Assessing the Impact of Multi-variate Steering-rate Vehicle Control on Driver Performance in a Simulation Framework

When a driver turns a steering-wheel, he or she normally expects the vehicle\u27s steering system to communicate an equivalent amount of signal to the road-wheels. This relationship is linear and occurs regardless of the steering-wheel\u27s position within its rotational travel. The linear steering paradigm in passenger vehicles has gone largely unchanged since mass production of passenger vehicles began in 1901. However, as more electronically-controlled steering systems appear in conjunction with development of autonomous steering functions in vehicles, an opportunity to advance the existing steering paradigms arises. The following framework takes a human-factors approach toward examining and evaluating alternative steering systems by using Modeling and Simulation methods to track and score human performance. Present conventional steering systems apply a linear relationship between the steering-wheel and the road wheels of a vehicle. The rotational travel of the steering-wheel is 900° and requires two-and-a-half revolutions to travel from end-stop to opposite end-stop. The experimental steering system modeled and employed in this study applies a dynamic curve response to the steering input within a shorter, 225° rotational travel. Accommodation variances, based on vehicle speed and steering-wheel rotational position and acceleration, moderate the apparent steering input to augment a more-practical, effective steering rate. This novel model follows a paradigm supporting the full range of steering-wheel actuation without necessitating hand repositioning or the removal of the driver\u27s hands from the steering-wheel during steering maneuvers. In order to study human performance disparities between novel and conventional steering models, a custom simulator was constructed and programmed to render representative models in a test scenario. Twenty-seven males and twenty-seven females, ranging from the ages of eighteen to sixty-five were tested and scored using the driving simulator that presented two successive driving test vignettes: One vignette using conventional 900° steering with linear response and the other employing the augmented 225° multivariate, non-linear steering. The results from simulator testing suggest that both males and females perform better with the novel system, supporting the hypothesis that drivers of either gender perform better with a system augmented with 225° multivariate, non-linear steering than with a conventional steering system. Further analysis of the simulated-driving scores indicates performance parity between male and female participants, supporting the hypothesis positing no significant difference in driver performance between male and female drivers using the augmented steering system. Finally, composite data from written questionnaires support the hypothesis that drivers will prefer driving the augmented system over conventional steering. These collective findings support justification for testing and refining novel steering systems using Modeling and Simulation methods. As a product of this particular study, a tested and open-sourced simulation framework now exists such that researchers and automotive designers can develop, as well as evaluate their own steering-oriented products within a valid human-factors construct. The open-source nature of this framework implies a commonality by which otherwisedisparate research and development work can be associated. Extending this framework beyond basic investigation to reach applications requiring morespecialized parameters may even impact drivers having special needs. For example, steeringsystem functional characteristics could be comparatively optimized to accommodate individuals afflicted with upper-body deficits or limited use of either or both arms. Moreover, the combined human-factors and open-source approaches distinguish the products of this research as a common and extensible platform by which purposeful automotive-industry improvements can be realized—contrasted with arbitrary improvements that might be brought about predominantly to showcase technological advancements

Jogos híbridos: um problema novo em design visual

Os jogos estão presentes na humanidade há muitos milênios, acompanhando seus desenvolvimentos culturais e tecnológicos, os jogos de tabuleiro também se adaptaram, desenvolvendo mecânicas e interfaces mais divertidas e inovadoras. Recentemente, uma nova e bem-sucedida ramificação incorporou tecnologia digital aos jogos de tabuleiro utilizando as capacidades dos smart devices e originando assim os atuais jogos híbridos. Esta tese propõe-se a realizar uma pesquisa exploratória sobre os jogos híbridos pelo viés do design visual numa abordagem à interface desses novos jogos. Na ausência de literatura específica sobre o assunto, será realizada uma pesquisa sobre as interfaces de jogos de tabuleiro e de jogos digitais, assim como pesquisas que revelem o current state dos híbridos, sua relevância e definição, procurando também entender suas dimensões e o melhor equilíbrio entre as componentes físicas e digitais nos jogos híbridos. Por fim, um estudo sobre a interface de jogos híbridos lançados comercialmente será realizado utilizando os conhecimentos acumulados durante as etapas anteriores da pesquisa.Games have been present in the humanity for many thousands of years, following their cultural and technological developments, board games have also been adapted, developing new mechanics and interfaces more enjoyable and innovative. Recently, a new and successful branch has incorporated digital technology into board games using the capabilities of smart devices and thus becoming to the current hybrid games. This thesis proposes to carry out an exploratory research on the hybrid games by the bias of the visual design in an approach to the interface of these new games. In the absence of specific literature on the subject, a research will be carried out on the interfaces of board games and digital games, as well as researches that reveal the current state of the hybrids, their relevance and definition, also trying to understand their dimensions and the best balance between physical and digital components in hybrid games. Finally, a study on the hybrid game interface commercially released will be carried out using the knowledge accumulated during the previous steps of the research

