Massachusetts Institute of Technology is currently offering an online course to make applicants learn how to create their own mobile app using HCI principles. This 4-week course is aimed at helping in designing, developing and deploying their own app.

This course is part one of a five-part Mobile Apps series.

Course At A Glance

Length: 4 weeks
Effort: 10-12 hours/week
Subject: Philosophy of Mind
Institution: Massachusetts Institute of Technology and edX
Languages: English
Price:  Free. Verified Certificate for $49
Certificate Available: Yes
Session: Dates to be announced

Providers’ Details

Massachusetts Institute of Technology — a coeducational, privately endowed research university founded in 1861 — is dedicated to advancing knowledge and educating students in science, technology, and other areas of scholarship that will best serve the nation and the world in the 21st century. MITx courses embody the inventiveness, openness, rigor and quality that are hallmarks of MIT and many use materials developed for MIT residential courses in the Institute’s five schools and 33 academic disciplines.

This online platform edX provides online courses from the world’s best universities. edX can empower you to build innovative applications, services, and experiences.

About This Course

Want to create the next big app, grounded in the needs of real users? This course will teach you Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) methods to understand current behaviour in a domain and identify opportunities for novel apps to meet gaps in current offerings. At the end of this series of courses, you will have designed, developed, and deployed your own app.

Come with a domain of interest (e.g., music, photo sharing, planning with friends, etc.) and we’ll help you fully explore that domain and land on an idea (or set of ideas) that can fit the needs of millions of people worldwide.

Why Take This Course?

This is a free online course. This MOOC will be offered with Video Transcripts. This is the most in-depth philosophy course available online.

Learning Outcomes

After completing this course you will have knowledge of:
-HCI research methods such as Contextual Inquiry, Diary Studies, Interviewing, and Field Studies
-Qualitative analysis techniques such as Grounded Theory, Affinity Analysis, and Flow Models
-An understanding of current academic research and products in your domain of interest
-How to use data from people as inspiration for new application concepts

Course Format

Module 1: Understanding a Domain
Week 1: Studying a Domain
Week 2: Identifying Themes and Market Gaps
Week 3: Proposing a Novel Application

Module 2: Mobile Design
Week 1: From Use Cases to Screens
Week 2: Paper and Interactive Prototyping
Week 3: Usability Testing

Module 3: Building Mobile Applications
Week 1: Getting Started on Android and iOS
Week 2: Mobile Location and Networking
Week 3: Instrumentation and Logging / Poster Session

Module 4: Understanding Use
Week 1: Quantitative Methods: Logging, A/B Testing
Week 2: Qualitative Methods: Field and Diary Studies
Week 3: Analyzing Data: Case Study

Module 5: Reporting Research Findings
Week 1: Writing a CHI-style paper
Week 2: Submit paper

 Instructors

-Frank Bentley

Frank is a Principal Researcher at Yahoo in Sunnyvale, CA and a Visiting Lecturer in Comparative Media Studies at MIT.

Ed Barrett

Ed Barrett is Senior Lecturer in Comparative Media Studies and Writing at MIT and author of several books on digital media published by MIT Press.

Requirements

None

How To Join This Course

1. Go to the course website link
2. Create an edX account to SignUp
3. Choose “Register Now” to get started.
4. EdX offers honour code certificates of achievement, verified certificates of achievement, and XSeries certificates of achievement. Currently, verified certificates are only available in some courses.
5. Once you sign up for a course and activate your account, click on the login button on the edx.org home page and type in your email address and edX password. This will take you to your dashboard, with access to each of your active courses. (Before a course begins, it will be listed on your dashboard but will not yet have a “view course” option.) 

Detailed Information