Engineering Adaptive Model-Driven User Interfaces for Enterprise Applications

Enterprise applications such as enterprise resource planning systems have numerous complex user interfaces (UIs). Usability problems plague these UIs because they are offered as a generic off-the-shelf solution to end-users with diverse needs in terms of their required features and layout preferences. Adaptive UIs can help in improving usability by tailoring the features and layout based on the context-of-use. The model-driven UI development approach offers the possibility of applying different types of adaptations on the various UI levels of abstraction. This approach forms the basis for many works researching the development of adaptive UIs. Yet, several gaps were identified in the state-of-the-art adaptive model-driven UI development systems. To fill these gaps, this thesis presents an approach that offers the following novel contributions: - The Cedar Architecture serves as a reference for developing adaptive model-driven enterprise application user interfaces. - Role-Based User Interface Simplification (RBUIS) is a mechanism for improving usability through adaptive behavior, by providing end-users with a minimal feature-set and an optimal layout based on the context-of-use. - Cedar Studio is an integrated development environment, which provides tool support for building adaptive model-driven enterprise application UIs using RBUIS based on the Cedar Architecture. The contributions were evaluated from the technical and human perspectives. Several metrics were established and applied to measure the technical characteristics of the proposed approach after integrating it into an open-source enterprise application. Additional insights about the approach were obtained through the opinions of industry experts and data from real-life projects. Usability studies showed the approach’s ability to significantly improve usability in terms of end-user efficiency, effectiveness and satisfaction

A Web Design Curriculum for At-Risk Students

Students today deal emotionally, physically and socially with many negative influences in their lives. Too frequently they are besieged by violent images, the propagation of illegal drug usage among friends and family as well as other negative environmental influences. These influences create barriers that inhibit student learning and cause students to pull away from friends, teachers and school. The implementation of a web design curriculum will help provide struggling students an opportunity to reconnect with school through the use of technology. The web design curriculum lessons also provide activities that address bullying, harassment, drug and alcohol abuse, tobacco usage, suicide and sexual harassment. These thought provoking activities can assist students make good life decisions

STANDARDIZATION OR ADAPTATION IN COSMETICS WEBSITES MARKETING ? AN EMPIRICAL STUDY

The websites marketing is becoming an important tool both for multinationals and SMEs, in their effort to internationalizing their business. This study focuses on the international opportunities that are present within the European markets. The paper aims at identifying the degree of websites marketing standardization vs. adaptation, as a marketing tool for cosmetic products. Moreover, the study examines in a comparative manner the standardization strategy of multinationals and small and medium enterprises (SMEs), leaders in European markets, for different cosmetic cathegories. The evaluation of online advertising standardization is based on the modified Model for Testing Advertising Standardization, developed by Whitelock and Chung. The web sites degree of localizations are analyzed based upon 98 criteria, as resulted from an adapted methodology of ProfNet Institut fur Internet Marketing, Munster (Germany). The sample includes the 101 leaders from European markets. The research outcomes reflect a standardized websites marketing policy for SMEs and localized for multinationals. Also, for perfumes, dental care products and toiletry, European cosmetic leaders implement standardized websites marketing policies and balanced for the other cosmetics categories. The hypothesis concerning a strong correlation between standardization and handling dimension was supported.websites marketing, SME, multinationals, online interactivity, cosmetics, standardization, adaptation Romania

Reflow: Automatically Improving Touch Interactions in Mobile Applications through Pixel-based Refinements

Touch is the primary way that users interact with smartphones. However, building mobile user interfaces where touch interactions work well for all users is a difficult problem, because users have different abilities and preferences. We propose a system, Reflow, which automatically applies small, personalized UI adaptations, called refinements -- to mobile app screens to improve touch efficiency. Reflow uses a pixel-based strategy to work with existing applications, and improves touch efficiency while minimally disrupting the design intent of the original application. Our system optimizes a UI by (i) extracting its layout from its screenshot, (ii) refining its layout, and (iii) re-rendering the UI to reflect these modifications. We conducted a user study with 10 participants and a heuristic evaluation with 6 experts and found that applications optimized by Reflow led to, on average, 9% faster selection time with minimal layout disruption. The results demonstrate that Reflow's refinements useful UI adaptations to improve touch interactions

A Framework for Computational Design and Adaptation of Extended Reality User Interfaces

