CONCEPTS AND IMPLICATIONS OF INTERACTIVE RECOVERY

RC 10562 (#47293) When working interactively on the computer, it is valuable to be able to undo a series of commands in order to return to a previous state. We identify contradictions and limitations in the basic concepts of undo. We introduce three types of undo functions with which we examine the characteristics of undo, explain these limitations, and determine the minimum requirements for a recovery facility. Then we discuss the implications of undo for user interfaces and suggest au.xiliary functions to display and simplify the resulting history structure and to view and recover prior states

Designing speculative artifacts

In recent decades, Mark Weiser's vision of ubiquitous computing has become today's reality through embedded electronics, the rise of machine learning, and the proliferation of wireless Internet access. This development brings not only opportunities but also new challenges for the Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) community. Technology, for example, is (1) entering novel application scenarios and pristine interaction environments, (2) leaving the screen and conquering the physical world, and (3) changing the previous tool-like nature of computers to social, self-learning, and pro-active entities. As a result, there are no already established interaction paradigms, metaphors, and design strategies for designing such systems. Thus, HCI faces questions about the interaction design in the context of embedded systems and novel materials, the conceptualization of intelligent systems in everyday environments, and, subsequently, the consequences on human-technology relations. To approach such questions, a standard tool in HCI research is the human-centered design process, which creates knowledge about user needs and considers user perspectives to inform design decisions. Observations and interviews are used to understand the context, workflow, or tools, before developing ideas and concepts for technological improvements or solutions. This process has proven to be effective when dealing with matters familiar to users, such as their workplaces, leading to improved workflows and experiences. However, it remains open how design can be grounded if future technologies result in unfamiliar situations. When people can no longer contribute with their domain knowledge, what are novel interaction concepts, paradigms, and designs based on? To tackle these problems, I present and discuss a programmatic design approach to generate original design ideas and concepts. This approach builds on Speculative and Critical Design practices within the HCI context. The main idea central to this work is to create designs using real-world patterns to inform HCI since these patterns still comply with users' prior knowledge, experiences, and perception of fundamental social or natural principles. Such Real-World Patterns (RWP) can be familiar metaphors, morphologies, or mental models - e.g., understanding causality in the physical world or knowing the basic working principles of musical instruments. These patterns are chosen and then transferred into designs to meet or contradict users' expectations of the technology in order to create confrontational situations in which new perspectives are opened up. Based on the confrontation with the speculative artifacts, implications and requirements are deduced, which in reverse can be applied to future technologies. The projects presented apply this approach in various HCI research domains, including human-robot interaction, new interfaces for musical expression, and deformable and flexible interfaces. In this dissertation, I reflect on the approach using three questions: (Q1) How does the use of RWPs complement the Research through Design practice?; (Q2) How can RWPs be instrumentalized in the design of HCI systems?; and (Q3) How does the use of RWPs in design affect the relation between humans and technology? This thesis contributes (1) an overview of the approach as well as three perspectives which are instrumental in understanding and applying RWPs in the design of HCI, (2) eight speculative artifacts, which exemplify the approach, (3) theories and concepts inspired by the used RWPs, and (4) empirical knowledge deduced from the associated studies and surveys.In den letzten Jahrzehnten ist Mark Weisers Vision des Ubiquitous Computing durch eingebettete Systeme, den Aufstieg künstlicher Intelligenz und die Verbreitung des drahtlosen Internetzugangs zur heutigen Lebensrealität geworden. Diese Entwicklung bringt nicht nur Chancen, sondern auch neue Herausforderungen für die Human Computer Interaction (HCI) Community mit sich. Technologien dringen bspw. in neuartige Anwendungsszenarien und noch unberührte Interaktionsumgebungen ein, verlassen den Bildschirm und erobern die physische Welt und verändern so den bisherigen werkzeugartigen Charakter von Computern zu sozialen, selbstlernenden und proaktiven Entitäten. Infolgedessen gibt es keine bereits etablierten Interaktionsparadigmen, Metaphern und Designstrategien, auf die für die Gestaltung solcher Systeme zurückgegriffen werden könnte. Für die HCI stellen sich daher Fragen zur Interaktionsgestaltung im Kontext eingebetteter Systeme und neuartiger Materialien, zur Konzeptualisierung intelligenter Maschinen in Alltagsumgebungen und folglich zu den Auswirkungen auf die Beziehung, in der Mensch und Technologie zueinander stehen. Um sich solchen Fragen zu nähern, ist in der HCI der Human-Centered Design Prozess eine verbreitete Vorgehensweise, die Erkenntnisse über die Bedürfnisse der Benutzer:innen schafft und deren Perspektive bei Designentscheidungen berücksichtigt. Beobachtungen und Interviews werden genutzt, um den Kontext, die Arbeitsabläufe oder Werkzeuge zu verstehen, bevor Ideen und Konzepte für technische Lösungen entwickelt werden. Dieses Vorgehen hat sich als effektiv erwiesen und führt zu Verbesserungen von Technologien, solange die betreffenden Situationen den Nutzer:innen vertraut sind. Offen bleibt jedoch, worauf Design-Konzepte bauen können, wenn zukünftige Technologien zu ungewohnten Situationen führen. Worauf basieren neuartige Interaktionskonzepte, Paradigmen und Entwürfe, wenn Menschen nicht mehr mit ihrem Fachwissen und Erfahrungen beitragen können? Um diese Problematik anzugehen, präsentiere und diskutiere ich in dieser Dissertation einen programmatischen Ansatz, um neuartige Designideen und -konzepte zu entwickeln. Dieser baut auf den Praktiken des spekulativen und kritischen Designs im HCI-Kontext auf. Im Mittelpunkt steht die Entwicklung von Designs unter Verwendung von Mustern aus der realen Welt, da diese das Vorwissen der Nutzer:innen sowie soziale und natürliche Prinzipien einbeziehen. Bei solchen Real-World Patterns (RWP) kann es sich um vertraute Metaphern, Morphologien oder mentale Modelle handeln, bspw. um das Verständnis von Kausalität in der physischen Welt oder um die Kenntnis der grundlegenden Funktionsprinzipien von Musikinstrumenten. Potentielle Muster werden ausgewählt und derart in Entwürfe übertragen, dass die Erwartungen der Nutzer:innen an die Technologie erfüllt oder ihnen widersprochen wird. So werden konfrontative Situationen geschaffen, in denen sich neue Perspektiven eröffnen. Aus der Konfrontation mit den spekulativen Artefakten werden Implikationen und Anforderungen abgeleitet, die sich im Umkehrschluss auf zukünftige Technologien anwenden lassen. Die vorgestellten Projekte wenden diesen Ansatz in verschiedenen HCI-Forschungsbereichen an, unter anderem in der Mensch-Roboter-Interaktion, im Kontext neuer Schnittstellen für die musikalische Interaktion, sowie für deformierbare und flexible Schnittstellen. In dieser Dissertation reflektiere ich den Ansatz anhand dreier Fragen: (Q1) Wie ergänzt der Einsatz von RWPs die Research through Design Praxis?; (Q2) Wie können RWPs für das Design von HCI-Systemen instrumentalisiert werden?; und (Q3) Wie beeinflusst der Einsatz von RWPs die Beziehung zwischen Mensch und Technologie? Der Beitrag dieser Arbeit liegt in (1) einem Überblick über den Ansatz sowie in den drei Perspektiven, die für das Verständnis und die Anwendung von RWPs in der Gestaltung von HCI maßgeblich sind, (2) den acht spekulativen Artefakten, die den Ansatz beispielhaft darstellen, (3) den Theorien und Konzepten, die von den verwendeten RWPs inspiriert sind, und (4) den empirischen Erkenntnissen, die aus den zugehörigen Studien und Umfragen abgeleitet wurden

