Mike Wu

Multi-finger and whole hand gestural interaction techniques for multi-user tabletop displays

Recent advances in sensing technology have enabled a new generation of tabletop displays that can sense multiple points of input from several users simultaneously. However, apart from a few demonstration techniques [17], current user interfaces do not take advantage of this increased input bandwidth. We present a variety of multifinger and whole hand gestural interaction techniques for these displays that leverage and extend the types of actions that people perform when interacting on real physical tabletops. Apart from gestural input techniques, we also explore interaction and visualization techniques for supporting shared spaces, awareness, and privacy. These techniques are demonstrated within a prototype room furniture layout application, called RoomPlanner.

Gesture registration, relaxation, and reuse for multi-point direct-touch surfaces

Freehand gestural interaction with direct-touch computation surfaces has been the focus of significant research activity. While many interesting gestural interaction techniques have been proposed, their design has been mostly ad-hoc and has not been presented within a constructive design framework. In this paper, we develop and articulate a set of design principles for constructing - in a systematic and extensible manner - multi-hand gestures on touch surfaces that can sense multiple points and shapes, and can also accommodate conventional point-based input. To illustrate the generality of these design principles, a set of bimanual continuous gestures that embody these principles are developed and explored within a prototype tabletop publishing application. We carried out a user evaluation to assess the usability of these gestures and use the results and observations to suggest future design guidelines.

Participatory design of an orientation aid for amnesics

We present the participatory design and evaluation of an orientation aid for individuals who have anterograde amnesia. Our design team included six amnesics who have extreme difficulty storing new memories. We describe the methods we used to enable the participation of individuals with such severe cognitive impairments. Through this process, we have conceived, designed, and developed the OrientingTool, a software application for Personal Digital Assistants that can be used by amnesics to orient themselves when feeling lost or disoriented. Two complementary studies were conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of this tool in ecologically valid contexts. Our findings suggest that the OrientingTool can improve an amnesics independence and confidence in managing situations when disoriented, and that participatory design may be productively used with participants who have significant cognitive disabilities.

Participatory design with individuals who have amnesia

We present experiences and insights into participatory design with individuals who have anterograde amnesia and therefore have extreme difficulty storing new memories. We discuss our design of the design process, and present a set of techniques used to support memory during and between design sessions. From this experience, we identify cognitive assumptions of participatory design that break down when working with amnestics. We generalize these ideas into an analytical framework for researchers and practitioners who intend to use participatory design with persons having various kinds of cognitive impairments. We illustrate the framework by analyzing a cognitive deficit unrelated to memory that we encountered, and an unanticipated benefit from what at first appeared to be a liability in working with this design team.

Under my finger: human factors in pushing and rotating documents across the table

When passing a document to someone across a table, the person passing the document often rotates it to face the receiver. In this paper, we present the results of a user evaluation of three Push-and-Rotate schemes that offer different underlying control semantics for how an electronic document can automatically rotate as it is pushed across an interactive tabletop surface. The effects of document size are also discussed.

Collaborative Tabletop Research and Evaluation

Tables provide a large and natural interface for supporting direct manipulation of visual content, for human-to-human interactions and for collaboration, coordination, and parallel problem solving. However, the direct-touch table metaphor also presents considerable challenges, including the need for input methods that transcend traditional mouse- and keyboard-based designs.

An exploration of social requirements for exercise group formation

Exercising is often a social activity performed with other people, yet finding compatible exercise partners is difficult in practice. To gain a better understanding of the social requirements involved with forming exercise groups, we conducted a two-phased exploratory study involving an online web questionnaire with 96 respondents and two focus groups. Our results highlight various aspects of collaborating with exercise partners, but also indicate the limited utility of currently available systems to support such collaborations. We discuss implications for collaborative technologies supporting exercise group formation.

Toys to teach: mathematics as a collaborative climbing exercise

Whereas traditional research on collaborative educational systems has primarily focused on how to define better modes of digital interaction, this approach is found lacking when applied to developing collaborative systems for elementary school aged children. It is creatively and collaboratively restrictive to filter the enthusiastic interactions of these excited 12-year-old children through progressively more complicated GUIs. Current E-GEMS research examines design factors of educational systems that recognize and facilitate the social context of the classroom and hopes to encourage, rather than restrict, peer-to-peer social discussion and interaction. By correlating observed interactions in the digital domain with those in the social domain, we hope to shed light on design factors of collaborative systems that can be an integral and exciting part of a childs mathematical education. The vessel of our current research is the two-player collaborative mathematical exercise PrimeClimb, developed at E-GEMS. This paper describes the study conducted with PrimeClimb and documents the methodology of data capture and analysis used in the study -- methods borrowed from ethnography, education research and sociology.

LIFELONG INTERACTIONS Memory impairment is a family affair

As all of us know, whether we are seven or 77, each of us can have challenging needs when in good health or when we are suffering from any number of ailments. The reality of understanding users is that health issues can color our lives in ways we might never expect. In this issues forum, Mike Wu discusses the pressing needs of adults with severe memory impairments and what can be done to support them and their families through technology. What this article reminds us is that even when we consider our older or younger users, we must also consider the people that live with them. Their care-givers, whether they be grown-children or parents, can play a critical role in the lives of family members at any age. This forum on life-long interactions celebrates not just one age of user, but all ages working together to make life a little better for all of us.---Allison Druin

PRIMECLIMB: DESIGNING TO FACILITATE MEDIATED COLLABORATIVE INQUIRY

We present the design of a two-player mathematical problem solving environment for 12 and 13 year old children. The system was explicitly designed to facilitate social collaboration by incorporating principles of Mediated Collaborative Inquiry, socio-cultural theory and theories of group interaction. We demonstrate that it is possible to incorporate these social theories of collaboration into learning environments in very specific ways through aspects of system design. These principles guide the physical setup within the classroom environment, the design of the activity and resources, and the progression of challenge within the activity.