guards who complained that they had a hard time identifying threats because their outdated security monitor was too hard to see and it required them to be intently staring at their monitor all the time but this redesign can help alleviate this problem.

Lofi Prototype

Top row: 

1.  Starts with the main screen where there are three options available. Users should press number 1 to start
   
2. Number one or "Who's safe" sets up your profile and also creates and back and white list of who is safe and who is not to be around your home or office

Bottom row:

1. Users can set notifications settings for each group and each list
   
2. Users can see all the camera video streams they set up

a more detailed step by step description can be found in my concept video below:

http://youtu.be/i57sGWSvI2o

Interviewee Insights: 

Julie (my interviewee) and I at People's Cafe

Julie - 70 yr old working in the graphics/electronics industry; I found her sitting in People's Cafe on Telegraph.

(was originally going to talk to the security guard but the building was locked when I got there so found Julie instead)

• Excited about the idea, says she is going to take an app development class too!
• Setup page: even though the steps were numbered, she pressed the "start" button right away
• Did not choose to upload her pictures/set up her profile, instead jumped to the "Add Friendly" option
• Said she wanted to add 100+ friendlies
• Seemed impatient at the number of steps/screens - kept pressing done
• Asked why do I need their numbers
• Wanted to add a "strangers" list - did not seem to understand the concept of "friendlies" could include strangers such as mailmen 
• Gave a great suggestion of using the video recognition software to id "strangers" wearing uniform (ie. scan their badge/icon on their shirt) to signify that they are okay
• Confused about the toggle button for the settings page
• Again wondered if there was a "strangers" option
• Said that the pictures were confusing for the camera screen - need to draw better images

Thoughts from the interview

• Julie brought up some obvious flaws and suggestions I haven't thought of before. However since she worked in the Bay Area, she seemed to have some experience with design so gave a lot of design/functionality comments rather than the structure of the mockup. 
• Did like the idea of the app and said she had multiple sons who would appreciate this especially since she just sent a package to her son so she kept bringing up the mailman idea