One of the dimensions of the Industry 4.0 vision is the focus on role of the worker on the shop floor. It is also one of the FACTS4WORKERS project goals. We want to empower the workers to take advantage of their skills and knowledge (either individual or group), and of the information which is gathered from machines with the development of solutions (fulfilling our Use Cases requirements) supporting the ubiquitous real time access to information and collaborating functionalities.

Smart phones, smart glasses, smart-watches and augmented reality are technologies which, alone or mixed, seem to be on the way to allow user friendly interaction with digital information. But are they mature enough? Under which conditions do they work correctly? Are they really working or are they just buzzwords? Can they be applied on the industrial shop floor?
The first release of D2.1 describes state-of-the-art trends in the area of Human Computer Interaction. Based on current available devices and established interaction paradigms, it also provides a forecast into the near future. We created a comprehensive HCI technologies taxonomy, considering hardware and software that helps improving interaction with digital data on the shop floor. We also challenge the taxonomy’s nodes comparing the strengths and weaknesses of each technology both in the consumer and in the industrial field of applications. Our goal is to find the technologies that best fit to the industrial use cases considering their actual maturity state and their predicted development. We also want to provide a reference for other projects dealing with the implementation of Industry 4.0 solutions.

D2.1, Technology Monitoring: Report on Information Needed For Workers in the Smart Factory is part of the work in progress of the H2020 project “FACTS4WORKERS – Worker-Centric Workplaces in Smart Factories” (FoF 2014/636778). You can download the document here.

21. January 2016

Evaluating HCI Technologies readiness for being used on the shop-floor

One of the dimensions of the Industry 4.0 vision is the focus on role of the worker on the shop floor. It is also one of […]
13. January 2016

Requirements of workers and organisations

Figure: Whom are we designing for – all personas of our scenarios The ultimate goal of the H2020 project “FACTS4WORKERS – Worker-Centric Workplaces in Smart Factories” […]