User interfaces for computer-aided architectural design

Ankara : The Department of Interior Architecture and Environmental Design and the Institute of Fine Arts of Bilkent University, 1993.Thesis (Master's) -- Bilkent University, 1993.Includes bibliographical references leaves 107-112.The rapidly developing technology of the twentieth century has transformed the general use of computers into a specific, convenient, and necessary tool for professionals. As in each profession, they are also used by architects. But, architects have some problems with the properties of user-computer interface that inherit from the times when computers were only used by computer professionals. Considering the architects professional needs and expectations, this thesis intends to avoid the unsatisfying results of this poor dialogue. After mentioning the development of human-computer interaction, the specific problems that a new user may face and the characteristics of a well designed interface are described. Although there are much more primitive action units performed by the user, the essential ones such as interaction tasks, the complementaries like controlling tasks that may be preferred by architects are examined. Different types of interaction techniques which respond to the various kinds of requirements of these tasks are explained, by identifying their advantages and disadvantages. In order to establish the architects’ intended goals, some formal specifications, standards and prototypes that are required by the increasing needs for communication, the access of information technology and the rising involvement of architects into the computer-aided technology, are identified. Gradually the evaluation of the interface is stated as a guidehne both for the architect who wants to use a software and the computer programmer who wants to write a software for the architects.Kulaksız, AygünM.S

Comic Kit : knowledge acquisition of story scripts

Thesis (M. Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2005.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 50-51).The field of Artificial Intelligence stands poised to make great leaps in emulating human intelligence. The development of a way to acquire and use common sense is the key to this advancement. This thesis describes the design and construction of ComicKit, a tool for acquiring story scripts for a common sense knowledge base. ComicKit's core mechanism is dragging and dropping icons into the panels of a comic. As the user creates a comic, ComicKit makes common sense suggestions for the story. ComicKit follows on the successful model of Open Mind Common Sense, a web-based activity that thousands of people around the world contributed bits of common sense knowledge to. It is hoped that many people will contribute a few hundred thousand stories through ComicKit, and build a large corpus of common sense story knowledge.by Ryan Duane Williams.M.Eng

Investigating User Experience Using Gesture-based and Immersive-based Interfaces on Animation Learners

Creating animation is a very exciting activity. However, the long and laborious process can be extremely challenging. Keyframe animation is a complex technique that takes a long time to complete, as the procedure involves changing the poses of characters through modifying the time and space of an action, called frame-by-frame animation. This involves the laborious, repetitive process of constantly reviewing results of the animation in order to make sure the movement-timing is accurate. A new approach to animation is required in order to provide a more intuitive animating experience. With the evolution of interaction design and the Natural User Interface (NUI) becoming widespread in recent years, a NUI-based animation system is expected to allow better usability and efficiency that would benefit animation. This thesis investigates the effectiveness of gesture-based and immersive-based interfaces as part of animation systems. A practice-based element of this research is a prototype of the hand gesture interface, which was created based on experiences from reflective practices. An experimental design is employed to investigate the usability and efficiency of gesture-based and immersive-based interfaces in comparison to the conventional GUI/WIMP interface application. The findings showed that gesture-based and immersive-based interfaces are able to attract animators in terms of the efficiency of the system. However, there was no difference in their preference for usability with the two interfaces. Most of our participants are pleasant with NUI interfaces and new technologies used in the animation process, but for detailed work and taking control of the application, the conventional GUI/WIMP is preferable. Despite the awkwardness of devising gesture-based and immersive-based interfaces for animation, the concept of the system showed potential for a faster animation process, an enjoyable learning system, and stimulating interest in a kinaesthetic learning experience

Virtual Reality Games for Motor Rehabilitation

This paper presents a fuzzy logic based method to track user satisfaction without the need for devices to monitor users physiological conditions. User satisfaction is the key to any product’s acceptance; computer applications and video games provide a unique opportunity to provide a tailored environment for each user to better suit their needs. We have implemented a non-adaptive fuzzy logic model of emotion, based on the emotional component of the Fuzzy Logic Adaptive Model of Emotion (FLAME) proposed by El-Nasr, to estimate player emotion in UnrealTournament 2004. In this paper we describe the implementation of this system and present the results of one of several play tests. Our research contradicts the current literature that suggests physiological measurements are needed. We show that it is possible to use a software only method to estimate user emotion