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This paper deals with the problem of recognizing the unique role in dynamic environments. Different from social roles, the unique role refers to those who are unusual in their carrying items or movements in the scene. In this paper, we propose a hierarchical probabilistic reasoning method that relates spatial relationships between interested objects and humans with their temporal changes to recognize the unique individual. Two observation models, Object Existence Model (OEM) and Human Action Model (HAM), are established to support role inference by analyzing the corresponding semantic-interaction features and spatio-temporal features. Then, OEM and HAM results of each person are compared with the overall distribution in the scene, respectively. Finally, we can determine the role through the fusion of two observation models. Experiments are conducted in both indoor and outdoor environments concerning different settings, degrees of clutter, and occlusions. The results show that the proposed method can adapt to a variety of scenarios and outperforms other methods on accuracy and robustness, moreover, exhibiting stable performance even in complex scenes. NRF (Natl Research Foundation, S’pore) Accepted version

One of the most important research topics nowadays is human action recognition, which is of significant interest to the computer vision and machine learning communities. Some of the factors that hamper it include changes in postures and shapes and the memory space and time required to gather, store, label, and process the pictures. During our research, we noted a considerable complexity to recognize human actions from different viewpoints, and this can be explained by the position and orientation of the viewer related to the position of the subject. We attempted to address this issue in this paper by learning different special view-invariant facets that are robust to view variations. Moreover, we focused on providing a solution to this challenge by exploring view-specific as well as view-shared facets utilizing a novel deep model called the sample-affinity matrix (SAM). These models can accurately determine the similarities among samples of videos in diverse angles of the camera and enable us to precisely fine-tune transfer between various views and learn more detailed shared facets found in cross-view action identification. Additionally, we proposed a novel view-invariant facets algorithm that enabled us to better comprehend the internal processes of our project. Using a series of experiments applied on INRIA Xmas Motion Acquisition Sequences (IXMAS) and the Northwestern–UCLA Multi-view Action 3D (NUMA) datasets, we were able to show that our technique performs much better than state-of-the-art techniques.

User-centered thinking is incorporated into many contemporary design practices. However, some practices may lack a thorough consideration of the user-product relation during the product development. This paper introduces natural behaviour interface through a theoretical approach to the activity system, for the purpose of facilitating a more natural subconscious interaction between the user and the product. It first presents an analysis of activity theory and activity-centered design to identify their constituent elements and to understand the nature of design focused on user-product focused design: affordance design and natural behavior interface design, through case analyses. Ultimately, the paper aims to introduce a natural behavior interface design framework as an effective means of correlating a product"s main operation with the user"s natural behaviour and thus closing the gap between the subject, mediating artifacts and the object. Furthermore, a product that considers natural behaviour interface as a higher chance of triggering the user"s emotion, can foster the user"s deeper attachment to the product.

In model-driven user interface development, several models are used to describe different aspects of user interface when level of detail varies. The relations between the models are established through model transformations. The Model Driven Engineering (MDE) approach has been proposed in software engineering domain in order to provide techniques and tools to deal with models in the automated way. In this paper, we will review existing user interface languages that gain wider acceptance, and discuss their applicability for model-driven user interface development.

This paper aims to establish an online affordance evaluation model for measuring affordance degree to evaluate the usability of a product. By using this model, designers could easily identify the appearance features of a product necessary to be revised and optimized. In addition, an online survey, which replaces the realized operational survey, is also recommended. This model includes three parts: first, identifying the affordance properties and its correlative weights by using multidimensional scaling, K-means clustering and the Analytic Hierarchy Process; second, analyzing the user’s tasks and functional components of the product; third, constructing an evaluation model which provides the affordance degree. Finally, a case study with the steam iron GC2510 is performed to verify the effect of this model.

In this paper we propose a novel idea for adaptation of the user interface in complex supervisory tasks. Under the assumption that the user behavior is stationary and that the user has limited cognitive and motor abilities, we have shown that a combination of genetic algorithm for constrained optimization and probabilistic modeling of the user may evolve the adaptive interface to the level of personalization. The non-parametric statistics has been employed in order to evaluate the feasibility of the ranking approach. The method proposed is flexible and easy to use in various problem domains. We have tested the method with an automated user and a group of real users in an air traffic control environment. The automated user, implemented for initial tests, is built first under the same assumptions as a real user. In the second step, we have exploited the adaptive interface through a group of real users and collected subjective ratings using questionnaires. We have shown that the proposed method can effectively improve human-computer interaction and our approach is pragmatically a valid approach for the interface adaptation in complex environments.

