Gavin Jancke

Designing and deploying an information awareness interface

The concept of awareness has received increasing attention over the past several CSCW conferences. Although many awareness interfaces have been designed and studied, most have been limited deployments of research prototypes. In this paper we describe Sideshow, a peripheral awareness interface that was rapidly adopted by thousands of people in our company. Sideshow provides regularly updated peripheral awareness of a broad range of information from virtually any accessible web site or database. We discuss Sideshows design and the experience of refining and redesigning the interface based on feedback from a rapidly expanding user community.

Localization and Segmentation of A 2D High Capacity Color Barcode

A 2D color barcode can hold much more information than a binary barcode. Barcodes are often intended for consumer use where using a cellphone, a consumer can take an image of a barcode on a product, and retrieve relevant information about the product. The barcode must be read using computer vision techniques. While a color barcode can hold more information, it makes this vision task in consumer scenarios unusually challenging. We present our approach to the localization and segmentation of a 2D color barcode in such challenging scenarios, along with its evaluation on a diverse collection of images of Microsofts recently launched high capacity color barcode (HCCB). We exploit the unique trait of barcode reading: the barcode decoder can give the vision algorithm feedback, and develop a progressive strategy to achieve both - high accuracy in diverse scenarios as well as computational efficiency.

Linking public spaces: technical and social issues

Three public spaces frequency used by members of a single organization who are distributed across different floors of two buildings were linked by constantly-running video and audio connections. We discuss the design of the system, including issues in providing low-latency, full-duplex audio-video connectivity, ways to increase possibilities for interaction while addressing privacy concerns, and the introduction of the system to the community. We report on responses to the system and lessions learned, including unexpected issues, such as creative decorations of the spaces and assertions by a vocal minority of employees about the private nature of “public space.”

Presenting to local and remote audiences: design and use of the TELEP system

The current generation of desktop computers and networks are bringing streaming audio and video into widespread use. A small investment allows presentations or lectures to be multicast, enabling passive viewing from offices or rooms. We surveyed experienced viewers of multicast presentations and designed a lightweight system that creates greater awareness in the presentation room of remote viewers and allows remote viewers to interact with each other and the speaker. We report on the design, use, and modification of the system, and discuss design tradeoffs.

Distance learning through distributed collaborative video viewing

Previous research on Tutored Video Instruction (TVI) shows that learning is enhanced when small groups of students watch and discuss lecture videos together. Using specialized, high-end videoconferencing systems, these improved results have been shown to apply even when the students are in different locations (Distributed TVI, or DTVI). In this paper, we explore two issues in making DTVI-like scenarios widely supported at low cost. First, we explore design of a system that allows distributed individuals to collectively watch video using shared VCR controls such as play, pause, seek, stop. We show how such a system can be built on top of existing commercial technologies. Second, we explore the impact of four alternative discussion channels on student learning and interaction behavior. The four channels-text chat, audioconferencing, videoconferencing, and face-to-face-have differing infrastructure requirements and costs. Our lab studies show that while text chat does not work, there is no significant difference in discussion behavior and learning between audioconferencing and videoconferencing. While lab studies have their limitations and long-term field studies need to be done, the preliminary results point to a low-cost way for a DTVI-like model to be deployed widely in the very near future.

Exploring PC-telephone convergence with the enhanced telephony prototype

Industry trends suggest that the PC and telephone user experiences will converge over the next several years. This convergence raises important questions for the HCI community: how should the PC-phone user experience be designed, and how does PC-phone technology affect work practices? This paper focuses on the first question and provides some initial data on the second question. We describe a PC-phone prototype we built called Enhanced Telephony, and we report data from an eight month field deployment of Enhanced Telephony within our company where over 7,000 people installed the prototype. Results indicate that PC-phone software is a promising technology for the workplace and that the most valuable features may be those that help people manage their incoming calls.

Tamper-Resistant Biometric IDs

We present FaceCerts, a simple, inexpensive, and cryptographically secure identity certification system. A FaceCert is a printout of person’s portrait photo, an arbitrary textual message, and a 2-D color barcode which encodes an RSA signature of the message hash and the compressed representation of the face encompassed by the photo. The signature is created using the private key of the party issuing the ID. ID verification is performed by a simple off-line scanning device that contains the public key of the issuer. The system does not require smart cards; it can be expanded to encompass other biometric features, and more interestingly, the ID does not need to be printed by a trusted or high-end printer, it can be printed anywhere, anytime, and potentially by anyone. The ID verifier uses a single scan process which does not require the use of displays. We detail system’s components and present a preliminary performance evaluation using an in-field experiment.