James R. Wallace

The NiCE Discussion Room: Integrating Paper and Digital Media to Support Co-Located Group Meetings

Current technological solutions that enable content creation and sharing during group discussion meetings are often cumbersome to use, and are commonly abandoned for traditional paper-based tools, which provide flexibility in supporting a wide range of working styles and task activities that may occur in a given meeting. Paper-based tools, however, have their own drawbacks; paper-based content is difficult to modify or replicate. We introduce a novel digital meeting room design, the NiCE Discussion Room, which integrates digital and paper tools into a cohesive system with an intuitive pen-based interface. The combination of digital and paper media provides groups with a flexible design solution that enables them to create, access, and share information and media from a variety of sources to facilitate group discussions. This paper describes the design solution, along with results from a user study conducted to evaluate the usability and utility of the system.

Investigating teamwork and taskwork in single- and multi-display groupware systems

Multi-display groupware (MDG) systems, which typically comprise both public and personal displays, promise to enhance collaboration, yet little is understood about how they differ in use from single-display groupware (SDG) systems. While research has established the technical feasibility of MDG systems, evaluations have not addressed the question of how users’ behave in such environments, how their interface design can impact group behavior, or what advantages they offer for collaboration. This paper presents a user study that investigates the impact of display configuration and software interface design on taskwork and teamwork. Groups of three completed a collaborative optimization task in single- and multi-display environments, under different task interface constraints. Our results suggest that MDG configurations offer advantages for performing individual task duties, whereas SDG conditions offer advantages for coordinating access to shared resources. The results also reveal the importance of ergonomic design considerations when designing co-located groupware systems.

Collaborative sensemaking on a digital tabletop and personal tablets: prioritization, comparisons, and tableaux

We describe an investigation of the support that three different display configurations provided for a collaborative sensemaking task: a digital table; personal tablets; and both the tabletop and personal tablets. Mixed-methods analyses revealed that the presence of a digital tabletop display led to improved sensemaking performance, and identified activities that were supported by the shared workspace. The digital tabletop supported a groups ability to prioritize information, to make comparisons between task data, and to form and critique the groups working hypothesis. Analyses of group performance revealed a positive correlation with equity of member participation using the shared digital table, and a negative correlation of equity of member participation using personal tablets. Implications for the support of sensemaking groups, and the use of equity of member participation as a predictive measure of their performance are discussed.

Investigating the Role of a Large, Shared Display in Multi-Display Environments

We conducted an empirical study to investigate the use of personal and shared displays during group work. The collaborative environments under study consisted of personal workspaces, in the form of laptops, and a shared virtual workspace displayed on a nearby wall. Our study compared the use of the large shared display under two different interface content conditions; a status display that provided an overview of the group’s current task performance, and a replicated view of the shared workspace that allowed task work to occur on the shared display. The study results suggest that while participants used their personal displays primarily to perform the task, the shared display facilitated several key teamwork mechanisms. In particular, the provided status display best facilitated monitoring of group progress, whereas the replicated content display best facilitated conversational grounding. Regardless of the shared display content, having a shared, physical reference point also appeared to support synchronization of the group activity via body language and gaze.

Contextual design considerations for co-located, collaborative tables

To date, digital tabletop research has predominantly focused on resolving fundamental software and hardware challenges introduced by this new interactive platform. Understanding not only what technical functionality a digital tabletop can provide, but also how appropriate that functionality is for different usage contexts is crucial in designing tables intended for use outside of the research lab. In this paper, we propose five contextual factors to consider in the tabletop design process - social and cultural, activity, temporal, ecological, and motivational - and discuss how these factors influence the design of three main aspects of tabletop systems: software interface, physical form, and connectedness. This work provides a means for tabletop designers to understand the factors that impact the applicability of existing and future design approaches for a given context of use.

Exploring automation in digital tabletop board game

Digital tabletops present the opportunity to combine the social advantages of traditional tabletop games with the automation and streamlined gameplay of video games. However, it is unclear whether the addition of automation enhances or detracts from the game experience. A study was performed where groups played three versions of the cooperative board game Pandemic, with varying degrees of automation. The study revealed that while game automation can provide advantages to players, it can also negatively impact enjoyment, game state awareness, and flexibility in game play.

Modelling and identifying collaborative situations in a collocated multi-display groupware setting

Detecting the presence or absence of collaboration during group work is important for providing help and feedback during sessions. We propose an approach which automatically distinguishes between the times when a co-located group of learners, using a problem solving computer-based environment, is engaged in collaborative, non-collaborative or somewhat collaborative behaviour. We exploit the available data, audio and application log traces, to automatically infer useful aspects of the group collaboration and propose a set of features to code them. We then use a set of classifiers and evaluate whether their results accurately match the observations made on videorecordings. Results show up to 69.4% accuracy (depending on the classifier) and that the error rate for extreme misclassification (e.g. when a collaborative episode is classified as non-collaborative, or vice-versa) is less than 7.6%. We argue that this technique can be used to show the teacher and the learners an overview of the extent of their collaboration so they can become aware of it.

Comparing content and input redirection in MDEs

Designers of Multi-Display Environments (MDEs) often use input redirection to allow users to manipulate content on multiple displays with a single interaction device, but users seated at sub-optimal positions (i.e., not facing the display) may find interaction difficult or frustrating. In collaborative MDEs, users should be able to choose their preferred collaborative arrangement, rather than adjusting to the limitations of the technology. We compare content and input redirection from a variety of seating positions in an MDE. Results from our studies show that content redirection does not suffer from performance loss in sub-optimal seating positions, as opposed to input redirection, which does. Content redirection provides a method for all members of a group to interact with shared content regardless of their position relative to a shared display.

Effect of Bezel Presence and Width on Visual Search

We investigate how the presence and width of interior bezels impacts visual search performance across tiled displays. In spite of a potential benefit from structured segmentation, we do not find significant differences in visual search time, and note a small effect size of less than 0.5% for bezel width. However, we find participants are more accurate when searching for targets spanning a bezel. Based on these findings, we suggest two implications for the design of tiled displays: 1) that additional costs associated with thinner bezels may not provide significant return on investment; and 2) that bezels may act as visual anchors, and be useful for the placement of interface elements.

Watchpoint: Freehand Pointing with a Smartwatch in a Ubiquitous Display Environment

We describe the design and evaluation of a freehand, smartwatch-based, mid-air pointing and clicking interaction technique, called Watchpoint. Watchpoint enables a user to point at a target on a nearby large display by moving their arm. It also enables target selection through a wrist rotation gesture. We validate the use of Watchpoint by comparing its performance with two existing techniques: Myopoint, which uses a specialized forearm mounted motion sensor, and a camera-based (Vicon) motion capture system. We show that Watchpoint is statistically comparable in speed and error rate to both systems and, in fact, outperforms in terms of error rate for small (high Fittss ID) targets. Our work demonstrates that a commodity smartwatch can serve as an effective pointing device in ubiquitous display environments.