This course introduces fundamental ideas of the Information Age, focusing on the value, organization, use, and processing of information. The course is organized as a survey of these ideas, with readings from the research literature. Specific topics (e.g., visualization, retrieval) will be covered by guest faculty who research in each of these areas.
Degree Requirements – Human-Centered Computing Sub-Plan
The Human-Centered Computing Sub-Plan includes an additional core course in HCC and a variety of focused electives. Human-Centered Computing courses explore topics like simulations, virtual reality, human-computer interaction, user experience, and personal data-collection.
Plan of Study
You should work with your faculty to develop a Master’s Plan of Study during your first few months in the program. The Plan of Study should be submitted to the Graduate College no later than your second semester in the program.
The Master’s Plan of Study identifies 1) courses you intend to transfer from other institutions; 2) courses already completed at the University of Arizona which you intend to apply toward the graduate degree, and 3) additional coursework to be completed to fulfill degree requirements. The Plan of Study must have the approval of the Director of Graduate Studies before it can be submitted to the Graduate College.
Core Courses
- 9 units total
The field of Human Computer Interaction (HCI) encompasses the design, implementation, and evaluation of interactive computing systems. This course will provide a survey of HCI theory and practice. The course will address the presentation of information and the design of interaction from a human-centered perspective, looking at relevant perceptive, cognitive, and social factors influencing in the design process. It will motivate practical design guidelines for information presentation through Gestalt theory and studies of consistency, memory, and interpretation. Technological concerns will be examined that include interaction styles, devices, constraints, affordances, and metaphors. Theories, principles and design guidelines will be surveyed for both classical and emerging interaction paradigms, with case studies from practical application scenarios. As a central theme, the course will promote the processes of usability engineering, introducing the concepts of participatory design, requirements analysis, rapid prototyping, iterative development, and user evaluation. Both quantitative and qualitative evaluation strategies will be discussed.
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This course provides an overview of the various concepts and skills required for effective data visualization. It presents principles of graphic design, programming skills, and statistical knowledge required to build compelling visualizations that communicate effectively to target audiences. Visualization skills addressed in this course include choosing appropriate colors, shapes, variable mappings, and interactivity based on principles of color perception, pre-attentive processing, and accessibility. |
Experiential Courses
Complete 3 units total. More information on experiential courses is available on our internships and individual studies pages.
Internship is intended to provide an opportunity for students to build on what they have mastered in the program and practice the knowledge and skills in the real world. The Internship should be relevant to student's degree competencies and contribute to the development and enforcement of the student's knowledge and skill sets in the field of Information Science. The student should propose an internship plan and then identify an internship site supervisor, who typically is external. The site supervisor and the graduate advisor of the school need to approve the plan prior to course registration. The plan should include goals for the internship, degree competencies addressed by the internship, expected tasks to be completed, work schedule, and the assessment plan. The amount of the work should be appropriate for the units registered (3 units = 135 hours). The internship may be paid or unpaid. Student may take an internship in the same organization where student is employed, but work planed for the internship need to have a clear separation from the work expected by the employment. At the conclusion of the internship, the site supervisor is expected to submit a written assessment of student's work.
Capstone Project is intended to provide an opportunity for students to show off what they have mastered in the program. The project should be relevant to MS degree competencies and contribute to the development and enforcement of the student's knowledge and skill sets in the field of Information Science. The student should propose a project plan and the faculty advisor should approve it before registration. The project plan should include goals for the project, MS competencies addressed by the project, system design, an implementation schedule, and the assessment plan. The project plan should also include reasonable milestones and check points. The amount of the work should be appropriate for a 3-unit course. The primary faculty advisor must be an SI faculty, but faculty members from other units may participate in advising the student.
Capstone Project
For either course:
- Identify your internship supervisor (INFO 693) or iSchool faculty supervisor (INFO 698)
- Request and experience via Handshake as described on our internships and individuals studies page
- The internship or capstone project must exercise all competencies required for the M.S. degree
- The internship or capstone project must have a software development component. Capstones must deposit code in GitHub or other source code repository
- Upon completing the internship or capstone project, submit a report (5000-6000 words in length) in the form of an academic paper, documenting what has been accomplished and explaining how the competencies have been demonstrated
- Your supervisor(s) will complete a competencies evaluation form, evaluate the project, and assign a pass/fail grade
You must submit your application in Handshake. More information can be found on the individual studies page.
Human-Centered Computing Elective Courses
- Minimum 9 units
Choose three courses (Minimum 9 units) from the following:
This course is a hands-on, project-based approach to understanding and designing art installations. Enrollees will learn principles, tools, and techniques of rapid prototyping and installation design, and will collaborate to design and implement a large-scale installation by the end of the semester. The course lectures will also provide an overview of the history, theory, and aesthetics of installation art. Graduate-level requirements include writing an analytical paper comparing several recent installation projects in relation to themes found in contemporary art (e.g., Artificial Life, Body/Identity Politics, Social Media/Hacktivism, Virtual or Augmented Reality, Databases and Information Visualization). The paper should be 15-20 pages in length.
Virtual reality (VR) is an emerging technology that has recently been widely used in various areas, such as education, training, well-being, and entertainment. VR offers a highly immersive experience as the head mounted displays surround a 360-degree view of the user. It encompasses many disciplines, such as computer science, human computer interaction, game design and development, information science, and psychology. This course merges a theoretical and practical approach to give students the necessary knowledge that is required to design, develop, and critique virtual reality games and applications.
Algorithms is a crucial component of game development. This course will provide students with an in-depth introduction to algorithm concepts for game development. The course will cover basic algorithm and data structures concepts, basic math concepts related to game algorithms, physics and artificial intelligence based game algorithms that are supplemented with modern examples. Unity Game Engine along with C# programming language will be used throughout the class.
This course provides an introduction to video game development. We will explore game design (not just computer games, but all games) and continue with an examination of game prototyping. Once we have working prototypes, we will continue with the development of a complete 2D computer game. The remaining course topics include: designing the game engine, rendering the graphics to the screen, and artificial intelligence. Students will be given periodic homework that reinforces what was learned in class. Homework will include developing a game prototype, game design documentation, some programming tasks. Students will work in small teams to develop a working game as a term project. Grades will be primarily based on the term project with some small amount of weight to homework. The examples provided in class will be programmed in Java and available for execution on any operating system. Programming homework assignments will be done in either Java or the language chosen by the instructor. The term project can be written in any programming language with instructor permission.
Game development is a vast field with many advanced concepts. This course aims to teach students
such concepts, techniques and mechanisms in Unity, covering procedural content generation, design
patterns, artificial intelligence, shaders and postprocessing effects, animation, custom interactions and
gestures, and performance optimization. The students are expected to have fundamental game
development knowledge in Unity and C#. The course is heavily hands-on and project oriented. Students
will implement the covered concepts on small-scaled Unity project templates using C# and also develop
a larger-scaled final term project. At the end of the course, students will have gained advanced game
development skills that can be applied to future jobs or self-development.
Study of the user interface in information systems, of human computer interaction, and of website design and evaluation. Graduate-level requirements include group work and longer examinations.
General Elective Courses
- Minimum 9 units
- Choose three elective courses with the INFO prefix
- Up to two elective courses may be substituted from other academic units with advisor approval