Mobile Pen and Paper Interaction

Although smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices become increasingly popular, pen and paper continue to play an important role in mobile settings, such as note taking or creative discussions. However, information on paper documents remains static and usage practices involving sharing, researching, linking or in any other way digitally processing information on paper are hindered by the gap between the digital and physical worlds. A considerable body of research has leveraged digital pen technology in order to overcome this problem with respect to static settings, however, systematically neglecting the mobile domain. Only recently, several approaches began exploring the mobile domain and developing initial insights into mobile pen-and-paper interaction (mPPI), e.g., to publish digital sketches, [Cowan et al., 2011], link paper and digital artifacts, [Pietrzak et al., 2012] or compose music, [Tsandilas, 2012]. However, applications designed to integrate the most common mobile tools pen, paper and mobile devices, thereby combining the benefits of both worlds in a hybrid mPPI ensemble, are hindered by the lack of supporting infrastructures and limited theoretical understanding of interaction design in the domain. This thesis advances the field by contributing a novel infrastructural approach toward supporting mPPI. It allows applications employing digital pen technology in controlling interactive functionality while preserving mobile characteristics of pen and paper. In addition, it contributes a conceptual framework of user interaction in the domain suiting to serve as basis for novel mPPI toolkits. Such toolkits ease development of mPPI solutions by focusing on expressing interaction rather than designing user interfaces by means of rigid widget sets. As such, they provide the link between infrastructure and interaction in the domain. Lastly, this thesis presents a novel, empirically substantiated theory of interaction in hybrid mPPI ensembles. This theory informs interaction design of mPPI, ultimately allowing to develop compelling and engaging interactive systems employing this modality

Analysing activities in the Portuguese secondary schools’ Science Learning Studios

The plan for the modernisation of the Portuguese secondary schools’ buildings, started in 2007 by Parque Escolar E.P.E, the sixth of this size since the beginning of the XXth century, established a new school building model with a priority intervention in the spaces for Science and Technology. The new model of schools’ Science spaces aims to support a variety of teaching strategies, linking theory and practice, aligning itself with the principles of the reform of secondary education and Science curricula. Unlike the Anglo-American model of Science learning spaces, formalised in a single laboratory for all classes with daily activities of observation and experimentation, the previous Portuguese model included both regular classrooms for lectures and laboratories for practical work, especially for students in secondary education. This separation of spaces corresponded to a separation of teaching strategies, with the first devoted mainly to instruction and problem solving, and the later to practical work, near its origins in the university model of Science teaching in the nineteenth century. This bipartite model contrasts with the new design, in line with the Learning Studios and classrooms/environments for active learning, a hybrid space to support instruction, practical work and multiple learning programmes. Taking advantage of the opportunity offered by the modernisation plan, this project proposed to investigate the attitudes and expectations of teachers about the new model of Science learning Studio as well as inquire about the current situation of teaching and learning activities in these new space

From social tagging to polyrepresentation: a study of expert annotating behavior of moving images

Mención Internacional en el título de doctorThis thesis investigates “nichesourcing” (De Boer, Hildebrand, et al., 2012), an emergent initiative of cultural heritage crowdsoucing in which niches of experts are involved in the annotating tasks. This initiative is studied in relation to moving image annotation, and in the context of audiovisual heritage, more specifically, within the sector of film archives. The work presents a case study of film and media scholars to investigate the types of annotations and attribute descriptions that they could eventually contribute, as well as the information needs, and seeking and searching behaviors of this group, in order to determine what the role of the different types of annotations in supporting their expert tasks would be. The study is composed of three independent but interconnected studies using a mixed methodology and an interpretive approach. It uses concepts from the information behavior discipline, and the "Integrated Information Seeking and Retrieval Framework" (IS&R) (Ingwersen and Järvelin, 2005) as guidance for the investigation. The findings show that there are several types of annotations that moving image experts could contribute to a nichesourcing initiative, of which time-based tags are only one of the possibilities. The findings also indicate that for the different foci in film and media research, in-depth indexing at the content level is only needed for supporting a specific research focus, for supporting research in other domains, or for engaging broader audiences. The main implications at the level of information infrastructure are the requirement for more varied annotating support, more interoperability among existing metadata standards and frameworks, and the need for guidelines about crowdsoucing and nichesourcing implementation in the audiovisual heritage sector. This research presents contributions to the studies of social tagging applied to moving images, to the discipline of information behavior, by proposing new concepts related to the area of use behavior, and to the concept of “polyrepresentation” (Ingwersen, 1992, 1996) applied to the humanities domain.Esta tesis investiga la iniciativa del nichesourcing (De Boer, Hildebrand, et al., 2012), como una forma de crowdsoucing en sector del patrimonio cultural, en la cuál grupos de expertos participan en las tareas de anotación de las colecciones. El ámbito de aplicación es la anotación de las imágenes en movimiento en el contexto del patrimonio audiovisual, más específicamente, en el caso de los archivos fílmicos. El trabajo presenta un estudio de caso aplicado a un dominio específico de expertos en el ámbito audiovisual: los académicos de cine y medios. El análisis se centra en dos aspectos específicos del problema: los tipos de anotaciones y atributos en las descripciones que podrían obtenerse de este nicho de expertos; y en las necesidades de información y el comportamiento informacional de dicho grupo, con el fin de determinar cuál es el rol de los diferentes tipos de anotaciones en sus tareas de investigación. La tesis se compone de tres estudios independientes e interconectados; se usa una metodología mixta e interpretativa. El marco teórico se compone de conceptos del área de estudios de comportamiento informacional (“information behavior”) y del “Marco integrado de búsqueda y recuperación de la información” ("Integrated Information Seeking and Retrieval Framework" (IS&R)) propuesto por Ingwersen y Järvelin (2005), que sirven de guía para la investigación. Los hallazgos indican que existen diversas formas de anotación de la imagen en movimiento que podrían generarse a partir de las contribuciones de expertos, de las cuáles las etiquetas a nivel de plano son sólo una de las posibilidades. Igualmente, se identificaron diversos focos de investigación en el área académica de cine y medios. La indexación detallada de contenidos sólo es requerida por uno de esos grupos y por investigadores de otras disciplinas, o como forma de involucrar audiencias más amplias. Las implicaciones más relevantes, a nivel de la infraestructura informacional, se refieren a los requisitos de soporte a formas más variadas de anotación, el requisito de mayor interoperabilidad de los estándares y marcos de metadatos, y la necesidad de publicación de guías de buenas prácticas sobre de cómo implementar iniciativas de crowdsoucing o nichesourcing en el sector del patrimonio audiovisual. Este trabajo presenta aportes a la investigación sobre el etiquetado social aplicado a las imágenes en movimiento, a la disciplina de estudios del comportamiento informacional, a la que se proponen nuevos conceptos relacionados con el área de uso de la información, y al concepto de “poli-representación” (Ingwersen, 1992, 1996) en las disciplinas humanísticas.Programa Oficial de Doctorado en Documentación: Archivos y Bibliotecas en el Entorno DigitalPresidente: Peter Emil Rerup Ingwersen.- Secretario: Antonio Hernández Pérez.- Vocal: Nils Phar