Implications of non-volatile memory as primary storage for database management systems

Traditional Database Management System (DBMS) software relies on hard disks for storing relational data. Hard disks are cheap, persistent, and offer huge storage capacities. However, data retrieval latency for hard disks is extremely high. To hide this latency, DRAM is used as an intermediate storage. DRAM is significantly faster than disk, but deployed in smaller capacities due to cost and power constraints, and without the necessary persistency feature that disks have. Non-Volatile Memory (NVM) is an emerging storage class technology which promises the best of both worlds. It can offer large storage capacities, due to better scaling and cost metrics than DRAM, and is non-volatile (persistent) like hard disks. At the same time, its data retrieval time is much lower than that of hard disks and it is also byte-addressable like DRAM. In this paper, we explore the implications of employing NVM as primary storage for DBMS. In other words, we investigate the modifications necessary to be applied on a traditional relational DBMS to take advantage of NVM features. As a case study, we have modified the storage engine (SE) of PostgreSQL enabling efficient use of NVM hardware. We detail the necessary changes and challenges such modifications entail and evaluate them using a comprehensive emulation platform. Results indicate that our modified SE reduces query execution time by up to 40% and 14.4% when compared to disk and NVM storage, with average reductions of 20.5% and 4.5%, respectively.The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union’s 7th Framework Programme under grant agreement number 318633, the Ministry of Science and Technology of Spain under contract TIN2015-65316-P, and a HiPEAC collaboration grant awarded to Naveed Ul Mustafa.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Don’t Be Such a Downer: Using Positive Psychology to Enhance the Value of Negative Feedback