In recent years, the number of computationally-based devices has grown rapidly, and with them the number of interfaces we encounter. Often, the face for today’s product or service is, at first touch, an interface. While the pervasiveness of the interface might present a minor challenge for the majority, for those with little previous knowledge or accessibility limitations the challenge can be insurmountable. In many cases, the way we access and use, and even the degree to which we rely on technology, may be vastly different from generation to generation. As the number of interfaces and the diversity of users grow, the need for effective interface design increases. Clocks on VCRs and DVD players flash at users insistently demanding to be reset, a mute testimony to the failure of the interface. Designers commonly mimic standard interface design elements such as icons and metaphors, or create flashy interfaces that may appeal visually, but often at the expense of user understanding and functionality. Despite mimicry, creativity, new technology, and a steadily growing need, interfaces are mired in paradigms established decades ago at a time when user interface was more a computer novelty than a part of everyday life. Thus far, pundits, consultants, and authors have attempted to improve interface design primarily by exploring and analyzing existing patterns of interface design, or by defining desirable enduser experiences. One example of a detailed analysis of an existing pattern is the Nielsen Norman Group’s 106-page report, “Site Map Usability.”1 A site map is a means for quickly gaining an overview of a Web site. The report mentions a principle in the first sentence of the executive summary: “Help users understand where they are”; then analyzes in great detail a specific means or pattern for meeting that need such as “Web site maps,” delivering twenty-eight guidelines “to improve site map usability.” Another recent example is Duyne, Landay, and Hong’s book The Design of Sites,2 which focuses on using existing patterns to improve Web interface design. As helpful as such approaches are, the examination of an existing pattern such as the site map, and a detailed recipe for the execution of that pattern, is not designed to stimulate innovation. 1 Nielsen Norman Group, Site Map Usability (Fremont, CA, 1998). 2 Douglas K. van Duyne, James A. Landay, and Jason I Hong, The Design of Sites (Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003).

The development of a user-friendly online module depends on the inputs, the processes and the outcomes from the user interface design, the learner interface design and the instructional design. The online module includes the user interface design, the learner interface and the instructional design. This chapter would examine the theories behind these three designs. What guidelines can be garnered from the theories of these three designs? How can these guidelines be used to develop a user-friendly online module? In addition, it would examine their similarities and how they can be used to develop a user-friendly online module. Further, the chapter recommended an alignment of the garnered guidelines from the three designs to explore the plausible reasons for the high attrition rate in Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC).

The first stage in the design of a user interface is the quest for its `typical user', an abstract generalization of each user of the application. However, in web systems and other scenarios where the application can be used by dozens of different kinds of users, the identification of this `typical user' is quite difficult, if not impossible. Our proposal is to avoid the construction of interactive dialogs during the design stage, building them dynamically once the specific cognitive, perceptual and motor requirements of the current user are known: that is, during the execution stage. This is the approach used by GADEA, an intelligent user interface management system (UIMS) able to separate the functionality of an application from its interface in real time. The system adapts the components of the interface depending on the information stored in a user model which is continuously updated by a small army of data-gathering agents.

This paper aims to clarify the concept and elucidate the role of affordances in the interaction design for physical products by making a parallel comparison to product semantics. This study argues that the core of affordance concept in design lies not in expressing the design intent, but constructing the actions required in the user–product interaction. A framework consisting of three design dimensions: affordance, perceptual information, and symbol, is suggested to deal with different aspects in physical interaction design, in particular, the motor, perceptual, and cognitive factors with an illustrative example. In conclusion, implications for interaction design and future research are suggested.

