Sources of Computer Metaphors for Visualization and Human-Computer Interaction

This chapter is devoted to finding sources for metaphors of computer visualization and human-computer interaction. Computer metaphor is considered the basic idea for the development of interfaces, visualization views, and scenarios of visualization and interaction. Global metaphors map the main design idea. These ideas depend on global events and changes in society, art, and science. In the “pre-computer” era, such ideas formed the basics of cartography, engineering drawings, and drawing function graphs on the Cartesian plane. When designing visualization and interactive systems, computer metaphors use “magic features” beside analogies with daily life. Nowadays ideas of visualization are often based on “gamification.” This approach presupposes creating tools that provide software engineers with an interface similar to that of computer games. In this chapter, ideas drawn upon fairy tales, science fiction books, fantasy films, and other similar spheres are considered as sources of computer metaphors. Such metaphors are very interesting when designing visualization systems based on virtual reality

Interface and Visualization Metaphors

The paper is devoted to problems of computer metaphors, such as Interface metaphor and Visualization metaphor. Interface metaphor is considered as the basic idea of likening between interactive objects and model objects of the application domain. A visualization metaphor is defined as a map establishing the correspondence between concepts and objects of the application domain under modeling and a system of some similarities and analogies. This map generates a set of views and a set of methods for communication with visual objects. Some positions of the metaphor theory are discussed. Concept of metaphor action is suggested.. "Formula" of metaphor is constructed. A set of examples of metaphor was analyzed. Aprioristic quality criteria of interface and visualization metaphors are suggested. These criteria allow evaluating as existing metaphors and to search for adequate metaphors for designing new specialized systems. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007

Semiotic Analysis of Computer Visualization

The purpose of this chapter is to discuss the semiotic approach to form theory of computer visualization. Such theory should be the foundation of design, development, and evaluations of visualization systems. The “direct” semiotic analysis of visualization is defined and the scheme of the analysis is considered. This analysis reveals “who is who” in the process of the visualization semiosis and helps in design and development of the real visualization systems. The analysis allows to describe the problems arising at developments of specialized systems in terms of the semiotics and showing how this analysis can serve as a tool for the visualization systems design. It is important to analyze the sign nature of the human‐computer interface and the visualization. Such conceptions as computer metaphor, metaphor action, and metaphor formula are defined. The properties of metaphors are analyzed with a view to possible usage of metaphors for specific applications. The properties are considered by the example of the hierarchical sequence of the natural Room‐Building‐City (Landscape) metaphors. Also the properties of the molecule metaphor are considered in the context of software visualization systems. In conclusion, some approaches to the theory of computer visualization are outlined

The design-by-adaptation approach to universal access: learning from videogame technology

This paper proposes an alternative approach to the design of universally accessible interfaces to that provided by formal design frameworks applied ab initio to the development of new software. This approach, design-byadaptation, involves the transfer of interface technology and/or design principles from one application domain to another, in situations where the recipient domain is similar to the host domain in terms of modelled systems, tasks and users. Using the example of interaction in 3D virtual environments, the paper explores how principles underlying the design of videogame interfaces may be applied to a broad family of visualization and analysis software which handles geographical data (virtual geographic environments, or VGEs). One of the motivations behind the current study is that VGE technology lags some way behind videogame technology in the modelling of 3D environments, and has a less-developed track record in providing the variety of interaction methods needed to undertake varied tasks in 3D virtual worlds by users with varied levels of experience. The current analysis extracted a set of interaction principles from videogames which were used to devise a set of 3D task interfaces that have been implemented in a prototype VGE for formal evaluation

Simulation and Visualization of Thermal Metaphor in a Virtual Environment for Thermal Building Assessment

La référence est présente sur HAL mais est incomplète (il manque les co-auteurs et le fichier pdf).The current application of the design process through energy efficiency in virtual reality (VR) systems is limited mostly to building performance predictions, as the issue of the data formats and the workflow used for 3D modeling, thermal calculation and VR visualization. The importance of energy efficiency and integration of advances in building design and VR technology have lead this research to focus on thermal simulation results visualized in a virtual environment to optimize building design, particularly concerning heritage buildings. The emphasis is on the representation of thermal data of a room simulated in a virtual environment (VE) in order to improve the ways in which thermal analysis data are presented to the building stakeholder, with the aim of increasing accuracy and efficiency. The approach is to present more immersive thermal simulation and to project the calculation results in projective displays particularly in Immersion room (CAVE-like). The main idea concerning the experiment is to provide an instrument of visualization and interaction concerning the thermal conditions in a virtual building. Thus the user can immerge, interact, and perceive the impact of the modifications generated by the system, regarding the thermal simulation results. The research has demonstrated it is possible to improve the representation and interpretation of building performance data, particularly for thermal results using visualization techniques.Direktorat Riset dan Pengabdian Masyarakat (DRPM) Universitas Indonesia Research Grant No. 2191/H2.R12/HKP.05.00/201

An Introduction to 3D User Interface Design

3D user interface design is a critical component of any virtual environment (VE) application. In this paper, we present a broad overview of three-dimensional (3D) interaction and user interfaces. We discuss the effect of common VE hardware devices on user interaction, as well as interaction techniques for generic 3D tasks and the use of traditional two-dimensional interaction styles in 3D environments. We divide most user interaction tasks into three categories: navigation, selection/manipulation, and system control. Throughout the paper, our focus is on presenting not only the available techniques, but also practical guidelines for 3D interaction design and widely held myths. Finally, we briefly discuss two approaches to 3D interaction design, and some example applications with complex 3D interaction requirements. We also present an annotated online bibliography as a reference companion to this article

ISML: an interface specification meta-language

In this paper we present an abstract metaphor model situated within a model-based user interface framework. The inclusion of metaphors in graphical user interfaces is a well established, but mostly craft-based strategy to design. A substantial body of notations and tools can be found within the model-based user interface design literature, however an explicit treatment of metaphor and its mappings to other design views has yet to be addressed. We introduce the Interface Specification Meta-Language (ISML) framework and demonstrate its use in comparing the semantic and syntactic features of an interactive system. Challenges facing this research are outlined and further work proposed

Text visualization techniques: Taxonomy, visual survey, and community insights

Figure 1: The web-based user interface of our visual survey called Text Visualization Browser. By using the interaction panel on the left hand side, researchers can look for specific visualization techniques and filter out entries with respect to a set of categories (cf. the taxonomy given in Sect. 3). Details for a selected entry are shown by clicking on a thumbnail image in the main view. The survey contains 141 categorized visualization techniques by January 19, 2015. Text visualization has become a growing and increasingly impor-tant subfield of information visualization. Thus, it is getting harder for researchers to look for related work with specific tasks or vi-sual metaphors in mind. In this paper, we present an interactive visual survey of text visualization techniques that can be used for the purposes of search for related work, introduction to the subfield and gaining insight into research trends. We describe the taxonomy used for categorization of text visualization techniques and com-pare it to approaches employed in several other surveys. Finally, we present results of analyses performed on the entries data