Using paper and pen to control home-IT: lessons learned by hands-on experience

Standard remote controls are the most important interface to handle and control TV and media center systems for home entertainment. While the controlling device is being used as something statically, most providers now realize the flexibility of an interface on the software level at the controlled device. Such straightforward approaches reach their limits, when complex functionalities are to be handled remotely. Managing the media library, converting media items or entering text are examples of such enhanced options. In order to handle such complexity we experimented with smart remotes. In a first case study we explored the use of digital pen & paper as a personalizable control device with enhanced text input capability. A prototype called p-Remote (personal remote) was implemented. The evaluation showed us that the users appreciate the possibility of being able to personalize the remote control interfaces, as they fully understand their own interfaces and they can have specific interfaces for different scenarios. The evaluation also showed that the p-Remote provides the user with a fast access and intuitive usage. By discussing the results, we will also point out several issues from which we have derived implications for designing smart remote control concepts in further work.