Senior Projects

When you email me to request a meeting to discuss me being your senior project advisor (UF courses CEN 4914 or CIS 4914 only), please indicate you have read this page.

Alert: currently I advise Senior Projects only in Spring semester. IF you have taken a class with me, you may still email me about Fall projects but the probability I can take you on will be low. Also, I give preference to students who have taken a class with me.

I advise two types of senior projects:

1. Projects based on an idea generated independently by the student(s) (and for which my expertise would be useful)
2. Projects from the below list of existing project needs that the student(s) are interested in working on

In both cases, students should expect to incorporate elements of Human-Centered Computing into their projects, such as user-centered design, interaction design, user testing (or playtesting if it’s a game), etc. Students who are not interested in working with people to make their software better should consider finding a different senior project advisor.

If you have an idea for a project in one of the following areas (and are interested in incorporating human-centered computing techniques into your project), I might be the right advisor for you: natural user interfaces, gesture interaction, speech interaction, whole-body interaction, Android apps, mobile apps, Kinect-based apps, games, apps for kids, apps for education, apps for fitness, etc.

What you can expect from me: I will meet with you and/or your project team up to every 2 weeks throughout the semester to help keep you on track for your project. I can advise on architecture, algorithms, libraries / frameworks / toolkits, user testing, and design methods; I do not help debug or advise on specifics of your code. I require all students to prepare, with my input, a project timeline and grading scheme (examples here and here) to help guide us through the semester and agree on expectations for grading at the conclusion of the project.

Please note: I am only able to advise a fixed number of senior projects per year, and operate on a first-come/first-served basis. If you contact me too late in the fall, I may already be full and unable to take you on, even if it’s a very relevant project. I recommend starting to think about your senior project ideas and possible advisors in early November.

Existing Project Needs*:

• Google Glass applications for Children: using user-centered design methods, design and develop a prototype application for young children (ages 5 to 10) on the Google Glass platform. Application domain is open-ended but should be motivated from a real need focused on children’s needs, expectations, and abilities. Recommended team size: 1-3.
• Augmented Reality applications for Children: using user-centered design methods, design and develop a prototype application for young children (ages 5 to 10) in augmented reality, using off-the-shelf AR toolkits. Application domain is open-ended but should be motivated from a real need focused on children’s needs, expectations, and abilities. Recommended team size: 1-3.
• Analyzing Children’s Motion or Touchscreen Gestures: a range of possible projects in this space including: (a) using machine learning techniques to classify a user as a child or adult from their motion or touchscreen gestures; (b) building software to visualize a dataset of motion or touchscreen gestures; etc. Recommended team size: 1-2.
• Children and Stylus Grips: explore effective grip sizes and designs for young children (ages 5 to 10) using touchscreen input that supports stylus interaction. Use 3D printing to mock-up new grip styles and compare them in rapid prototyping studies with real children. Write software to test effectiveness of the grip styles in interaction tasks. Recommended team size: 2-3.
• Children and Fitts’ Law: establish the parameters of Fitts’ Law, an empirically derived formula for how interactive target size and distance affects accuracy of acquiring the target, for young children (ages 5 to 10). Recommended team size: 1-2.

* In all cases, I can help provide access to data from children of the target age group!