Interface agents are computer programs that provide personalized assistance to users with their computer-based tasks. The interface agents developed so far have focused their attention on learning a user's preferences in a given application domain and on assisting him according to them. However, in order to personalize the interaction with users, interface agents should also learn how to best interact with each user and how to provide them assistance of the right sort at the right time. To fulfil this goal, an interface agent has to discover when the user wants a suggestion to solve a problem or deal with a given situation, when he requires only a warning about it and when he does not need any assistance at all. In this work, we propose a learning algorithm, named WoS, to tackle this problem. Our algorithm is based on the observation of a user's actions and on a user's reactions to the agent's assistance actions. The WoS algorithm enables an interface agent to adapt its behavior and its interaction with a user to the user's assistance requirements in each particular context.

This paper investigates the user interface design principles and evaluation methods with the corresponding examples. Some of these principles are: 1) focus on the users and their tasks, not the technology; 2) consider function first, presentation later; 3) conform to the users` view of the task; 4) do not complicate the user`s task; 5) promote learning; 6) deliver information, not just data; 7) design for responsiveness; and 8) try it out on users, then fix it. In addition, this paper deals with the general human computer interaction issues as the basis for introducing the user interface design principles.

Digital control systems, like those controlling the functions of buildings or industrial processes, pose a number of special problems for good user interface design. The general problems of providing usability, common to all systems, include difficulty in accessing and applying principles of good design. In addition, digital control systems can have multiple users, with multiple roles, and each installation has different configurations of systems, controls, and user interface devices. Providing interactions for the users of building control systems is often achieved by manually implementing each required display. This is an expensive solution, which often produces less than optimal results. We address these problems through the automation of user interface design. Our solution, called DIGBE (dynamic interface generation for building environments), separates the domain knowledge, interaction design, and presentation heuristics into multiple collaborating models. Each model contains knowledge about a particular aspect of interface design, and uses this knowledge to dynamically create each user interface that is needed to support the users of a control system. DIGBE demonstrates that it is possible to automatically and dynamically create consistent and individualized user interfaces from model-based design knowledge.

A fundamental objective of human–computer interaction research is to make systems more usable, more useful, and to provide users with experiences fitting their specific background knowledge and objectives. The challenge in an information-rich world is not only to make information available to people at any time, at any place, and in any form, but specifically to say the “right” thing at the “right” time in the “right” way. Designers of collaborative human–computer systems face the formidable task of writing software for millions of users (at design time) while making it work as if it were designed for each individual user (only known at use time). User modeling research has attempted to address these issues. In this article, I will first review the objectives, progress, and unfulfilled hopes that have occurred over the last ten years, and illustrate them with some interesting computational environments and their underlying conceptual frameworks. A special emphasis is given to high-functionality applications and the impact of user modeling to make them more usable, useful, and learnable. Finally, an assessment of the current state of the art followed by some future challenges is given.

This paper describes USE-IT, a knowledge-based tool for automating the design of interactions at the physical level, so as to ensure accessibility of the target user interface by different user groups, including people with disabilities. To achieve this, USE-IT elicits, manipulates and interprets representations of design knowledge in order to reason about, select and decide upon lexical adaptation constituents of a user interface. Adaptation constituents are attributes of abstract interaction object classes. USE-IT generates a collection of adaptation rules (i.e. a lexical specification scenario), based on design constraints generated from three basic knowledge sources: (a) the user model, (b) the task schema, and (c) a set of platform constraints (i.e. interaction objects, attributes, device availability, etc.). A data structure called the adaptability model tree has been designed to (i) facilitate the development of plausible semantics of adaptation at the lexical level of interaction, (ii) allow unification of design constraints, and (iii) enable selection of maximally preferred design options. The output of USE-IT can be subsequently interpreted by the run-time libraries of a high-level user interface development toolkit, which provides the required implementation support for realizing the user-adapted interface on a target platform.

A good user interface is a necessity for the success of knowledge-based expert systems. Issues such as user requirements, user model and system model have been given insufficient attention in the development of the majority of many such systems, particularly those for design applications. This paper discusses the requirements, the benefits and the problems of building user interfaces for knowledge-based expert systems. The notions of a user model and system model are discussed and their impact on the success of user interfaces considered. The paper concludes with a description of the user interface developed for a knowledge-based design tool for preliminary seismic design of reinforced concrete buildings.

