New Interaction Concepts for Interface Folders

The main usability issue of the realization of Interface Folders is the slow process of opening and closing Folders as described in Section 6.2.1. In fact, once the content of an Interface Folder is spread out on the connected Current, the connection bridge between Current and Folder was perceived as rather disturbing than helpful or supporting. For this reason, the realization of Interface Folders was revised. This revision was strongly based on a comment one participant made during the second task: “You know what would be cool? If it (the concept of Interface Folders) would be like a window on the computer. If you click on the folder and the Current with all images comes up. (...) Like you double-click it and it just pops up just like on the PC.” The observations of other groups during their interaction with Interface Currents confirmed the appropriateness of this idea. Transforming Interface Folders directly into an Interface Current is very much related to the concept that most operating systems apply when a user opens a folder: The folder “transforms” into a window that contains the content of the folder. Furthermore, in the cumbersome waiting times until all items are spread out on the Interface Current, as mentioned in Section 6.2.1, would be eliminated. The following describes how the participant’s comment was realized.

When a user double-clicks on an Interface Folder, the Folder disappears and an Interface Current appears instead (see Figure 6.21). The content of the Interface Folder is spread out automatically and evenly on the Current and starts to flow immediately if the flow on the Current is enabled. The shape and the location of the Current can be manipulated just like on conventional Interface Currents. Items can be added to or removed from the folder-based Current. The Current can also be deleted by using the trash can. However, a

6.4 Chapter Summary

Figure 6.21:Transforming an Interface Folder into a Current.

folder-based Current is deleted, it transforms back into an Interface Folder. This feature gives users the opportunity to quickly collapse Interface Currents whose content is no longer needed and restore them later if necessary. In particular during collaborative work where large amounts of information are used, the ability to collapse content can be crucial. The name tag on the Interface Folder helps users to retrieve the collapsed content easily. When the Folder is opened again, the Current invokes in the same shape it had when it was collapsed.

Transforming Interface Folders into Currents seems to be a promising realization of the concept of Interface Folders. While it seems much more intuitive to use than the first realization, further user studies are required to prove usability.

6.4 Chapter Summary

In this chapter, the usability issues concerning Interface Currents and Interface Folders revealed by the exploratory user study were discussed. The first part of the chapter explained the actual usability issues and the resulting design implications while in the second part the redesign of Interface Currents and Folders was introduced. The usabil- ity issues of Interface Currents and Interface Folders are summarized in Table 6.1 and Table 6.2. The issues are classified on a scale from “1” to “3”. Issues classified with “1” are minor issues whereas a “3” stands for major issues. With regard to Interface Currents, the major usability issues were found in the interaction with the menu and the interac- tion techniques for manipulating the flow on an Interface Current. In certain situations, the flow, in particular on the peripheral Current, was found to be distracting and partici- pants tended to stop it. In addition, the interaction of users with the peripheral Current was sometimes interfering with the activities of other users.

Relocating a Current was found to require some customization. Overlapping of infor- mation items on a Current was revealed to be a serious problem that has to be solved in order to ensure that Interface Currents can be utilized for tasks that involve large amounts of information. Simultaneous user interaction with Interface Currents should

Chapter 6 Usability Issues

Usability Issues of Interface Currents Classification Resolved

Relocating a Current needs practice 1 no

Manipulating the flow of an Interface Current

Perceiving the flow as distracting 1 no

Interference between users because the flow on

the Current was manipulated by one user 3 no

No indicator for the velocity setting of a Current 2 yes

Interacting with the menu

Assigning menu icons to the relating functions is

difficult for unpracticed users 2 yes

Inconsistent menu design of pool- and stream-

shaped Currents 2 yes

Indirect manipulation of the boundary of stream-

shaped Currents that has no control points 3 yes

Other issues

Overlapping of information items on Currents 3 no

Simultaneous manipulation of Currents is not

possible 2 no

Buttons for creating new Current were sometimes

hindering 1 no

Table 6.1:Summary of usability issues with regard to Interface Currents.

