1. NFC BASED REMOTE CONTROL OF
SERVICES FOR INTERACTIVE
SPACES
Master’s Thesis
Iván Sánchez Milara

2. WHAT?

3. REACHeS
• REACHeS platform:
– Enables the creation of Interactive Spaces
– Permits a user to control services and resources
(displays and speakers) by using physical user
interfaces.
– NFC technology is the ”bridge” between the
digital and virtual world. By touching NFC tags
located in users’ environment using their NFC
enabled mobile phone users can:
• Start a service
• Command a service
• Select a resource
• Interact with a resource

4. WHY?

5. Smart spaces
• Environments that tries to predict user
intentions and needs based on sensed data.
– Implicit interaction
• Problem:
– Human comunication is very complex
– Wrong decisions by the system implies user’s
frustation and bad UX.
• User does not feel in control of the interaction

6. Interactive Spaces
• Environments in which:
– Users control services and resources by
interacting with objects in the environments
• TUIs or PUIs
– User is in control of interaction: system does not
initate any task without explicit user intervention
• Research questions:
– Is it possible to build more user-centered
pervasive computer environments using
Interactive Spaces? How?
– Which are the best technologies and interaction
methods for Interactive Spaces

7. HOW?

8. REACHeS
• REACHeS allows the quick creation of
Interactive Spaces
– Communicates users, services and resources
(displays and speakers)
• REACHeS is a gateway between users’ mobile clients
and the rest of the Interactive Space.
– Allows multiple interaction methods
• In this Master’s Thesis the focus is on NFC
– Provides different services such as resource
allocation, session control, client installation via
OT, content management.

9. REACHeS scenario

10. REACHeS architecture

11. REACHeS’ interaction modes
using NFC
• Starting a service
– Tag contains the service name,
information for the resource allocation
system and other particular parameters.
• Controlling a service
– Tag contains commands and
parameters.
• Selecting devices
– The tag contains the device id and the
device type
• Transferring content to resources
– The tag contains the device id

12. RESULTS

13. REACHeS’ applications

14. Usability tests
• Touch & Control versus
traditional keypad control
• Gesture recognition vs.
traditional keypad control
• Speech and gesture recognition
vs. Touch & Control
• Resource allocation processes
PHONE
GUI
TOUCH &
CONTROL
Reliability 8,1 8,6
Easiness 8,7 9,4
Speed 6,8 7,6
Intuitiveness 8,4 9,2
Cognitive load 8,2 8,8
Average UX 8,3 8,6
• Better learnability, speed,
reliabilty and intuitiviness
• Similar task execution time
• Better UX than initial user
expectance
• Much better task execution
time and learnability
• Different environments =>
different allocation processes
• Automatic method is the
worst option

15. Main test results
• NFC interaction is easy to use and very
intuitive.
• Main visual feedback in external displays
– Phone’s display only when there is no external
display available
– Phone’s haptic and audio feedback for
complementary feedback
• NFC cannot be used to build real time
applications.
– NFC produces too much delay

16. Main REACHeS problems
• Latency
• Scalability
Average time
(ms)
Start
command
Average time
(ms)
Others
command
Round trip time
(internal service)
3369 (σ =
2620)
1230 (σ =
705)
REACHeS Execution
time (internal service)
1265 10
Service Execution time
(internal service)
1095 2
Display update time
(internal service)
1398 171
Effective time (internal
service)
3082 786

17. CONCLUSION

18. Conclusion
• The main contributions are:
1. REACHeS a server platform to build Interactive
Spaces
2. Study of different interaction methods based on
NFC
3. Example applications and usability tests
4. Theoretical background about Interactive
Spaces, its interaction methods and
technologies