Creating and reading realistic electronic books

A digital library project aims to combine the look and feel of physical books with the advantages of online documents such as hyperlinks and multimedia. A lightweight open source implementation enables highly responsive page turning and works within standard Web browsers

Realistic electronic books

People like books. They are convenient and can be accessed easily and enjoyably. In contrast, many view the experience of accessing and exploring electronic documents as dull, cumbersome and disorientating. This thesis claims that modelling digital documents as physical books can significantly improve reading performance. To investigate this claim, a realistic electronic book model was developed and evaluated. In this model, a range of properties associated with physical books---analogue page turning, bookmarks and annotations---are emulated. Advantage is also taken of the digital environment by supporting hyperlinks, multimedia, full-text search over terms and synonyms, automatically cross referencing documents with an online encyclopaedia, and producing a back-of-the-book index. The main technical challenge of simulating physical books is finding a suitable technique for page turning that is sufficiently realistic, yet lightweight, responsive, scalable and accessible. Several techniques were surveyed, implemented and evaluated. The chosen technique allows realistic books to be presented in the Adobe Flash Player, the most widely used browser plug-in on the Web. A series of usability studies were conducted to compare reading performance while performing various tasks with HTML, PDF, physical books, and simulated books. They revealed that participants not only preferred the new interface, but completed the tasks more efficiently, without any loss in accuracy

Searching in a Book

Information has no value unless it is accessible. With physical books, most people rely on the table of contents and subject index to find what they want. But what if they are reading a book in a digital library and have access to a full-text search tool?. The paper describes a search interface to Realistic Books, and investigates the influence of document format and search result presentation on information finding. We compare searching in Realistic Books with searching in HTML and PDF files, and with physical books

Touching Annotations: A Visual Metaphor for Navigation of Annotation in Digital Documents.

Direct touch manipulation interactions with technology are now commonplace and significant interest is building around their use in the culture and heritage domain. Such interactions can give people the opportunity to explore materials and artefacts in ways that would otherwise be unavailable. These are often heavily annotated and can be linked to a large array of related digital content, thus enriching the experience for the user. Research has addressed issues of how to present digital documents and their related annotations but at present it is unclear what the optimal interaction approach to navigating these annotations in a touch display context might be. In this paper we investigate the role of two alternative approaches to support the navigation of annotations in digitised documents in the context of a touch interface. Through a control study we demonstrate that, whilst the navigation paradigm displays a significant interaction with the type of annotations task performed, there is no discernible advantage of using a natural visual metaphor for annotation in this context. This suggests that design of digital document annotation navigation tools should account for the context and navigation tasks being considered

Guidelines for eBook design

In this paper we intended to propose guidelines for novice designers, i.e., without prior experience with eBook design. The first step was a systematic literature review, which resulted in 1052 guidelines, which were iteratively analysed until reduced to a smaller amount. After that, 15 practicing designers evaluated the utility of these guidelines, and excluded the ones they considered not useful (to novice designers). In an effort to embed expert knowledge, we asked doctoral students to propose guidelines, which went through the same process of analysis and peer evaluation, and were added to the previous set, which resulted in 38 unique design guidelines. Finally, three doctoral students who also are practicing designers with experience in eBook design, commented each guideline and defined the final set. The result is a set of 13 guidelines.Neste artigo pretendemos propor diretrizes para designers iniciantes, ou seja, sem experiência anterior com o design de e-books. O primeiro passo foi uma revisão sistemática da literatura, que resultou em 1052 diretrizes, que foram analisadas iterativamente até serem reduzidas para uma quantidade menor. Depois disso, 15 designers experientes avaliaram a utilidade dessas diretrizes e excluíram as que consideraram não úteis (para designers iniciantes). Em um esforço para incorporar conhecimento especializado, pedimos a estudantes de doutorado para proporem diretrizes, que passaram pelo mesmo processo de análise e avaliação por pares, e foram adicionadas ao conjunto anterior, o que resultou em 38 diretrizes. Finalmente, três estudantes de doutorado que também são designers com experiência em design de eBooks, comentaram cada diretriz e definiram o conjunto final. O resultado é um conjunto de 13 diretrizes

Developing sustainable business models for institutions’ provision of open educational resources: Learning from OpenLearn users’ motivations and experiences

Universities across the globe have, for some time, been exploring the possibilities for achieving public benefit and generating business and visibility through releasing and sharing open educational resources (OER). Many have written about the need to develop sustainable and profitable business models around the production and release of OER. Downes (2006), for example, has questioned the financial sustainability of OER production at scale. Many of the proposed business models focus on OER’s value in generating revenue and detractors of OER have questioned whether they are in competition with formal education. This paper reports on a study intended to broaden the conversation about OER business models to consider the motivations and experiences of OER users as the basis for making a better informed decision about whether OER and formal learning are competitive or complementary with each other. The study focused on OpenLearn - the Open University’s (OU) web-based platform for OER, which hosts hundreds of online courses and videos and is accessed by over 3,000,000 users a year. A large scale survey and follow-up interviews with OpenLearn users worldwide revealed that university provided OER can offer learners a bridge to formal education, allowing them to try out a subject before registering on a formal course and to build confidence in their abilities as learners. In addition, it was found that using OER during formal paid-for study can improve learners’ performance and self-reliance, leading to increased retention and satisfaction with the learning experience

Open educational resources for all? Comparing user motivations and characteristics across The Open University’s iTunes U channel and OpenLearn platform.

