Nicholas Jitkoff

Window Shopping: A Study of Desktop Window Switching

Desktop users frequently open and switch between multiple windows. Here we present an experiment comparing 3 window switching interfaces: the Cards interface spreads windows out like a vertical stack of cards with the most recent window at the front; the Mosaic interface places each window in a grid ordered by recency; and, the Exposé interface provides an map-like overview based on the relative size and position of windows. Experimental results suggest that the Mosaic interface scales, enabling faster window selection than the Cards interface and less erroneous window selection than the Exposé interface.