Cristian Bogdan

A discourse model for interaction design based on theories of human communication

Most current models of interaction design build on scenarios and task analysis. We think that interaction design should be more along the lines of communication between humans. With this motivation, our paper presents a new approach to modeling interaction design based on insights from theories of human communication. From such discourse models, we aim for automated generation of user interfaces.

Automatic generation of the behavior of a user interface from a high-level discourse model

In addition to the structure and “look” of a user interface (UI), its behavior needs to be defined. For a fullyautomated UI generation, of course, it will have to be generated fully automatically as well. We avoid that finite-state machines or similar would have to be created manually by a UI designer. Instead, we start from a largely declarative high-level discourse model including a few procedural constructs. Based on our definitions of the procedural semantics of all parts of such a discourse model, we are able to automatically generate a finite-state machine that fully defines the behavior of the generated UI. In this way, we show how automatic generation of the behavior of a user interface is possible from a high-level discourse model.

Generating an Abstract User Interface from a Discourse Model Inspired by Human Communication

Programming user interfaces is hard, error-prone and expensive, but recent advances allow generating them from interaction design models. We present an approach for modeling interaction design that is inspired by human communication. Our interaction design models are discourse models, more precisely models of dialogues. They are based on theories of human communication and should, therefore, be more understandable to humans than programs implementing user interfaces. The main ingredients of our models are communicative acts (Speech Act Theory), which are connected as adjacency pairs (Conversation Analysis) and via RST relations (Rhetorical Structure Theory). While RST provides useful means for modeling discourse in the sense of monologue, a dialogue results from connecting monologues via adjacency pairs. This paper presents a new metamodel that integrates these approaches. Based on it, we show how abstract user interfaces can be generated from such discourse models. In a nutshell, we generate finite-state machinery and employ rules devised by us to map parts of a discourse model to abstract widgets.

Tuning In: Challenging Design for Communities through a Field Study of Radio Amateurs

As illustrated by the emerging field of Communities and Technologies, the topic of community, whether further qualified by ‘virtual’ (Rheingold 1993), ‘on line’ or ‘networked’ (Schuler 1996), has become a major focus for field study, design, technical infrastructural provision, as well as social, psychological and economic theorising. Let us review some early examples of this ‘turn to community’. (1999) discuss the ‘network communities of SeniorNet’, an organisation that supports people over the age of 50 in the use of computer networking technologies. The SeniorNet study highlights the complex ‘collage’ of participation and interaction styles that community members sustain, many of which go beyond conventional understandings of older people, their practices and relations to technology. While the members of SeniorNet are geographically dispersed, (1996) describe the ‘Blacksburg Electronic Village’, a local community computing initiative centred around Blacksburg, Virginia, USA. As long ago as 1994, (1994) claimed the existence of over 100 such projects in the US with very diverse aims and experiences but all concerned to be responsive to a community’s needs while exploiting the Internet and the technical developments it has made possible. For their part, (2001) offer some generic infrastructural tools for community computing, including support for ‘identity management’.

Enough power to move: dimensions for representing energy availability

Energy and design of energy-feedback are becoming increasingly important in the mobile HCI community. Our application area concerns electric vehicles, we thus depart from home and workplace appliances and address range and energy anxiety caused by short driving distance capabilities and long charging times in mobile settings. Meanwhile some research has been done on energy management of mobile devices, less has been done on mobility devices like electric vehicles. We explore this topic by letting conventional fuel car drivers reflect on their current driving habits through an exploration tool that we developed. Our results demonstrate three dimensions related to energy availability to consider for design of energy dependent mobility devices and provide explanations on how these dimensions could be utilize in our design through energy visualizations. With this we contributed not only by demonstrating aspects of energy availability and mobility, but also through opening up for new interesting possibilities and inquires in our and possibly other domains.

Modeling of interaction design by end users through discourse modeling

End users of software typically have to let someone else develop it and its user interface, or to learn to design and to program it themselves. Especially user interfaces developed by someone else may not fit well the given task. Designing and programming is hard and takes a lot of effort in general, and even more so for people not especially trained or experienced. Therefore, we propose end-user development of user interfaces through a new approach and interface for discourse modeling. End users may themselves model an interaction design as a discourse (in the sense of a dialogue between human and computer). From such an interaction design, eventually a user interface is to be generated automatically by a tool. As a consequence, end-user development becomes end-user modeling instead of programming.

Transforming Discourse Models to Structural User Interface Models

User-interface design is still a time consuming and expensive task to do, but recent advances allow generating them from interaction design models. We present a model-driven approach for generating user interfaces out of interaction design models. Our interaction design models are discourse models, more precisely models of classes of dialogues. They are based on theories of human communication and should, therefore, be more understandable to humans than programs implementing user interfaces. Our discourse models also contain enough semantics to transform them automatically into user interfaces for multiple devices and modalities. This paper presents a two-step transformation approach with an intermediate user interface model. By showing specific transformation rules, we concentrate on a major part of the first step, transforming discourse models to structural user interface models.

Makumba: the role of the technology for the sustainability of amateur programming practice and community

We address the issue of sustainability of practice, which we regard as crucial for the sustainability of the community at large. In the absence of material reward, sustaining a specialized activity such as programming is not trivial especially when members move often in and out of the community. Our case is the group of voluntary, amateur student programmers from a European-wide student organization. We present this setting as an Amateur Community and as a Community of Practice, and show how such framing helps in understanding sustainability of practice. Although being totally voluntary and managing a large intranet, the group has been thriving for six years. To explain such high practice sustainability we examine the role of the technology framework used by the group during this time. We then propose a more general framework for understanding practice sustainability in the context of amateur communities of practice.

Linking Data to Action: Designing for Amateur Energy Management

Design of eco-feedback has primarily aimed at persuading individuals to change behaviours into more environmentally sustainable ones. However, it has been questioned how effective such feedback is in supporting long-term change. As an alternative focus for energy feedback, we present a case study of amateur energy management work in apartment buildings owned by housing cooperatives, and the design of an app that aims to stimulate and support cooperatives in taking energy actions that significantly reduce the cooperatives collective energy use. By linking energy data to energy actions, the users can see how actions taken in their own and other cooperatives affected the energy use, learn from each others experiences and become motivated as energy amateurs. Based on our housing cooperative case, we reflect on design aspects to consider when designing for energy management in amateur settings.

Robot-Supported Cooperative Work: A Shared-Shopping Scenario

Computer-support cooperative work has been studied extensively and achieved applications that are widely useful. However, there was not much emphasis on support through robots for cooperative work. So, there is no deep understanding of what is needed to support tasks that involve individually moving communication partners and for which the physical context is relevant. This work shows an example of robot-supported cooperative work, where two robots communicate with each other to indirectly support communication between their human users. This example is a shared-shopping scenario. For its realization, we make use of high-level discourse models both for specifying communication between a robot shopping cart and its human user, and between two robot carts. The emerging communication from such intertwined discourses supports a shared (shopping) task of their two human users, who collaborate based on the shopping list shared in this way. Such support is important in a setting where the physical context is relevant, e.g., the vicinity to products.