Virtual Reality

At present, the virtual reality has impact on information organization and management and even changes design principle of information systems, which will make it adapt to application requirements. The book aims to provide a broader perspective of virtual reality on development and application. First part of the book is named as "virtual reality visualization and vision" and includes new developments in virtual reality visualization of 3D scenarios, virtual reality and vision, high fidelity immersive virtual reality included tracking, rendering and display subsystems. The second part named as "virtual reality in robot technology" brings forth applications of virtual reality in remote rehabilitation robot-based rehabilitation evaluation method and multi-legged robot adaptive walking in unstructured terrains. The third part, named as "industrial and construction applications" is about the product design, space industry, building information modeling, construction and maintenance by virtual reality, and so on. And the last part, which is named as "culture and life of human" describes applications of culture life and multimedia-technology

Metaverse beyond the hype: Multidisciplinary perspectives on emerging challenges, opportunities, and agenda for research, practice and policy

The metaverse has the potential to extend the physical world using augmented and virtual reality technologies allowing users to seamlessly interact within real and simulated environments using avatars and holograms. Virtual environments and immersive games (such as, Second Life, Fortnite, Roblox and VRChat) have been described as antecedents of the metaverse and offer some insight to the potential socio-economic impact of a fully functional persistent cross platform metaverse. Separating the hype and “meta…” rebranding from current reality is difficult, as “big tech” paints a picture of the transformative nature of the metaverse and how it will positively impact people in their work, leisure, and social interaction. The potential impact on the way we conduct business, interact with brands and others, and develop shared experiences is likely to be transformational as the distinct lines between physical and digital are likely to be somewhat blurred from current perceptions. However, although the technology and infrastructure does not yet exist to allow the development of new immersive virtual worlds at scale - one that our avatars could transcend across platforms, researchers are increasingly examining the transformative impact of the metaverse. Impacted sectors include marketing, education, healthcare as well as societal effects relating to social interaction factors from widespread adoption, and issues relating to trust, privacy, bias, disinformation, application of law as well as psychological aspects linked to addiction and impact on vulnerable people. This study examines these topics in detail by combining the informed narrative and multi-perspective approach from experts with varied disciplinary backgrounds on many aspects of the metaverse and its transformational impact. The paper concludes by proposing a future research agenda that is valuable for researchers, professionals and policy makers alike

Developing ideation cards to support the design of mixed reality games

Mixed reality games combine interactive digital content with real world environments, objects, and actors by utilizing a multitude of different sensors. While offering plenty of opportunities for designers, they are also notoriously difficult to design. This is in part due to them still being a relatively new form of gaming with only very few examples of commercially successful games. This means that the majority of aspiring designers lacks knowledge about the design space of these games – something that is crucial in order to create new and exciting experiences. While there exist several authoring tools to facilitate the development of mixed reality games, these tools do not provide guidance on the game design aspects. The design of mixed reality games is likewise bringing together experts from different domains (e.g. game design, technology, locales). In order to support this multifaceted and collaborative design process I have developed the Mixed Reality Game Cards. These are a deck of ideation cards that encapsulate the design space of mixed reality games in the form of physical playing cards. The cards can be used for rapid idea generation (i.e. creating a multitude of ideas from scratch in a short time) and in-depth idea development (i.e. further expanding and refining an idea). The Mixed Reality Game Cards consist of four types of cards to support idea generation as well as idea development. Opportunity Cards are the building blocks of an idea and describe potential elements of a design. Question Cards prompt the design group to consider the experience from different angles to refine the design. Challenge Cards surface typical design issues and problems that might occur. These domain-specific cards are supported by Theme Cards that are taken from the board game Dixit in order to provide additional domain-extrinsic sources of inspiration. I developed the Mixed Reality Game Cards iteratively over the course of seven studies following a Research through Design approach. This provided valuable insight into what makes ideation cards such powerful facilitators of collaborative design sessions. I identify content, appearance, and rules as crucial elements under direct control of an ideation card designer and tangible as well as playful interactions as dynamics that emerge during an ideation session. This thesis describes the development of the Mixed Reality Game Cards and uses the insights gained from this process to reflect on ideation cards as design tools in general, expanding our understanding of them

