User Analysis
Home owners
User A is a home owner who has some familiarity with desktop applications and mobile phone apps.
He would like to be able to turn devices on and off from outside the house and to keep track of the total energy consumption of the appliances in his house.
He prefers an app that would require little to no maintenance, but would enable the user to change the settings. He would like to be able to buy energy from cheaper sources, when possible, meaning that the ability to sell energy is also important.
He would like the system to be able to access current pricing and automatically turn devices on and off or change their set point, depending on the current energy cost.
He does not want to deal with passwords and complicated security settings.
Shared home users, with roommates
User B is a young male who recently graduated from college. He rents an apartment and shares it with a roommate. Although he and his roommate have different life styles and thus different energy consumption patterns, they receive one gross energy bill each month, and evenly split up the cost. He thus wants to know more fine-grained information that correlates to each individual’s profile.
He is up to date with new technologies. His computer experience is mostly on desktop computers. But he can learn to operate touch screen devices quickly. With a tablet, he will use it at home on a weekly or monthly basis. With a smart phone, he will use it at any time.
He doesn't have detailed knowledge on how much each individual device consumes, but is curious to know. He doesn't have much smart grid knowledge. With the application, he just wants to know the overall energy and cost savings.
He is concerned with security and privacy. If the application can operate via Internet, he wants to make sure it's secure and manages privacy right.
Business users
To accommodate business users, features have to be scalable to larger numbers and different types of devices
Task Analysis
Monitor energy consumption of each device, and aggregate consumption
- Present the smart devices available in the facility in an organized manner
- Aggregated consumption information of the entire facility is easily accessible
- Aggregated consumption information for each device is easily accessible
- Allow consumption information be broke up by time periods
Control devices
- Present an interface for user to control the devices, such as turning them on/off
View price information received from grid
- Notify users on the energy prices of peak time and non-peak time received from the grid
- Notify users of the prices for selling power
- Store the information so user can review the historical data and future scheduled data
Sell generated power back to utility company
- Present interface for user to sell the extra power back to the grid
- Allow user to view the scheduled selling transaction
- Allow user to cancel a pending transaction or an on-going transaction in case such needs arise