With the rise in access to mobile multimedia devices, educational institutions have exploited the iTunes U platform as an additional channel to provide free educational resources with the aim of profile-raising and breaking down barriers to education. For those prepared to invest in content preparation, it is possible to produce interactive, portable material that can be made available globally. Commentators have questioned both the financial implications for platform-specific content production, and the availability of devices for learners to access it (Osborne, 2012). The Open University (OU) makes its free educational resources available on iTunes U and via its web-based open educational resources (OER) platform, OpenLearn. The OU’s OER on iTunes U reached the 60 million download mark in 2013; its OpenLearn platform boasts 27 million unique visitors since 2006. This paper reports the results of a large-scale study of users of the OU’s iTunes U channel and OpenLearn platform. A survey of several thousand users revealed key differences in demographics between those accessing OER via the web and via iTunes U. In addition, the data allowed comparison between three groups: formal learners, informal learners and educators. The study raises questions about whether university-provided OER meet the needs of users and makes recommendations for how content can be modified to suit their needs. As the publishing of OER becomes core to business, we reflect on reasons why understanding users’ motivations and demographics is vital, allowing for needs-led resource provision and content that is adapted to best achieve learner satisfaction, and to deliver institutions’ social mission

(r) evolução e remediação

SFRH/BPD/75715/2011Os manuais escolares digitais são ainda uma raridade no quotidiano do ensino português. Contudo, as potencialidades destes recursos são consideravelmente exploradas em países como os Estados Unidos da América, onde o forte mercado editorial tratou de disponibilizar um elevado número de plataformas de leitura e distribuição de manuais digitais. A abordagem adotada pelas principais editoras americanas é descentrada do objeto como um dos principais instrumentos pedagógicos, ao invés é utilizada uma perspetiva mercantilista, onde se alugam ou vendem trechos, capítulos ou livros completos. A premissa do manual escolar digital como estratégia de remediação pode contribuir, de certa forma, para uma evolução ou revolução no paradigma de interação com o livro. Neste âmbito torna-se relevante perceber de que forma pode este recurso resultar numa ferramenta adaptada à era digital e ocupar, nestes novos formatos, o papel de relevo que sempre teve na promoção da aprendizagem. Numa pesquisa anterior que versou a análise de mais de uma dezena das referidas plataformas foi possível reconhecer um padrão no desenho das interfaces, bem como várias funcionalidades de especial relevo para a conceptualização de um protótipo inicial. É neste contexto que surge o presente trabalho, apresentando uma reflexão sobre o manual escolar digital como objeto essencial na aprendizagem e como este pode ser reconfigurado de modo a ocupar o seu lugar na educação digital do futuro.publishersversionpublishe

Scrolling vs Paging: Reading Performance and Preference of Reading Modes in Long-form Online News

This study explores the impact of scrolling and dynamic pagination in long-form online documents on reader performance and reader experience. Previous research has produced mixed results, indicating no difference between modes, or a positive effect favouring scrolling. Recent advances in web standards have enabled simpler, dynamic, performant methods of pagination to tailor content responsively to any screen, meriting renewed study in this area. This paper uses one such method to load subsequent online news pages instantly without buffering. In an online browser experiment with 38 participants, an increase in reading speed in the scrolling mode was found at a level of significance. This follows previous research which has suggested that while a scrolling presentation style exacts extra demands on working memory capacity (WMC), many current web users have developed compensatory strategies and cognitive flexibility for navigating scrolling web documents

Dreidimensionale Webanwendungen zur Verräumlichung von Informationen

Die vorliegende Arbeit untersucht das Potential von Webanwendungen in 3D zur Vermittlung von Informationen im Allgemeinen und zur Darstellung von städtebaulichen Zusammenhängen im Speziellen. Als grundlegender Faktor der visuellen und funktionalen Qualität - welche die Wahrnehmung des Nutzers direkt beeinflusst -, erfolgt die Bewertung der Machbarkeit von 3D Webinhalten unter Anwendung einer explorativen, qualitativen Evaluierung von Webagenturen. Darauf aufbauend wird das Potential von 3D Webanwendungen aus Nutzerperspektive untersucht, um Zusammenhänge herstellen zu können: einerseits zwischen der Machbarkeit bei der Entwicklung und anderseits die Akzeptanzkriterien beim Rezipienten betreffend. Die empirische Studie, die mit dem Forschungspartner Bosch für diese Arbeit modelliert wurde, eruiert zum einen, inwiefern 3D im Vergleich zu 2D und 2,5D, und zum anderen WebGL im Vergleich zu bisherigen 3D Webtechnologien die visuelle Wahrnehmung und kognitive Leistungsfähigkeit des Nutzers beeinflusst. Die Erkenntnisse der Untersuchung zeigen Parallelen zu bestehenden Studien aus web-fernen Bereichen. Um die Bedeutung von 3D Webanwendungen zur Verbesserung von Entscheidungsprozessen in Stadtplanungsprojekten ableiten zu können, werden Aspekte zur Interaktion und visuellen Wahrnehmung in den speziellen Kontext von Stadtplanungswerkzeugen gebracht. Dabei wird überprüft, ob sich web-basierte 3D Visualisierungen sinnvoll zur Vermittlung städtebaulicher Zusammenhänge einbinden lassen und inwieweit bestehende Projekte, wie in dieser Arbeit beispielhaft das vom Fraunhofer IGD entwickelte Forschungsprojekt urbanAPI, die Technologie WebGL nutzen können. Vor diesem Hintergrund soll die Arbeit Akzeptanzkriterien und Nutzungsbarrieren von 3D Webanwendungen auf Basis der Technologie WebGL identifizieren, um einen Beitrag zur Machbarkeit von Webanwendungen und zur Entwicklung entsprechender Stadtplanungswerkzeuge zu leisten