Interaction Paradigms Windows and WIMPs Engelbart Xerox ALTO

Interaction Paradigms • Windows and WIMPs – Engelbart, Xerox ALTO and Star • Metaphors – Increase initial familiarity (desktop, desk) – Inadequacy in promoting or supporting full understanding (disk to trash) • Direct manipulation (DM)

Characteristics of DM Systems • Replacement of common-language syntax by direct manipulation of the objects of interest • Continuous visibility of objects and actions of interest • Rapid, reversible, incremental actions

Early DM Systems • Visi. Calc – instantly calculating electronic spreadsheet – “the software tail that wags (and sells) the PC dog”, Ben Rosen • Lotus 1 -2 -3, Microsoft Excel – graphics, 3 D, multiple windows, databases

DM and Games • PONG • Space Invaders, Missile Command, Centipede • Maze games: Pac. Man, Donkey Kong • 3 D games: Doom, Duke Nukem, Myst

Features of Games • • Internal locus of control Continuous feedback (score) Entertainment and challenge of mastery Focus on task, limited distractions New I/O devices User interface advances Advanced graphical techniques

DM and Text Editing • Line-oriented editors – Work with a single line at a time – Example: ed • Full-page display editors – View full screen of text, edit directly – Examples: vi, emacs • Point-and-click editors – Use mouse for selection, moving – Example: xemacs

WYSIWYG • • • What You See Is What You Get Document printed in on-screen format Cursor action visible, controls obvious Labeled icons for actions Results of actions displayed immediately Actions are easily reversible

Advantages of DM • • • Easy to learn and remember Direct WYSIWYG Flexible, easily reversible actions Context and visual feedback Exploits use of visual spatial cues Limits types of errors

Drawbacks of DM • What you see is all you get • Wastes screen space • Difficult to convey some meanings • Visual representations can be misleading • Mouse can be slow • Not self-explanatory • Not good at – Repetition – History storage and display – Certain tasks with no manual equivalent – Macro creation

Beyond DM • General level of user sophistication is rising – Many regular users of multiple applications, web, email • Pervasive network makes it possible to collaborate – No longer single individual in front of a computer • Information overload creates strong requirements – Need more help in finding, organizing, analyzing • Speed, flexibility of PCs growing rapidly – (Though network delays pull back in opposite direction) – Permits complex visualizations, high bandwidth I/O – But also technologies based on embedded microchips. . .

Alternatives to DM • Hypertext and the World Wide Web – Vannevar Bush and Memex • CSCW and groupware • Agent-based interfaces – Eager cat, Microsoft Clip-it • Ubiquitous computing – Mark Weiser and the dangling string

From Mac to Anti-Mac

What Is CSCW? • Computer Supported C----- Work – Cooperative – Collaborative – Competitive • Design and evaluation of new technologies to support social work processes • Fusion of sociology and computing • Creation of groupware systems

Collaboration The Time-Space Matrix Remote Co-located Synchronous Asynchronous Decision support software Electronic brainstorming Shared file system Group intranet Digital whiteboards Voting, real-time comments Face-to-face discussions Version control Knowledge management Post-it notes Video/audio conferencing Text chat, messaging Email, listservs Newsgroups Shared editors MUDs and MOOs Virtual meeting rooms Web forums MUDs and MOOs Document annotations

Why Does CSCW Fail? • Disparity between who does work and who gets benefit • Threats to existing power structures • Insufficient critical mass of users • Violation of social taboos • Arguments over measures of success

Software Agents • Work on behalf of users within the electronic world • Perform repetitive tasks, watch and respond to events, learn from user’s actions • Use natural language input to leverage familiarity (ambiguity? clarity? )

A Simple Agent • Email filters with if-then rules – if (to=mccricks) then (priority=1) (to=cs 5714) then (priority=2) (to=cs 2604) then (priority=3) (cc=mccricks) then (priority=4) • Determine actions performed on certain kinds of mail messages

An Early Agent: EAGER • Problem: how to display generalizations to user • Solution: anticipate and automate repetitive tasks – EAGER works invisibly until it detects a pattern in the user’s actions – Once a pattern is detected, EAGER uses highlighting to show what it expects the user to do next – Once the user is confident that EAGER knows what to do, s/he can allow EAGER to complete the task • Developed by Allan Cypher

What EAGER Does • • Observes user actions Logs high level events Detects loops Tries to anticipate user actions • If the user sees that EAGER is anticipating the right pattern, EAGER can complete the rest of the task

Recommender Systems • Mediate, support, and automate the process of sharing recommendations • Generates communities of people with common interests • Examples: – Eat at restaurant with lots of patrons – Rent movie that a friend liked – Buy album voted “Best of the Year”

Ubiquitous Computing • Mobile devices bring new set of UI requirements – – Miniaturization, physical robustness, interoperability Effective UIs for a range of small physical devices High bandwidth connections may not be available Increased chance of two or more tasks in parallel, i. e. because no longer in traditional work environment • Augmented reality pushes computing into world – Any old object may now have computational powers – BUT will people expect this? Know how to interact? – Leveraging existing affordances— roomware that you simply drag around to configure an ad hoc network

Calm Technology • Weiser and Brown, Calm Technology • Natalie Jeremijenko’s Dangling String

Tangible Bits • Give physical form to digital information • Make use of ambient media (light, sound, airflow, water movement) • Ishii, Ullmer, Wisneski, Brave, Dahley

Information Percolator • Heiner, Hudson, Tanaka, Ambient Information Display in a Decorative Object

Digital but Physical Surrogates • Tangible representations of remote people • Greenberg, Kuzuoka

Real World Interfaces • Leverage objects in the real world using X 10 devices • Provide an API similar to those for traditional widgets • Support temporal events similar to animation toolkits

Virtual Environments • 3 D simulation of a concrete populated world – User navigates, interacts directly with objects of interest • Assumes novel input and output techniques – E. G. , haptic feedback (pressure), gestures, eye gaze • Veridicality versus magic that extends real world – Where, how much, how to convey magic to users? • How much immersion, i. e. , drawn into simulation – High engagement, but may induce nausea, disorientation – Gear needed for full immersion awkward, fatiguing – Desktop VR often a good compromise (e. g. , VRML)

Notification Systems

research area fields defs Experimental & Engineering Psychology seminar intro recent vision Human-Computer Interaction Computer Supported Collaborative Work Information Visualization Display Design Cognitive Engineering Ubiquitous Systems Attention, Time-Sharing & Workload Analysis Systems Engineering goals initiatives Usability Engineering Focal Displays Notification Systems Graphic Methods Statistics

HCI and Emerging Paradigms • By definition, interaction techniques are not yet standard practice • Design ideas may not be feasible (or may not be helpful) • Usability engineering methods help us define proper techniques

Tuesday Activity • Read Vannevar Bush’s “As We May Think” essay • Consider how elements in the essay foreshadowed advances in the field of study for your project • Speculate on elements in the essay that may yet come to pass as well as things that we now know will not • Take a scenario/claims approach to your analysis