Software developers face many difficult decisions when building new applications, not the least of which is the design of the graphical user interface. The answer to one question-is it better to use a GUI development tool or build it manually?-is relatively straightforward. Today's tools offer several benefits that manual coding does not. Because these tools often provide a simple graphical interface for developing displays, nonprogrammers and human factors engineers can contribute their expertise. Also, if the schedule permits, a tool can be used to build prototypes throughout the development cycle; some tools even provide a test/prototype mode for testing displays without compiling and executing the entire application. And finally, end users can evaluate each prototype and provide feedback, increasing their satisfaction with the final product.

The design of high quality user interfaces is increasingly becoming a knowledge-intensive task. Designers of user interfaces require tools to: (i) provide ‘assistance’ towards optimal decision making in varying design situations, (ii) ‘critique’ the quality of tentative design alternatives, (iii) ‘propagate’ and ‘reuse’ the accumulated design wisdom resulting from past experience, best practice and existing knowledge and (iv) ‘automate’ the design of certain aspects of the user-computer interaction. This paper briefly reviews the architecture and scope of a knowledge-based user interface design aid, called USE-IT, and describes its knowledge base, the inference facilities and the data structures that are available for capturing and embedding design decisions into user interface implementation. USE-IT exhibits characteristic properties which cross the boundaries of the known categories of knowledge-based user interface design tools, such as user interface design assistants, user interface design critics or user interface design generators. The primary objective of USE-IT is to provide the user interface design team with a suit of tools allowing the consolidation of tentative designs, their re-use and incremental evolution, as well as the automatic generation of the lexical specification of a user interface. Such a specification can be subsequently consulted and interpreted by a user interface development toolkit to as to realize the specified lexical interactive behaviour on a target platform (e.g. MS-Windows).

The author describes Mobi-D (Model-Based Interface Designer), a comprehensive environment that supports user-centered design through model-based interface development. In the Mobi-D paradigm, a series of declarative models, such as user-task, dialog, and presentation, are interrelated to provide a formal representation of an interface design. This contrasts to model-based systems, which use only one or two models in isolation and have no explicit notion as to how the various model elements are organized into an interface design.

Computer-human interface design has been recognized as a distinct field for only a little more than a decade, but the design of interfaces to control mechanical devices has a much longer history. The interface-design models used in these mechanical systems play similar roles in computer systems, despite the obvious differences between the two types of systems. There are many ways to control a given mechanism. Whether consciously or unconsciously, every interface designer chooses a model that forms the basis for how the mechanism is controlled. Two principal approaches are the engineering model and the user-task model. There is no best way to design a user interface, however. Interface designers must be aware that a user interface can be based on any of several models, that each model has its advantages, and that their job is to choose the approach most suitable for the project at hand. We examine the models underlying computer-human interface designs by considering a wide variety of systems, including many from areas outside of computing. These noncomputer examples can be instructive because they are simpler and thus clearer. They also provide some helpful detachment and perspective for those of us who are immersed in computers.

This study examines the impact of a user's level of computer knowledge and an adaptive software interface on performance. Performance is examined with a simulation game decision-making task and with the user's expertise on the type of computer interface used to accomplish the task. MIS literature offers various interface characteristics for novice users that are different from those recommended for experienced users. The premise of this research is that the characteristics of the computer user will change based on exposure to the experience with the application at hand. When such change transpires, the characteristics of the interface can be software-adjusted to maximize the productivity of the user. This empirical study investigates the impact of using an adaptive user interface that evolves to correspond to the skill level of the user. Results indicate that the level of computer knowledge, when using an adaptive interface, is not significant on either task performance or interface learning. More importantly, however, the type of interface coupled to a particular user?novice, adaptive, or experienced?produces significant performance differences.

Despite the fact many proposals have been made for abstract user interface models it was not given a detailed context in which it should or could be used in a user-centered design process. This paper presents a clear role for the abstract user interface model in user-centered and model-based development, provides an overview of the stakeholders that may create and/or use abstract user interface models and presents a modular abstract user interface modeling language, CAP3, that makes relations with other models explicit and builds on the foundation of existing abstract user interface models. The proposed modeling notation is supported by a tool and applied to some case studies from literature and in some projects. It is also validated based on state-of-the-art knowledge on domain-specific modeling languages and visual notations and some case studies.

