Syllabus

Time and Location
Lectures on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 3:00 to 4:20. Gates Building, 4307.
Lab on Wednesdays from 11:00 to 12:00. Wean Hall, 5201.

Required Texts
There are no required texts for this course. Readings will be posted online.

Auditing
Auditing or sitting in for class lectures will be permitted as long as space is available in the lecture classroom and all enrolled students have been accommodated. All other class resources (e.g., lab, office hours, TA assistance, discussion forums) are available to enrolled students only.

Video Recording
Students should be aware that class lectures will be video recorded and posted online (e.g., on iTunes University). While video will focus on presenters in the front of the room, audio from the entire room will be recorded (including student questions and discussions).

Final Projects
A significant focus of this class is on student-driven final projects. Projects may be done in teams of one to three students. Students will have an opportunity to propose projects early in the course in order to find like-minded teammates and receive feedback. Projects can be on any topic related to the course (i.e., visualizing/making sense of information on the iPad); the instructors will provide some seed ideas on the discussion forums as well. Projects will be evaluated on their depth, scope, creativity, usefulness, usability, and fit to the goals of the course.

Grading
Cheating and plagiarism will not be tolerated. Homework submissions will be checked for plagiarism/copying, and students caught cheating or plagiarizing will receive no credit for the assignment on which the cheating occurred. Additional actions -- including assigning the student a failing grade in the class or referring the case for disciplinary action -- may be taken at the discretion of the instructors.

Your final grade in this course will be based on:
      60% Homework
      40% Final project (including code, writeup, and presentation)

Since the assignments and final project will provide opportunities for students to exercise creativity in visualization, sensemaking, and insight, part of the grading for assignments and the final project will necessarily be subjective. More details about grading will be provided with each assignment.

Information Visualization Topics
      Multidimensionality
      Zoomable interfaces
      Maps
      Graphs and networks
      Information overload
      Categorization
      Memory
      Perception
      Collaboration
      User-centered design

iOS Development Topics
      iOS Development tools (Xcode, Interface Builder, Instruments)
      Objective-C and Cocoa
      Design patterns
      iOS application UI design and prototyping
      Maps and location data
      Drawing and animation
      Touch and gesture interaction
      Testing, debugging, and deployment to iOS devices