This report describes the development of an application in collaboration with Designingenjörerna AB. The company has worked for a long time with a community platform and they required an application where users can create their own unique profile representations, called Avatar Creator. An Avatar Creator is computer based application, which makes it possible to create a virtual character. The problem area behind this is that, large websites require a lot of administrative work when people upload profile pictures on different community pages. They can contain abusive material or pictures of other people rather than those who created the profile.The questions in this report are, how can an Avatar Creator help user to get a unique profile of himself? What are the advantages and disadvantages of an Avatar Creator? How to create a user-friendly application?To understand how an Avatar Creator works and get ideas to create an application, exiting Avatar Creators were reviewed on the Web.Collaborative work with Designingenjörerna AB was done to pin down the requirements for the Avatar creator application.

The number of smartphones are constantly increasing, 2010 approximately 200 million unitswere sold globally and the figure is predicted to increase to 1 billion in 2016. The increased useof smartphones also carries many risks, for example many smartphones are connected to theInternet. This is a possible way for hackers to gain access to user devices. Smartphones are wellrepresented in research on its safety, while research on its use and users? awareness often leavesmore to be desired.

A large part of the Namibian low income population lack access to grid distributed electricity. This mean they are effectively shut out from basic functions such as lighting, information technologies and hygienic food handling. Hence, finding ways of providing affordable off-grid electricity is an important, not to say critical, task.This master thesis is an innovation and concept development project that has been carried out in cooperation with organisations in Sweden and Namibia. The purpose of the project has been to (1) develop a concept for off-grid electricity supply in Namibia and (2) to gain a deeper knowledge within the area of innovation and product development for the Base of the Pyramid population, i.e. the poorest, but largest, socio-economic part of the global population.Essential in this project has been to acquire user understanding and to identify user needs to create a foundation for developing the concept.

The overall aim of this thesis is to examine how Easy-to-Read information, used by governmental agencies, facilitates and limits the field of possibilities for the intended recipient, based on the information.This, in anera of e-government.The theoretical framework is based on two Foucauldian concepts governmentality and discourse analysis. Representatives from five Swedish governmental agencies have been interviewed and the results have been analyzed based on the following questions: (1) How do the representatives construct the category Easy-to-Read? (2) How do these representatives construct the recipients of Easy-to-Read? In order to broaden the understanding of Easy-to-Read, an important national level policy document, containing a summary of strategies and goals for e-government has also been analyzed based on the following questions: (3) How is the e-government constructed in the text? (4) How is the citizen constructed and positioned in the text? The collected material is analyzed using a discourse analysis inspired by Foucault.With the results from the interviews and the analyzis of the policy document, Easy-to-Read information has been discussed and examined as a technology to meet the needs of people with reading difficulties, putin an era of e-government.The findings of the study include the following: (1) The e-government is constructed as a service agency and the citizens are positioned as clients. Furthermore, the citizens are expected to participate digitally and be digitally competent. (2)Some of the representatives does not know, with certainty, to whom the texts are directed or if they are used.

In this Bachelor's thesis the result from a Delphi study regarding FRBR, performed by Yin Zhang and Athena Salaba in 2007 and published in 2009 ? What is next for Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records? A Delphi study ? is analyzed by qualitatively interviewing professionals active within the library and information science field in Sweden. The results are compared and possible deviations and adjustments are illuminated and discussed. The purpose of the thesis is to determine the topicality of the Delphi study in 2011 from a Swedish perspective. Conclusions made from the thesis shows that the main areas are still the same, but adjustments regarding the relative order of issues might be needed; primarily a shift of focus from theoretical to practical issues.

The aim of this paper is to investigate who the visitors are at a children's department at amain library in a larger municipality, and for what purpose they use it. We discuss: Is therea difference between various user groups, and if so, how do they differ'? Which library rolesdoes the children's department have? Does the children's department serve as a local libraryfor those who live in the immediate surroundings or as a main library for the whole municipality?The paper is based on a user survey performed in the spring of 1996 at the City Library ofGothenburg. 417 visitors and five staff members were interviewed.The children's department is used by various groups of people, from young children to seniorcitizens. The library roles are, among other things, an independent learning center and formaleducation support center.

The use of marketing research panels are a more and more frequently used source of information for studies within many different branches. The purpose of this report is to investigate the demographic composition of panels and compare it with the population of Sweden, a possible change in behaviour of respondents, and if the source of recruitment is the cause of possible differences in study results. The study was commissioned by Norstats Linkoping office. Sources for the data material include Norstat?s recruitment process and their two main panels with different recruitment sources.

