Jakob Plotts - NASA MOC Sat App

NASA | MOC Sat App

UI & UX Designer

The purpose of the MOCSat application is to make satellite data easily accessible and usable. It does so by taking the data received and stored by a ground station and connecting it to an interface via our app which is focused on the needs of the mission control users at the wheel. The team aimed to help NASA implement their mission and goals for the future of space exploration.

This project was done initially for a NASA grant and eventually in collaboration with the University of Illinois. I was a user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) designer (during 2018 and 2019) tasked with iterating on UI mockups and UX research in order to lead the project to a successful state that found real world use at the hands of mission control students and staff at the University of Illinois.

Agile methodologies were at the core of our project as our multi-disciplinary team worked to solve inefficiencies that make technological innovators lose lots of valuable time (especially with students who were often held up in classes away from their satellite ground station).

My specific duties were:

• Work on user interface design for mobile devices

• Work with programmers to facilitate user-centered design strategies

• Take part in Agile work sessions and plan ahead for designers

• Perform user testing & preliminary research

• Work on visual & graphic design (create design assets)

• Present work to stakeholders (create presentations/visualizations)

• Keep in close contact with members of the Cube Sat team at The University of Illinois

• Engage in or lead STEM outreach programs

Design & development tools used:

• Adobe Photoshop & Illustrator

• Adobe XD (prototyping tool)