Effective developmental feedback promotes a balanced and authentic view of employees\u27 current state, thereby addressing strengths and weaknesses of employees. The authors address how organizations\u27 increased emphasis on positivity can be reconciled with the delivery of negative feedback. Drawing on principles from positive psychology, the authors outline strategies managers can implement to increase the likelihood that negative feedback interventions will yield improved performance while promoting employee well-being

Scoping analytical usability evaluation methods: A case study

Analytical usability evaluation methods (UEMs) can complement empirical evaluation of systems: for example, they can often be used earlier in design and can provide accounts of why users might experience difficulties, as well as what those difficulties are. However, their properties and value are only partially understood. One way to improve our understanding is by detailed comparisons using a single interface or system as a target for evaluation, but we need to look deeper than simple problem counts: we need to consider what kinds of accounts each UEM offers, and why. Here, we report on a detailed comparison of eight analytical UEMs. These eight methods were applied to it robotic arm interface, and the findings were systematically compared against video data of the arm ill use. The usability issues that were identified could be grouped into five categories: system design, user misconceptions, conceptual fit between user and system, physical issues, and contextual ones. Other possible categories such as User experience did not emerge in this particular study. With the exception of Heuristic Evaluation, which supported a range of insights, each analytical method was found to focus attention on just one or two categories of issues. Two of the three "home-grown" methods (Evaluating Multimodal Usability and Concept-based Analysis of Surface and Structural Misfits) were found to occupy particular niches in the space, whereas the third (Programmable User Modeling) did not. This approach has identified commonalities and contrasts between methods and provided accounts of why a particular method yielded the insights it did. Rather than considering measures such as problem count or thoroughness, this approach has yielded insights into the scope of each method

FADI: a fault-tolerant environment for open distributed computing

FADI is a complete programming environment that serves the reliable execution of distributed application programs. FADI encompasses all aspects of modern fault-tolerant distributed computing. The built-in user-transparent error detection mechanism covers processor node crashes and hardware transient failures. The mechanism also integrates user-assisted error checks into the system failure model. The nucleus non-blocking checkpointing mechanism combined with a novel selective message logging technique delivers an efficient, low-overhead backup and recovery mechanism for distributed processes. FADI also provides means for remote automatic process allocation on the distributed system nodes

Database recovery

Recovery techniques are an important aspect of database systems. They are essential to ensure that data integrity is maintained after any type of failure occurs. The recovery mechanism must be designed so that the availability and performance of the system are not unacceptably impacted by the recovery algorithms running during normal execution. On the other hand, enough information must be stored so that the database can be restored or transactions backed out in a reasonable amount of time. Concepts, techniques, and problems associated with database recovery will be presented in this thesis. The recovery issues for both centralized and distributed systems will be discussed, along with the tradeoffs of different recovery tools. The database recovery schemes in IMS/VS, DB2 and SDD-1 will be described to show approaches in existing systems

Analytic Provenance for Software Reverse Engineers

Reverse engineering is a time-consuming process essential to software-security tasks such as malware analysis and vulnerability discovery. During the process, an engineer will follow multiple leads to determine how the software functions. The combination of time and possible explanations makes it difficult for the engineers to maintain a context of their findings within the overall task. Analytic provenance tools have demonstrated value in similarly complex fields that require open-ended exploration and hypothesis vetting. However, they have not been explored in the reverse engineering domain. This dissertation presents SensorRE, the first analytic provenance tool designed to support software reverse engineers. A semi-structured interview with experts led to the design and implementation of the system. We describe the visual interfaces and their integration within an existing software analysis tool. SensorRE automatically captures user\u27s sense making actions and provides a graph and storyboard view to support further analysis. User study results with both experts and graduate students demonstrate that SensorRE is easy to use and that it improved the participants\u27 exploration process