To facilitate high quality interaction during the regular use of computing systems, it is essential that the user interface (UI) deliver content and components in an appropriate manner. Although extended reality (XR) is emerging as a new computing platform, we still have a limited understanding of how best to design and present interactive content to users in such immersive environments. Adaptive UIs offer a promising approach for optimal presentation in XR as the user's environment, tasks, capabilities, and preferences vary under changing context. In this position paper, we present a design framework for adapting various characteristics of content presented in XR. We frame these as five considerations that need to be taken into account for adaptive XR UIs: What?, How Much?, Where?, How?, and When?. With this framework, we review literature on UI design and adaptation to reflect on approaches that have been adopted or developed in the past towards identifying current gaps and challenges, and opportunities for applying such approaches in XR. Using our framework, future work could identify and develop novel computational approaches for achieving successful adaptive user interfaces in such immersive environments.Comment: 5 pages, CHI 2023 Workshop on The Future of Computational Approaches for Understanding and Adapting User Interface

Engineering Adaptive Model-Driven User Interfaces

Software applications that are very large-scale, can encompass hundreds of complex user interfaces (UIs). Such applications are commonly sold as feature-bloated off-the-shelf products to be used by people with variable needs in the required features and layout preferences. Although many UI adaptation approaches were proposed, several gaps and limitations including: extensibility and integration in legacy systems, still need to be addressed in the state-of-the-art adaptive UI development systems. This paper presents Role-Based UI Simplification (RBUIS) as a mechanism for increasing usability through adaptive behaviour by providing end-users with a minimal feature-set and an optimal layout, based on the context-of- use. RBUIS uses an interpreted runtime model-driven approach based on the Cedar Architecture, and is supported by the integrated development environment (IDE), Cedar Studio. RBUIS was evaluated by integrating it into OFBiz, an open-source ERP system. The integration method was assessed and measured by establishing and applying technical metrics. Afterwards, a usability study was carried out to evaluate whether UIs simplified with RBUIS show an improvement over their initial counterparts. This study leveraged questionnaires, checking task completion times and output quality, and eye-tracking. The results showed that UIs simplified with RBUIS significantly improve end-user efficiency, effectiveness, and perceived usability

Accessibility barriers for users of screen readers in the Moodle learning content management system

In recent decades, the use of the Internet has spread rapidly into diverse social spheres including that of education. Currently, most educational centers make use of e-learning environments created through authoring tool applications like learning content management systems (LCMSs). However, most of these applications currently present accessibility barriers that make the creation of accessible e-learning environments difficult for teachers and administrators. In this paper, the accessibility of the Moodle authoring tool, one of the most frequently used LCMSs worldwide, is evaluated. More specifically, the evaluation is carried out from the perspective of two visually impaired users accessing content through screen readers, as well as a heuristic evaluation considering the World Wide Web Consortium's Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines. The evaluation results demonstrate that Moodle presents barriers for screen reader users, limiting their ability to access the tool. One example of accessibility problems for visually impaired users is the frequent inability to publish learning contents without assistance. In light of these results, the paper offers recommendations that can be followed to reduce or eliminate these accessibility barriers.This study has been partially funded by the MA2VICMR (S2009/TIC-1542) research project.Publicad

Otter spotter: The Creation and evaluation of an educational resource for the association of zoos and aquariums, Rochester Institute of Technology, and the Seneca Park Zoo

Otter Spotter is an educational website providing information about otters found in Association of Zoos and Aquariums\u27 (AZA) facilities. Though the site includes five species of otter it focuses primarily on the North American river otter. It was designed to meet the needs of AZA\u27s Otter Species Survival Plan (SSP) committee, Rochester Institute of Technology\u27s (RIT) Otter Research group, and the Seneca Park Zoo. This site helps fulfill the mission of modern zoos to become centers for conservation and education. Otter Spotter contains species information, photos, video clips, research summaries, teacher resources, and a blog with the latest news related to otters. Site statistics show that Otter Spotter is being used frequently with an increase in page views when social media tools are utilized. Evaluations show that the site is appealing and easy to navigate, useful to AZA educators, and will continue to be used as a resource for AZA facilities. Pre and post-testing of the lesson plans designed for the site also indicate that the lesson plans are a useful way to teach kindergarten through fourth grade students about otters and meet the standards of the New York State Core Curriculum. Overall, the site is a successful resource and by utilizing the findings of the evaluations it will continue to grow and extend its reach beyond the AZA community