The role of metaphor in user interface design

The thesis discusses the question of how unfamiliar computing systems, particularly those with graphical user interfaces, are learned and used. In particular, the approach of basing the design and behaviour of on-screen objects in the system's model world on a coherent theme and employing a metaphor is explored. The drawbacks, as well as the advantages, of this approach are reviewed and presented. The use of metaphors is also contrasted with other forms of users' mental models of interactive systems, and the need to provide a system image from which useful mental models can be developed is presented. Metaphors are placed in the context of users' understanding of interactive systems and novel application is made of the Qualitative Process Theory (QPT) qualitative reasoning model to reason about the behaviour of on-screen objects, the underlying system functionality, and the relationship between the two. This analysis supports reevaluation of the domains between which user interface metaphors are said to form mappings. A novel user interface design, entitled Medusa, that adopts guidelines for the design of metaphor-based systems, and for helping the user develop successful mental models, based on the QPT analysis and an empirical study of a popular metaphor-based system, is described. The first Medusa design is critiqued using well-founded usability inspection method. Employing the Lakoff/Johnson theory, a revised version of the Medusa user interface is described that derives its application semantics and dialogue structures from the entailments of the knowledge structures that ground understanding of the interface metaphor and that capture notions of embodiment in interaction with computing devices that QPT descriptions cannot. Design guidelines from influential existing work, and new methods of reasoning about metaphor-based designs, are presented with a number of novel graphical user interface designs intended to overcome the failings of existing systems and design approaches

User-centered visual analysis using a hybrid reasoning architecture for intensive care units

One problem pertaining to Intensive Care Unit information systems is that, in some cases, a very dense display of data can result. To ensure the overview and readability of the increasing volumes of data, some special features are required (e.g., data prioritization, clustering, and selection mechanisms) with the application of analytical methods (e.g., temporal data abstraction, principal component analysis, and detection of events). This paper addresses the problem of improving the integration of the visual and analytical methods applied to medical monitoring systems. We present a knowledge- and machine learning-based approach to support the knowledge discovery process with appropriate analytical and visual methods. Its potential benefit to the development of user interfaces for intelligent monitors that can assist with the detection and explanation of new, potentially threatening medical events. The proposed hybrid reasoning architecture provides an interactive graphical user interface to adjust the parameters of the analytical methods based on the users' task at hand. The action sequences performed on the graphical user interface by the user are consolidated in a dynamic knowledge base with specific hybrid reasoning that integrates symbolic and connectionist approaches. These sequences of expert knowledge acquisition can be very efficient for making easier knowledge emergence during a similar experience and positively impact the monitoring of critical situations. The provided graphical user interface incorporating a user-centered visual analysis is exploited to facilitate the natural and effective representation of clinical information for patient care

Is what you see what you get? representations, metaphors and tools in mathematics didactics

This paper is exploratory in character. The aim is to investigate ways in which it is possible to use the theoretical concepts of representations, tools and metaphors to try to understand what learners of mathematics ‘see’ during classroom interactions (in their widest sense) and what they might get from such interactions. Through an analysis of a brief classroom episode, the suggestion is made that what learners see may not be the same as what they get. From each of several theoretical perspectives utilised in this paper, what learners ‘get’ appears to be something extra. According to our analysis, this something ‘extra’ is likely to depend on the form of technology being used and the representations and metaphors that are available to both teacher and learner

Visualisation of the information resources for cell biology

Intelligent multimodal interfaces can facilitate scientists in utilising available information resources. Combining scientific visualisations with interactive and intelligent tools can help create a “habitable” information space. Development of such tools remains largely iterative. We discuss an ongoing implementation of intelligent interactive visualisation of information resources in cell biology

A teaching and support tool for building formal models of graphical user-interfaces

In this paper we propose the design of a tool that will allow the construction of a formal, textual description of a software system even if it has a graphical user-interface as a component. An important aspect of this design is that it can be used for two purposes-the teaching of first-order logic and the formal specification of graphical user-interfaces. The design has been suggested by considering a system that has already been very successful for teaching first-order logic, namely Tarski's World

Plan recognition for space telerobotics

Current research on space telerobots has largely focused on two problem areas: executing remotely controlled actions (the tele part of telerobotics) or planning to execute them (the robot part). This work has largely ignored one of the key aspects of telerobots: the interaction between the machine and its operator. For this interaction to be felicitous, the machine must successfully understand what the operator is trying to accomplish with particular remote-controlled actions. Only with the understanding of the operator's purpose for performing these actions can the robot intelligently assist the operator, perhaps by warning of possible errors or taking over part of the task. There is a need for such an understanding in the telerobotics domain and an intelligent interface being developed in the chemical process design domain addresses the same issues