Thumbnail Image

Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat

Assam Agricultural University is the first institution of its kind in the whole of North-Eastern Region of India. The main goal of this institution is to produce globally competitive human resources in farm sectorand to carry out research in both conventional and frontier areas for production optimization as well as to disseminate the generated technologies as public good for benefitting the food growers/produces and traders involved in the sector while emphasizing on sustainability, equity and overall food security at household level. Genesis of AAU - The embryo of the agricultural research in the state of Assam was formed as early as 1897 with the establishment of the Upper Shillong Experimental Farm (now in Meghalaya) just after about a decade of creation of the agricultural department in 1882. However, the seeds of agricultural research in today’s Assam were sown in the dawn of the twentieth century with the establishment of two Rice Experimental Stations, one at Karimganj in Barak valley in 1913 and the other at Titabor in Brahmaputra valley in 1923. Subsequent to these research stations, a number of research stations were established to conduct research on important crops, more specifically, jute, pulses, oilseeds etc. The Assam Agricultural University was established on April 1, 1969 under The Assam Agricultural University Act, 1968’ with the mandate of imparting farm education, conduct research in agriculture and allied sciences and to effectively disseminate technologies so generated. Before establishment of the University, there were altogether 17 research schemes/projects in the state under the Department of Agriculture. By July 1973, all the research projects and 10 experimental farms were transferred by the Government of Assam to the AAU which already inherited the College of Agriculture and its farm at Barbheta, Jorhat and College of Veterinary Sciences at Khanapara, Guwahati. Subsequently, College of Community Science at Jorhat (1969), College of Fisheries at Raha (1988), Biswanath College of Agriculture at Biswanath Chariali (1988) and Lakhimpur College of Veterinary Science at Joyhing, North Lakhimpur (1988) were established. Presently, the University has three more colleges under its jurisdiction, viz., Sarat Chandra Singha College of Agriculture, Chapar, College of Horticulture, Nalbari & College of Sericulture, Titabar. Similarly, few more regional research stations at Shillongani, Diphu, Gossaigaon, Lakhimpur; and commodity research stations at Kahikuchi, Buralikson, Tinsukia, Kharua, Burnihat and Mandira were added to generate location and crop specific agricultural production packages.

Browse

20201
Reset filters
Subject: Home Science × Author: Baruah, Moonty × Start date: 2016 ×
Reset filters

Search Results

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
  • Thumbnail Image
    ThesisItemOpen Access
    DESIGN REQUIREMENTS FOR EASE OF OPERATION OF CONSUMER ELECTRONIC PRODUCTS USED FOR COOKING
    (AAU, Jorhat, 2020-05) Baruah, Moonty; Bhattacharyya, Nandita
    In the past few years there has been a tremendous change in the consumer electronic market with availability of wide ranges of products. Though the people possess these products and are dependent on it but still they are not satisfied since they face problems while using it, especially in case of products used for cooking activities. These problems are not related to the technical problems but with usability problems while using the user interface. User interface is the panel through which the users interact with the products. It may be due to incorporation of multiple functions in the products along with digitalization of user interface; in many cases the use of products is becoming complex. There is a gap between the intention of the manufacturers and the needs and understanding of the users while using these products. Solution lies in following a framework of guidelines on design requirements for ease of operation of the products, which can reduce these usability problems of user interface. These guidelines should be based on the opinion of users, their needs, etc. This will not only increase the usability of the product but will also try to capture the market in long run. Keeping these points in view the present study was undertaken with the following objectives (1) to study the Taxonomy of user Interfaces of Consumer Electronic Products used for cooking. (2) to identify the usability problems in use of selected products. (3) to generate design requirements for ease of operation of a selected product. The study was conducted in three phases. In the phase I, data on different consumer electronic products possessed by the respondents, dependency on the products, problems faced by the users, etc were collected through a survey. For the survey a total of 200 samples were selected randomly from Jorhat town by following purposive sampling procedure. In the Phase II, a user workshop was conducted to find out the design requirement of user interface. The information generated from the user workshop was used for developing mock up models/stimuli for further laboratory analyses. While developing the stimuli paired preference test was performed. Finally 32 stimuli were selected for the next phase of analyses in the laboratory. The user workshop was conducted with 40 numbers of respondents (20 percent of sampled respondents). In Phase III of the study, design requirements for user interface were generated for ease of operation of the selected product through usability study by using eye tracking experiment. The gathered data revealed that the respondents possess almost all types of electronic appliances and are dependent on it but still they are they have fear in using it. This fear is mostly because of the complicated user interfaces. In order to study the 8 usability problems, the different aspects of dimensions of taxonomy of the user interface was studied in details. It was seen from the analyses of data that user interfaces of many of the consumer electronic products are not user friendly. Especially, in case of microwave oven the interface is problematic due to the presence of many functions. From the paired preference test few guidelines came into foreface. These guidelines were people mostly preferred font size of 7.5 point with black font in white background, regarding the position of user interface the respondents mostly prefer vertical down position. Buttons were more preferred than knobs. From the eye tracking experiment three aspects were tested and it was found that the respondents prefer to have the start/stop button at the middle of the panel. The number of buttons in the interface should be adequate, it should neither be too less nor too more for ease of operation and as regards to colour contrast the mostly preferred combination found was white font in black background.