1 May 2000

DISCOVERY DAY AT COMPUTING DEPARTMENT DEGREE SHOW

Everyone from teenagers to elderly people could be helped by new projects developed at Dundee University's Applied Computing Department. The projects, developed by final year students as part of their degree work, will be on show to the public and invited school groups on Tuesday May 2nd between 2 and 4.30pm.

Most software development begins with adults describing their needs for a new product or service, even if the product is ultimately to be used by young children. Lorna Gibson realised that software for children should be developed in collaboration with the children themselves. She has worked with pupils from Park Place Primary School to develop a learning application, and fully involved the children in the software development process - a novel approach which has been very successful, judging by the product developed.

Gerry McNicoll has questioned the assumption that Windows is a natural and full way to interact with computers. He has developed an alternative in which the main tenet is the passage of time, not staring at a desktop!

Fiona Hunter wondered why computer games industry techniques were only used to develop computer games! She investigated if games techniques could be amalgamated with traditional usability and software engineering techniques to develop educational software. She has developed a demonstrator of the concept to produce a package covering aspects of the Scottish National Curriculum 5-14 plan in an exciting and innovatively interactive way.

Gillian McNab and Ian Swift wanted to develop computer systems for elderly people. Their projects included the production of: (i) an email program;
(ii) a reminder program (when to take medicines, and so on);
(iii) a Multimedia quiz for people with Alzheimer's disease, which focuses on old Dundee.

Neil Strachan's project is titled "Survive the Teens" and demonstrates how interactive multimedia can be used to educate teenagers about the consequences of their actions. He has worked with Maggie Morgan of Foxtrot Theatre Company to produce a CD-based package specifically aimed at teenage boys, dealing with the topic of underage sex. Neil realised that most sex education material is aimed at girls, and takes the "Don't do it" standpoint - he wanted to create a safe environment where boys could see what could happen if they do.

Caser Rasool has developed a unique emailing application for people who communicate using Blissymbolics. Blissymbolics is a language invented in the fifties, based loosely on Chinese ideographs. It is used today by some groups of non-speaking disabled people. Users can create text messages by accessing any Bliss-word in the Blissymbol dictionary. Speech output allows users to listen to the message before they send the email.

Peter Macmillan has developed a music synthesizer to implement a complex additive synthesis technique. The additive synthesier technique creates complex periodic sounds by adding a large number of sine wave signals of varying amplitude and frequency. The system allows an extremely large range of sounds to be created and edited.

For further information, please contact:
Mrs. Louisa Cross,
Dept. of Applied Computing,
University of Dundee.
(01382) 344151
Fax: (01382) 345509
e-mail: lcross@computing.dundee.ac.uk