In this workshop, we will gather researchers from across the Ubicomp and ISWC communities to discuss how we build the devices, systems, and test setups that enable scientific studies in the field. We encourage participants to divulge their missteps and lessons learned, showcase their clever hacks, and share their favorite tools and products.
This workshop will distill multidisciplinary information to expand the knowledge and capabilities of hardware developers working at research-scale. While the majority of our workshop schedule will draw from accepted 1-page extended abstract submissions, we welcome participation from the entire Ubicomp/ISWC community as an open-workshop.
Researchers from the Ubicomp/ISWC communities frequently work with collaborators from beyond the computer science, HCI, and engineering disciplines. These interdisciplinary research partnerships provide members of our community with opportunities to expand our research scope beyond the traditional paradigms and equip our collaborators with tools and systems which are tailored to their study constraints and research goals.
These projects are especially exciting when research studies are conducted in the field where they may experience harsh environments, hostile users, or are deployed in unsupervised or remote locations. While the hardware systems and data collection techniques are critical to the successful gathering of field research data, the publications resulting from these partnerships often miss the hands-on experience we develop while building and fielding this actual hardware.
There are not many venues to publish these experiences. DIY builder venues may not appreciate our narrowly focused requirements, while academic publication is not usually appropriate for the details of these engineering efforts, often only having room for a short description of the final version of the experimental setup. We might spend much of our time ruggedizing equipment for use with animals, ensuring user wear-ability and comfort, or just getting our hardware to survive the duration of a study, but these tasks can often get the least space in a paper.
What did we create to perform the study? What did and didn't work? Where did we get the insight for the part that finally saved the day? What combination of hardware from different sources made the difference? What design and testing techniques worked for your specific situation?
In this workshop, members of the research community will share their unique field-deployed/deployable hardware systems, processes for designing solutions to the unique constraints their systems face, and their lessons learned from failed prototypes. This workshop will distill multidisciplinary information from across the Ubicomp and ISWC communities to expand the knowledge and capabilities of hardware developers working at research-scale. While the majority of our programming will draw from accepted 1-page extended abstract submissions, we will welcome attendance from the entire Ubicomp/ISWC community as an open-workshop.
We welcome submissions from researchers working on ruggedized, or bespoke field-deployed research systems. Accepted submissions will present a lightning talk and participate in breakout discussions. Accepted projects will also be included in our field guide zine.
Submission Deadline: July 4th
Notification of Acceptance: July 12th
Camera Ready Deadline: July 26th
Submit via: [Coming soon!]