A Content-Analysis Approach for Exploring Usability Problems in a Collaborative Virtual Environment

As Virtual Reality (VR) products are becoming more widely available in the consumer market, improving the usability of these devices and environments is crucial. In this paper, we are going to introduce a framework for the usability evaluation of collaborative 3D virtual environments based on a large-scale usability study of a mixedmodality collaborative VR system. We first review previous literature about important usability issues related to collaborative 3D virtual environments, supplemented with our research in which we conducted 122 interviews after participants solved a collaborative virtual reality task. Then, building on the literature review and our results, we extend previous usability frameworks. We identified twelve different usability problems, and based on the causes of the problems, we grouped them into three main categories: VR environment-, device interaction-, and task-specific problems. The framework can be used to guide the usability evaluation of collaborative VR environments

Human-display interaction technology: Emerging remote interfaces for pervasive display environments

This is the author's accepted manuscript. The final published article is available from the link below. Copyright @ 2010 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other users, including reprinting/ republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted components of this work in other works.We're living in a world where information processing isn't confined to desktop computers - it's being integrated into everyday objects and activities. Pervasive computation is human centered: it permeates our physical world, helping us achieve goals and fulfill our needs with minimum effort by exploiting natural interaction styles. Remote interaction with screen displays requires a sensor-based, multimodal, touchless approach. For example, by processing user hand gestures, this paradigm removes constraints requiring physical contact and permits natural interaction with tangible digital information. Such touchless interaction can be multimodal, exploiting the visual, auditory, and olfactory senses.Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia and Amper Sistemas, SA

Natural user interfaces for interdisciplinary design review using the Microsoft Kinect

As markets demand engineered products faster, waiting on the cyclical design processes of the past is not an option. Instead, industry is turning to concurrent design and interdisciplinary teams. When these teams collaborate, engineering CAD tools play a vital role in conceptualizing and validating designs. These tools require significant user investment to master, due to challenging interfaces and an overabundance of features. These challenges often prohibit team members from using these tools for exploring designs. This work presents a method allowing users to interact with a design using intuitive gestures and head tracking, all while keeping the model in a CAD format. Specifically, Siemens\u27 Teamcenter® Lifecycle Visualization Mockup (Mockup) was used to display design geometry while modifications were made through a set of gestures captured by a Microsoft KinectTM in real time. This proof of concept program allowed a user to rotate the scene, activate Mockup\u27s immersive menu, move the immersive wand, and manipulate the view based on head position. This work also evaluates gesture usability and task completion time for this proof of concept system. A cognitive model evaluation method was used to evaluate the premise that gesture-based user interfaces are easier to use and learn with regards to time than a traditional mouse and keyboard interface. Using a cognitive model analysis tool allowed the rapid testing of interaction concepts without the significant overhead of user studies and full development cycles. The analysis demonstrated that using the KinectTM is a feasible interaction mode for CAD/CAE programs. In addition, the analysis pointed out limitations in the gesture interfaces ability to compete time wise with easily accessible customizable menu options