The Object of Platform Studies: Relational Materialities and the Social Platform (the case of the Nintendo Wii)

Racing the Beam: The Atari Video Computer System,by Ian Bogost and Nick Montfort, inaugurated thePlatform Studies series at MIT Press in 2009.We’ve coauthored a new book in the series, Codename: Revolution: the Nintendo Wii Video Game Console. Platform studies is a quintessentially Digital Humanities approach, since it’s explicitly focused on the interrelationship of computing and cultural expression. According to the series preface, the goal of platform studies is “to consider the lowest level of computing systems and to understand how these systems relate to culture and creativity.”In practice, this involves paying close attentionto specific hardware and software interactions--to the vertical relationships between a platform’s multilayered materialities (Hayles; Kirschenbaum),from transistors to code to cultural reception. Any given act of platform-studies analysis may focus for example on the relationship between the chipset and the OS, or between the graphics processor and display parameters or game developers’ designs.In computing terms, platform is an abstraction(Bogost and Montfort), a pragmatic frame placed around whatever hardware-and-software configuration is required in order to build or run certain specificapplications (including creative works). The object of platform studies is thus a shifting series of possibility spaces, any number of dynamic thresholds between discrete levels of a system

Don’t forget to save! User experience principles for video game narrative authoring tools.

Interactive Digital Narratives (IDNs) are a natural evolution of traditional storytelling melded with technological improvements brought about by the rapidly increasing digital revolution. This has and continues to enhance the complexities and functionality of the stories that we can tell. Video game narratives, both old and new, are considered close relatives of IDN, and due to their enhanced interactivity and presentational methods, further complicate the creation process. Authoring tool software aims to alleviate the complexities of this by abstracting underlying data models into accessible user interfaces that creatives, even those with limited technical experience, can use to author their stories. Unfortunately, despite the vast array of authoring tools in this space, user experience is often overlooked even though it is arguably one of the most vital components. This has resulted in a focus on the audience within IDN research rather than the authors, and consequently our knowledge and understanding of the impacts of user experience design decisions in authoring tools are limited. This thesis tackles the modeling of complex video game narrative structures and investigates how user experience design decisions within IDN authoring tools may impact the authoring process. I first introduce my concept of Discoverable Narrative which establishes a vocabulary for the analysis, categorization, and comparison of aspects of video game narrative that are discovered, observed, or experienced by players — something that existing models struggle to detail. I also develop and present my Novella Narrative Model which provides support for video game narrative elements and makes several novel innovations that set it apart from existing narrative models. This thesis then builds upon these models by presenting two bespoke user studies that examine the user experience of the state-of-the-art in IDN authoring tool design, together building a listing of seven general Themes and five principles (Metaphor Testing, Fast Track Testing, Structure, Experimentation, Branching) that highlight evidenced behavioral trends of authors based on different user experience design factors within IDN authoring tools. This represents some of the first work in this space that investigates the relationships between the user experience design of IDN authoring tools and the impacts that they can have on authors. Additionally, a generalized multi-stage pipeline for the design and development of IDN authoring tools is introduced, informed by professional industry- standard design techniques, in an effort to both ensure quality user experience within my own work and to raise awareness of the importance of following proper design processes when creating authoring tools, also serving as a template for doing so