Digital marketing has been changing continuously and rapidly since the introduction of Web2.0 ten years ago (Lin, Li, Deng, & Lee, 2013). Companies are now engaging their users intheir digital marketing by providing with interactive contents in digital campaigns. The digitalcampaigns are getting more converge with SNS (social networking sites) in order to let the usershare the content with others and therefore the e-WOM (electronic word of mouth) helps thecompanies digital campaigns to be shared by more users (Moran, Muzellec, & Nolan, 2014).The interactive content in the digital campaigns have shown to provide for engaged users andtherefore leads to loyal users. The reason for this has its roots in the culture of consumptionthat has brought our everyday consumption to a whole new level where we no longer justconsumes a product, we are the brand (Davis, 2013).The study, Click here for solidarity, aims to explain the interactive phases and rhetorical elementsthat companies use to engage the user to interact with the content of the digital campaigns.The study is based on four digital campaigns in four different market areas in order to providewith an overall picture of how companies work with interactive and rhetorical elements. Thusthe study falls into the area of marketing and branding.

The purpose of this Master?s thesis is to examine and analyze the discourse concerning a new public library in Stockholm. The paper further discusses how this discourse corresponds with what is written about public libraries in a number of national and international documents. To do this I have utilized the discourse theory of Laclau and Mouffe. By using some of their instruments I have established the discourse around a number of keywords.

The purpose of this thesis is to study how some librarians working at a public library experience problems that can occur at the reference interview, slightly focusing on communication difficulties. Therefore I interviewed three librarians working at the reference desk on a daily basis. I chose to limit the study to public libraries and to the south of Sweden. My main question is: what difficulties can a librarian encounter during a reference interview and what can he/she do to treat these? In support of my main question I have three subordinated questions:What reasons can there be to a librarian not understanding a user?s information need?What methods are useful for a librarian to enhance the condition of the reference interview? What attitudes and qualities can be of use for the librarian at a difficult reference interview?For the collection of empirical data I chose to use semi-structured interviews.

In this Bachelor Thesis (20 p.), we present the history and development of "Intelligent Houses", and most important- explore some of the future possibilities in this area. The project has been carried out through an interdisciplinary cooperation between three different educations at the Blekinge Institute of Technology. By conducting a dialogue with various actors with different professions, we have been trying to identify needs within the concept of "Intelligent Houses", were the end user is not only the tenant or homeowner. Through Participatory Design methods, such as a Future Workshop, we have brought the users together to discuss their own and each others needs and hindrances in their respective work practice, and how intelligent house technology could improve their work conditions. We have also been testing a highly sophisticated CO/CO2/Moisture/Temperature/Enthalpy multi-sensor & controller, originally developed for regulating indoor climate systems.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate whether there is a correlation between attitude andbuying decisions of consumers regarding certified coffee. The study will examine whether marketsurveys measuring consumer?s attitudes, is a good method for predicting a purchasing decisionsregarding certified coffee.Method: To study consumer attitudes towards certified coffee, we have implemented a web-basedsurvey at Facebook. A total of 108 responses were recorded. To complement the Facebook study wehave conducted three surveys on persons who are customers at ICA.

This thesis describes the development of a tank insert for diesel cars, from idea to a prototype. The idea is to design an insert which makes it impossible to refuel petrol in a diesel car. The insert shall be installed in the existing tank opening on diesel cars. The tank insert is designed for the Swedish company SverigeGrepen AB located in Vänge, just outside Uppsala. Their main product is a pitchfork that is ergonomically designed and durable.A pre-study were performed in which information relating to fuel caps, tank openings, petrol- and diesel nozzles were collected.

Automatic trimmerhead is an examination project for making an automatic trimmerhead for grass trimmers with the user and functionality in focus. Our perception is that a happy user is a user who can pick up his or her trimmer, use it and put it back to its place when the job is done. It should not be necessary to interrupt work and perform maintenance on the machine just to make it work as promised.The project has been made in collaboration with the company Husqvarna, which is one of the biggest actors dealing with garden machinery on the market. Together we determined the project goal, ?To invent, construct and test a brand new concept for how an automatic trimmerhead can look and function?.At this day there are several different automatic trimmerheads on the market, both semi and fully automatic.

The purpose of this master thesis is to investigate how librarians working in academic libraries are experiencing the reference situation from a pedagogical point of view, by applying a theoretical framework consisting of learning strategies and their different characteristics, to qualitative interviews. Other goals are to elucidate the fact that learning takes place every day at libraries during the reference situation and that this work must be seen as ?one of the most important activities that takes place at the library?, using the words from one of the interviewed librarians, but also to make place for more discussions regarding pedagogic and library work. This is done by posing questions about knowledge, learning, information literacy, communication, the reference encounter, the roles of the librarian, policy and also architectural aspects of the reference situation. The interviews were taped, transcribed and categorized according to the earlier mentioned areas of interest.