Weather Fairy

Background
In architecture, one of the biggest movements is that of Green Design. Green Design is the idea that architects should be responsible for how they affect the ecosystem. Followers of this philosophy go out of their way to create buildings that affect the environment as minimally as possibly.

But in addition to the ecosystem, Green Design also deals with the inhabitants of buildings and how to make them happier and more productive—research suggests that factors such as these affect morale and productivity. For example, fluorescent bulbs often make workers feel tired after a while, whilst stagnant, recycled air often does the same. Conversely, sunlight and fresh air improve energy and productivity. Often, this is done with ingenious ways of providing natural sunlight and fresh air. Often, old buildings are redesigned with this in common. Unfortunately, many old buildings are unable to be modified in these sorts of ways without heavy costs or extensive renovation.


Proposal
Because there is often no way to instantiate green design in all buildings, technology should be able to provide different ways around this problem. Often, workers have no windows or views outside. I propose to provide artificial windows for office buildings.

What this artificial window entails is a ‘portal’ to the outside and an intelligent system that can decide what is in the best interest of the person or persons exposed to it.


The Approach
The Weather Fairy consists of a modified version of an LCD screen. In individual version of the Weather Fairy, the display is connected to a computer, through which the user interacts with the fairy. Computers communicate with a server. The server collects data from each computer and, through a set of algorithms, decides what to change. This information is then sent back to the computer, which decodes this and sends the information again to the display. A larger version of the fairy, serving a larger space—say, a conference room or a section of offices— runs similarly, except that instead of taking information from multiple computers and redistributing it to each, all the input is processed to tailor itself to all of the users. This information is then sent to the single screen.

The monitor, at first, displays a series of questions to the user, in the form of a survey. Then, through a set of algorithms, the system decides what to display on the screen. Part of the display is the Weather Fairy, who interacts with users by periodically asking questions which the user may or may not answer. These questions are optional and only update the Fairy on how well it is performing its task. Questions that the Fairy asks may include things such as:

The user then can answer by entering a value one through seven, the meanings of the values varying based on the type of question. Responses are processed and the Fairy changes the content in the display to best suit the user or users.

The users are also able to interact with the Fairy when they want, being able to tell it that the display is too busy, or that it is too bright, or that they don’t like the view from the window. The options for communicating are available by clicking on the fairy itself, which brings up a menu of actions. Below is a diagram of the interaction with the fairy.