UBook Thumbnail

UBook

My role

UX Designer

Tools

Figma

Figma

ProtoPie

ProtoPie

Illustrator

Adobe Illustrator

Duration

1 week

Project Type

Solo Project

The Problem

Students and professors struggle to find spaces to focus on their studies because the ones at school don't fit their necessities

The library at school is a place where a lot of the school community go to study due to the commodity and resources they find there, but they sometimes face some problems that make them decide to go somewhere else.

Library of the Faculty of Science - UNAM

Who am I designing for?

Students and teachers of the UNAM who want to find a place to focus on their academic studies

Teacher
Professors
Student
Students

User Interviews

My goal was to understand how people currently use the library and identify areas of improvement

I interviewed remotely one student and one professor of the school community, through the conversation I explored the reasons why they use the library over other alternatives, their past experiences, and problems they've faced.

Interviews screenshots

Surveys

To gather more information, I created a survey that was answered by students of different faculties

With the survey, I collected information about people of different faculties who go to libraries with different installations. Overall, I found some patterns of the necessities and problems they've experienced.

80%

of surveyed preferred studying in the library over other places

70%

of surveyed have experienced problems with availability or noise in the library

90%

of surveyed would create more and bigger spaces in the library

60%

of surveyed don't plan their visits to the library

Research Insights

I found 2 major insights about the problem space

👥

Working in groups in the library is impossible

Although we believe that a library should be a quiet space, so everybody can focus on their work, I uncovered that the community needs special spaces to work in groups and talk in the library.

🗓

The schedule determines which can access to the library

The community believe that the way the library works just benefit people with a certain schedule, therefore, the chance to access these spaces isn't the same for everyone.

The Solution

UBook is a project that provides tools for desks and rooms which are connected with an app that lets people reserve the spaces anytime, anywhere

UBook App

UBook Desk

A desk that you can use anytime you need it

To use the desks already available in the library, I designed a tool that is going to be adapted to them. The device is going to show the information people need to know about a desk, its number, status, and the time its status is going to change. The QR code is what is going to help us know if the person who reserved the space arrived or not.

UBook Desk

UBook Room

A room where you can work in groups and enjoy everything the library offers

The rooms are spaces where you're isolated from the rest, therefore, you aren't getting distracted and you don't distract anyone. The transparent walls are going to help people join a room fast when they're late, as they're capable to know who is in each room. Furthermore, these walls are safer for the community, as people can see what's going on.

UBook Room

User Flow

How does a person reserve a space?

Emiliano wants to use a space at the Faculty of Science today at 13:15, so he uses Ubook to reserve it.

User Flow

Design

Helping everyone to reserve spaces in the library

Anyone can use the app, just log in with your institutional email

Your security is important, that's why only members of the school community are going to have access to the app.

Explore all the spaces available

The home screen will suggest you the best and closest spaces at the moment, but if you want to choose a specific one, go to the search box. With UBook you can reserve any space on the whole campus.

Look for a specific space

Search any space you want, with the calendar, you can select the dates and time you are looking for, and UBook will show you the spaces that fit your necessities.

Reserve a space before anyone else does

Navigate through the different places available and explore their schedule. Once you find the perfect place, reserve it before someone else does.

Scan the code of your space once you arrive

Be sure to scan the QR code of the space you reserved, therefore, we can know that it will be occupied.

Focus on studying, not the time

You arrive at the library without worrying about the availability of spaces, now you can start your study session. Don't worry about the time, we will alert you when it's over, therefore, you won't be late for your next class.

What I learned

Planning

  • The one-week deadline made me realize the importance of planning, during the development of my solution I had to sacrifice certain parts of my process because my planning wasn't the best one.
  • During my research I had the chance to talk to people from different backgrounds, seeing their perspectives made me realize that people use the same tools in very different ways.
  • The more people use your design, the more problems you're going to find, but due to the limit of time, you need to prioritize the ones that are more necessary to fix.