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Home > Projects > Theme: Human perspectives on computer systems design
Theme: Human-centred system architectures
Theme: Human-centred system architectures

Recent technological advances in location sensing, storage, mobile computing power, network connectivity, and cloud computing infrastructures enable new user experiences that impact traditional views of computer systems design.

For some tasks asking where processing takes place will become irrelevant, making computing more like a utility; while for other tasks the actual location of digital data remains emotionally significant. From a human perspective, though much of what is done with computing requires the utility of enormous processing power, those doings are not best thought of as merely utilitarian. When someone posts to their social network, or when they create and store a Microsoft Word file, or when they take and send digital images from their mobile phones, it is not the required processing power that is foremost in their minds. It is not the computer as utility that is at issue. People don't say 'I would have done this if it had been as simple as turning on and off a tap'. Other things matter. It is the management of social affairs, the completing of a work task for someone, or the giving and receiving of visual gifts between friends over coffee, that is at issue. Hence the human perspective on computing, on its role, design and functioning is crucial to computer systems design.
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