Usability Issues of Interface Folders Classification Dissolved Slow process of opening and closing Interface

Folders 3 yes

“Double-click” is often activated accidentally 2 no

Table 6.2:Summary of usability issues with regard to Interface Folders.

be enabled as well, at least for thereshaping and changing-the-widthfunctions. In addi-

tion, but this was found to be a minor problem, the positions of buttons for creating new Interface Currents should be manipulatable rather than fixed in order to enable users to locate them individually on most convenient positions in the workspace.

In general, the concept of Interface Folders was found to be useful but its realization re- quired some revision. Participants found it particularly frustrating to wait for the content of a Folder to spread out on the Current. Furthermore, the connection bridge between Current and Interface Folder was rather distracting than helpful.

For all usability issues the study revealed, design implications were presented that can be applied for future enhancements of the system. However, the most serious interaction problems were revisioned in the redesign of Interface Currents and Interface Folders that is introduced in the second part of the chapter. The redesign of Interface Currents

6.4 Chapter Summary involves basically a new realization of the interaction techniques for manipulating the shape of a stream-shaped Current. The type of stream-shaped Currents with control points on the inside border was abolished. Instead, all stream-shaped Currents now have two interactive boundaries: The functionality of changing-the-width of a Current was eliminated from the control point menu and, in exchange, installed on the inside boundary. This improves the consistency of control point menus on stream- and pool- shaped Currents and facilitates the interactions with them.

The new realization of Interface Folders presents a new mechanism for spreading out content of Interface Folders on an Interface Current. Instead of connecting the Current visually with an Interface Folder and letting its content move onto the Current, opening an Interface Folder causes the Folder to transform into an Interface Current. During this process the content of the Folder is spread out on the Current directly. Deleting a Folder- based Current causes the Current to transform back into an Interface Folder. This feature supports collaborative tasks that involve large amounts of information very well because it allows users to quickly collapse Interface Currents that are not needed at the time and invoke them again if required. The new design of Interface Currents and Folders will be

presented at SIGGRAPH 2005 [HCS05b] and SMART GRAPHICS 2005 [HCSP05].

While this chapter discussed the usability issues that the exploratory user study revealed, the following chapter will describe the general findings of the study, including for which purposes participants used the different types of Interface Currents and the general in- fluence of Interface Currents on collaborative work.

CHAPTER 7

Findings

While a usability analysis of Interface Currents as described in the previous chapter gives

information about the usability of the realization of Interface Currents, a qualitative

analysis of participants’ activities during the study tasks can reveal more about how

users adopt thegeneral concept of Interface Currents. However, it has to be considered

that the realization greatly influences the acceptance of the general concept.

In this chapter, the general findings of the exploratory user study are discussed. The analysis of the qualitative data is based on the underlying research questions of the study (see Section 3.2). With these research questions in mind, the collected data is analyzed in terms of certain work patterns or other significant activities that could be instigated, influenced, or reinforced by Interface Currents. While for the usability analysis user statements during the interview and during the tasks are analyzed carefully, for the qualitative analysis, the logged data plays a more important role since it mirrors the users’ activities directly and is capable of revealing more general patterns. An existing

plotting program developed by SCOTT [Sco05] was modified for this particular study

and is used to visualize relevant parts of the logged data automatically. On the basis of these visualizations the data from the different groups can be compared.

The chapter is structured as follows. First, the findings from the first study task are discussed. This task aimed at exploring what work strategies were applied during the task, for what purposes users would utilize Interface Currents in their collaborative task, and how Interface Currents as a concept fit into the design implications for interfaces on tabletop displays mentioned in Section 2.2.5. The second part of the chapter describes the findings the second study task revealed. This task provided rich information about how users would set up a workspace based on Interface Currents and often confirmed the findings discovered during the first task.

Chapter 7 Findings