Internship: OBA
My final concept is an interactive system that provides user the ability to write their personal story about a book, and leave this behind on a screen in the library. This story can be viewed, by other users, new stories can be put on top of other story’s users have the control in their own hand.
MISSION
Create a playful interactive system that enables the library to learn more about their users.
SITUATION OF INTERNSHIP
This semester I did an internship at the OBA and DQI under supervision of Oscar Tomico (TU/e) and Rob Visser (principal of Digital Library OBA). The internship I did was for 3 months. I started in February and ended in June 2011, with some weeks off in between. I worked in Amsterdam as well as in Eindhoven.
Motivation
In my second year I worked on an intelligent system for the library of the TU/e. The environment of the library provides en environment where a lot of technology could be integrated into the physical world. I liked the fact that I could work for such a big company and learn more how I could work on innovation in the real setting.
GOALS AND OPPORTUNITIES
In my previous library project my focus was on the visual integration of our concept, now I wanted to focus on the integrating technology part and learn more about databases. I also wanted to learn more about Co-Reflection, as Oscar Tomico was my coach and he is one of the developers of this method.
REFLECTION
Looking back at this semester I can be satisfied with the results I achieved. Although there are still a lot of things that I would have done differently when I would do this internship again. I would have liked to get more in contact with the employees and made a bigger impact than I have done now. But I can be very satisfied with what I learned and achieved.
The internship was highly individual without clear assignments from Oba. During the process I had to figure out myself where to go and what I wanted to develop. In a way it was like a normal project with a little bit more interaction between me and the client. I have the feeling that I developed most of the competencies but for next semester I need special focus on form and senses Social Cultural Awarness, and Descriptive and Mathematical Moddeling because I developed these competencies the least.
In future projects I want to focus more on physical aspects exploring materials and manufacturing techniques.