Usability Engineer and Designer
33h hackathon for
COVID-19 testing
key data
my role: graphical user interface (GUI) and interaction designer
duration: 33h
size: 15 participants
organisation: 4 teams - dispenser mechanism, collector mechanism, housing of the machines, GUI & mechatronics
project lead: Prof. Dr. Mirko Meboldt, Dr. Stephan Fox, Patrick Beutler
challenge: participants partly worked remotely
task: the task was to develop two working prototypes from the ground up within two days. These prototypes should distribute and collect kits of COVID-19 tests at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich (ETH Zürich). Both machine should handle about 100 test kits at once, which should be replaced multiple times during the day. The test kits in the dispenser had to be cooled. Due to the risk of infection, only a minimal amount of touch interaction should be necessary. In order to avoid crowding, the users had to book their time slots for the machines, which was handled by an own cloud server, provided by ETH Zürich IT services. The test kits were then analysed in an ETH Zürich laboratory by a laboratory robot.
1) interaction design
In a first step, the interaction design had to be developed. Here, it was important to define both the feedback for the users but also the commands for the mechatronic parts in the background.
2) wire framing
In a next step, first wire frames have been created. Here, the main focus was on the decision whether to mount the display for the raspberry Pi in a horizontal landscape view or in a vertical portrait view.
In addition, I tried out different elements for providing visual feedback for the users such as the taskbar.
The overall goal was to avoid the need of touch interaction because this might be a cause of infection.
3) low fidelity GUI prototype
Subsequently to the definition of the interaction design and rough drafting of the GUI designs, low fidelity GUI prototypes were created for both machines. The main focus was on guiding the users through the different steps and providing feedback about their progress. In total, this interaction should need less than a minute.
4) GUI for functional testing
Since the control of the mechatronic parts had to be fine tuned, we developed an additional GUI for the functional testing. Here, the steering of the mechatronic parts happens by pressing virtual buttons on the touch display.
5) final GUI (dispenser)
Finally, the interaction with the dispenser only needed a scan of the student ID card (legi) to trigger the release of the test kit (with an additional command of starting the scanner; it is still a prototype :)).
Result of the hackathon
Finally, two prototypes were ready for the subsequent trial run, which was not part of this hackathon.
One prototype (dispenser) was able to provide the test kits for COVID-19 testing and cooling them while on storage, and the other prototype was able to collect (Collector) the test tube with the saliva sample in a collector rack for testing with a laboratory robot.
Final product
We handed over the results of this hackathon to another development team with a vending machine manufacturer joining the project. Therefore, our fridge design for the dispenser machine was replaced by a professional vending machine. In contrast, the collector design was adapted only slightly.
Luckily, these two machines now enable the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich (ETH Zürich) to provide the necessary testing infrastructure to test its students and employees for COVID-19.
What I have learnt
It was a lot of fun to create the different designs with the team and to see how everything came together in two working prototypes after just two days.
I have learnt a lot of figuring out the interaction design and to create working GUIs using the tkinter library (python), which can be used to steer the mechatronic components.
The focus of the hackathon was on creating working proto-types. Therefore, there was only time to test the GUI with members of the hackathon.
Surprisingly, it worked out really well that I was working remotely and communicated digitally only with the mechatronic team on site.