GIVE-ME: Gamification In Virtual Environments for Multimodal Evaluation - A Framework

In the last few decades, a variety of assistive technologies (AT) have been developed to improve the quality of life of visually impaired people. These include providing an independent means of travel and thus better access to education and places of work. There is, however, no metric for comparing and benchmarking these technologies, especially multimodal systems. In this dissertation, we propose GIVE-ME: Gamification In Virtual Environments for Multimodal Evaluation, a framework which allows for developers and consumers to assess their technologies in a functional and objective manner. This framework is based on three foundations: multimodality, gamification, and virtual reality. It facilitates fuller and more controlled data collection, rapid prototyping and testing of multimodal ATs, benchmarking heterogeneous ATs, and conversion of these evaluation tools into simulation or training tools. Our contributions include: (1) a unified evaluation framework: via developing an evaluative approach for multimodal visual ATs; (2) a sustainable evaluation: by employing virtual environments and gamification techniques to create engaging games for users, while collecting experimental data for analysis; (3) a novel psychophysics evaluation: enabling researchers to conduct psychophysics evaluation despite the experiment being a navigational task; and (4) a novel collaborative environment: enabling developers to rapid prototype and test their ATs with users in an early stakeholder involvement that fosters communication between developers and users. This dissertation first provides a background in assistive technologies and motivation for the framework. This is followed by detailed description of the GIVE-ME Framework, with particular attention to its user interfaces, foundations, and components. Then four applications are presented that describe how the framework is applied. Results and discussions are also presented for each application. Finally, both conclusions and a few directions for future work are presented in the last chapter

Developing ideation cards to support the design of mixed reality games

Mixed reality games combine interactive digital content with real world environments, objects, and actors by utilizing a multitude of different sensors. While offering plenty of opportunities for designers, they are also notoriously difficult to design. This is in part due to them still being a relatively new form of gaming with only very few examples of commercially successful games. This means that the majority of aspiring designers lacks knowledge about the design space of these games – something that is crucial in order to create new and exciting experiences. While there exist several authoring tools to facilitate the development of mixed reality games, these tools do not provide guidance on the game design aspects. The design of mixed reality games is likewise bringing together experts from different domains (e.g. game design, technology, locales). In order to support this multifaceted and collaborative design process I have developed the Mixed Reality Game Cards. These are a deck of ideation cards that encapsulate the design space of mixed reality games in the form of physical playing cards. The cards can be used for rapid idea generation (i.e. creating a multitude of ideas from scratch in a short time) and in-depth idea development (i.e. further expanding and refining an idea). The Mixed Reality Game Cards consist of four types of cards to support idea generation as well as idea development. Opportunity Cards are the building blocks of an idea and describe potential elements of a design. Question Cards prompt the design group to consider the experience from different angles to refine the design. Challenge Cards surface typical design issues and problems that might occur. These domain-specific cards are supported by Theme Cards that are taken from the board game Dixit in order to provide additional domain-extrinsic sources of inspiration. I developed the Mixed Reality Game Cards iteratively over the course of seven studies following a Research through Design approach. This provided valuable insight into what makes ideation cards such powerful facilitators of collaborative design sessions. I identify content, appearance, and rules as crucial elements under direct control of an ideation card designer and tangible as well as playful interactions as dynamics that emerge during an ideation session. This thesis describes the development of the Mixed Reality Game Cards and uses the insights gained from this process to reflect on ideation cards as design tools in general, expanding our understanding of them

Design of a horizontally scalable backend application for online games

Mobile game market is increasing in popularity year after year, attracting a wide audience of independent developers who must endure the competition of other more resourceful game companies. Players expect high quality games and experiences, while developers strive to monetize. Researches have shown a correlation between some features of a game and its likelihood to succeed and be a potential candidate to enter the top grossing lists. This thesis focuses on identifying the trending features found on the current most successful games, and proposes the design of a scalable, flexible and modular backend application which integrates all the services needed for fulfilling the common needs of a mobile online game. A microservice oriented architecture have been used as a basis for the system design, leading to a modular decomposition of features into small, independent, reusable services. The system and microservices design comply with the Reactive Manifesto, allowing the application to reach responsiveness, elasticity, resiliency and asynchronicity. For its properties, the application is suitable to serve on a cloud environment covering the requirements for small games and popular games with high load of traffic and many concurrent players. The thesis, in addition to the application and microservices design, includes a discussion on the technology stack for a possible implementation and recommended setup for three use case scenarios