This paper presents a framework for modelling the interaction between a human operator and a robotic device, that enables the robot to collaborate with the human to jointly accomplish tasks. States of the system are captured in a model based on a partially observable Markov decision process (POMDP). States representing the human operator are motivated by behaviours from the psychology of the human action cycle. Hierarchical nature of these states allows the exploitation of data structures based on algebraic decision diagrams (ADD) to efficiently solve the resulting POMDP. The proposed framework is illustrated using two examples from as-sistive robotics; a robotic wheel chair and an intelligent walking device. Experimental results from trials conducted in an office environment with the wheelchair is used to demonstrate the proposed technique. © 2011 IEEE.

We attack the problem of user fatigue in using an interactive genetic algorithm to evolve user interfaces in the XUL interface definition language. The interactive genetic algorithm combines computable user interface design metrics with subjective user input to guide evolution. Individuals in our population represent interface specifications and we compute an individual's fitness from a weighted combination of user input and user interface design guidelines. Results from our preliminary study involving three users indicate that users are able to effectively bias evolution towards user interface designs that reflect both user preferences and computed guideline metrics. Furthermore, we can reduce fatigue, defined by the number of choices needing to be made by the human designer, by doing two things. First, asking the user to pick just two (the best and worst) user interfaces from among a subset of nine shown. Second, asking the user to make the choice once every t generations, instead of every single generation. Our goal is to provide interface designers with an interactive tool that can be used to explore innovation and creativity in the design space of user interfaces.

As application development environment changes rapidly, importance of user interface design is increasing. Usually, most of designers are clustering by subjective method of individual to define objects that have relativity in design interface. But, interface which is designed without particular rules just adds inefficiency and complexity of business to user who use this system. We propose an object oriented design model that allows for flexible development by formalizing the user interface prototype in any GUI environment. The visual cohesion of the user interface is a new set of criteria which has been studied in relation to the user interface contents, and is founded on the basis of the cohesion of the interface as defined using basic software engineering concepts. The visual cohesion includes the issue of how each unit is arranged and grouped, as well as the cohesion of the business events which appear in the programming unit.

We introduce a framework for classifying user interface design representations, and argue that multiple representations are must be used in the design process, and that modelling languages must support the transition between them. We present languages for modelling domain, task and dialog and show how they provide increased support for design, through flexibility and integration. Design patterns based on model fragments from these languages are suggested as a design and engineering tool.

Producing high-quality, comprehensible human interfaces is a difficult, labor-intensive process that requires experience and judgment. In this paper, we describe an approach to assisting this process by using explicit models of the user’s task to drive the interface design and to serve as a functional component of the interface itself. The task model helps to ensure that the resulting interface directly and transpru-ently supports the user in performing his task, and serves as a scaffolding for providing in-context help and advice. By crafting a library of standardized, reusable tasks and interface constructs, we believe it is possible to capture some of the design expertise and to amortize much of the labor required for building effective user interfaces.

The paper shows how a conceptual model represented as a combination of an Entity-Relationship diagram and a Petri net can be used in user interface design. We first discuss how the conceptual model can contribute to the design of usable systems in general. We then describe the specification of the interface as a refinement process from the events of the conceptual model to the operations of the interface.

User interface design and analysis is an inherently interdisciplinary activity that merges cognitive, computing, and engineering sciences. Due to the rapid pace of technological change, there is as yet no science of human-computer interaction and little consensus on what the core knowledge of the discipline should be. In other sciences, the development of taxonomies, such as the taxonomy of living organisms in biology, has proved to be a useful foundation for scientific activity. This paper proposes a taxonomy of user interface terminology as a possible basis for the eventual development of human-computer interaction as a science. This taxonomy includes a model of the basic components of the interface and coverage of some of the major cognitive engineering principles that form the basis for human-computer interaction.

This contribution describes an interdisciplinary approach to the problem of applying psychological knowledge about the human end-user of an application system to the design of the user interface. To this end, relevant concepts from the domain of human factors from the domain of systems design had to be related to each other. Several description methods and representational languages had to be defined for the mental model and the conceptual model of the system on the one hand, and for the user interface and application interface on the other. The different representations had to be mapped onto those applied in the other domain. The resulting set of methods and tools enables an interdisciplinary team to describe the conceptual model of an existing application system, to define a user interface for this application that is acceptable from a human factors point of view, and to construct the actual interface in order to test whether this enables the user to interact with the system in a more comfortable way.

People are continually creating and accessing internal representations of their current situation. I refer to this as their cognitive model. During an interaction with a computer system the person will form a cognitive model of the interaction that contains what he believes are the functions, capabilities and limitations of the system. An invalid or missing cognitive model will lead to user dis-satisfaction, a lack of confidence in the system and, hence, inefficient use of the system and human resources. The user interface, which includes off-line and on-line methods, is the link between the designer's conceptual model of the system's functions, capabilities and limitations and the user's cognitive model. The interface must present the system to the user in such a manner as to guide the user's cognitive model development to where it coincides with the designer's conceptual model. Awareness of the user's developing cognitive model will enable the production of a more effective human-computer interface.

This paper presents a self-adaptive approach to user interface design. The primary philosophy of this design is that the user interface must be aware of the changes in its user's behavior and then adapt to it. Three different default policies are proposed to control the adaptation of a user interface: fixed default, dynamic default, and no default. Performance of these policies are compared for various patterns of usage. Mechanisms that determine the optimal default value to reduce the unnecessary effort are also discussed.

Human factors professionals are not completely free to support the optimization of user interface design within the time span of individual software development projects. Interface design is constrained by conservative forces, such as the expectations of users of existing systems in the installed base and emerging de facto or formal standards. At the same time, human factors involvement with a particular product may ultimately have its greatest impact on future product releases. In this paper we explore an expanded time line for influencing product design. This time line brings middle- and upper-management concerns into focus, revealing critical opportunities for effectively positioning and applying human factors resources.

How can we understand why a bank teller has different needs for a user interface than those of casual users of a machine teller, or why a graphic designer needs a different user interface than a secretary? This article presents a framework for the design of user interfaces that originates from the work situations in which computer-based artifacts are used: The framework deals with the role of the user interface in purposeful human work. Human activity theory is used in this analysis. The purpose of this article is to make the reader curious and hopefully open his or her eyes to a somewhat different way of thinking about the user interface. The article applies examples of real-life interfaces to support this process, but it does not include a systematic presentation of empirical results.I focus on the role of the computer application in use. Thus, it is necessary to consider human-computer interaction and other related work conditions. I deal with human experience and competence as being rooted in the practice of the group that conducts the specific work activity.The main conclusions are: The user interface cannot be seen independently of the use activity (i.e., the professional, socially organized practice of the users and the material conditions for the activity, including the object of the activity). The standard view in these situations is to deduce an ultimate set of operations from an abstract use activity and apply these to design and analysis. This article argues that the user interface fully reveals itself to us only when in use. What is a good user interface for those with a certain degree of competence may not be efficient for those with different levels of competence. I give certain general recommendations for the user interface, but I have no guarantee that such recommendations are applicable to the specific case wherein these concerns may be overruled by specific social or material concerns.

This paper presents the identification, design and implementation of a user interface to a brokerage system and the conceptual architecture and functional behaviour of an intelligent interaction agent that supports and enhances the interaction between the user and the system. The term interaction agent is used in order to describe a particular class of interface agents that function as intelligent personal assistants to users of a computer based system. The interaction agent provides assistance to the user in two contexts. On the user interface level it assists users to comprehend and manipulate the user interface. On the domain of application level, it provides users with information and advice according to their preferences. This work is being carried out in the context of an ACTS (AC 221) project GAIA (Generic Architecture for Information Availability).

The paper addresses a research approach in the area of user interface development tools, namely to discover the helpful, structured, and organised ways to integrate the use of guidelines, standards, and styles into the development tools. The aim of this research approach is to assist the user interface designer during the design process with the help of a powerful design aid tool, called the user interface designer assistance, that will lead to user interfaces of high ergonomic quality, an important aspect for the end-users. >