685 research outputs found
Supporting users in understanding intelligent everyday systems
Intelligent systems have permeated many areas of daily life like communication, search, decision-making, and navigation, and thus present an important meeting point of people and artiïŹcial intelligence in practice. These intelligent everyday systems are in focus of this thesis. Intelligent everyday systems exhibit the characteristics of so-called complex systems as deïŹned in cognitive science: They serve ill-deïŹned user goals, change dynamically over time, and comprise a large number of interrelated variables whose dependencies are not transparent to users. Due to this complexity, intelligent everyday systems can violate established usability guidelines of user interface design like transparency, controllability and easy error correction. This may introduce uncertainty to interaction that users have to overcome in order to reach a goal. I introduce a perspective from cognitive science, where users do so through knowledge. The work presented in this thesis aims at assisting users in gaining this knowledge, or supporting users in understanding intelligent everyday systems, for example, through explanation, control, correction or feedback. To this end, the work included in this thesis makes three main contributions: First, I present a method for eliciting user need for support and informing adequate solutions through practical user problems with intelligent everyday systems in daily interaction. In a ïŹrst phase, the presented method uses passive data collection to extract user problems with intelligent everyday systems through a combination of automated and manual analyses. In the second phase, these problems are then enriched and validated through active data collection to derive solutions for support. In addition, I report on the application of this method to uncover user problems with four popular commercial intelligent everyday systems (Facebook, NetïŹix, Google Maps and Google Assistant). Second, I introduce a conceptual framework for categorising and differentiating prevailing notionsin the ïŹeld of how users should be supported in understanding intelligent systems related to what users seek to know, how they acquire knowledge, and what kind of knowledge they acquire. The presented framework can be used to make these notions explicit and thus introduces an overarching structure that abstracts from the ïŹeldâs fractured terminological landscape. It aims at helping other researchers become aware of existing approaches and locate and reïŹect on their own work. Third, I present a number of case studies and arguments as an exploration of how users can be supported in the face of real-world challenges and trade-offs. My research reïŹects two possible perspectives to approach this question, a normative and a pragmatic one. As part of a critical reïŹection on the normative perspective, the work shows that explanations without information can similarly foster user trust in a system compared to real explanations, and discusses how user support can be exploited to deceive users. From the pragmatic perspective emerges a stage-based participatory design process that incorporates different stakeholder needs and a study assessing how support can be interwoven with usersâ primary tasks. In summary, this thesis adopts a perspective on interaction with intelligent everyday systems, where understanding is a fundamental process towards reaching a user-set goal. On this basis, I introduce a research agenda for future work that incorporates the presented contributions and also includes challenges beyond the scope of this work, such as considering user empowerment. I hope that this agenda, along with the presented method, framework and design exploration, will help future work to shape interaction with intelligent everyday systems in a way that allows people to use them better, and to better ends and outcomes.Intelligente Systeme haben Einzug in viele Bereiche des tĂ€glichen Lebens wie Kommunikation, Informationssuche, EntscheidungsïŹndung, und Navigation erhalten und stellen damit einen wichtigen BerĂŒhrungspunkt von Menschen und kĂŒnstlicher Intelligenz in der Praxis dar. Solche intelligenten Alltagssysteme stehen im Fokus dieser Arbeit. Intelligente Alltagssysteme weisen die Charakteristika von sogenannten komplexen Systemen aus der Kognitionsforschung auf: Sie dienen unscharfen Nutzerzielen, verĂ€ndern sich dynamisch ĂŒber die Zeit, und beinhalten eine groĂe Anzahl an miteinander verknĂŒpften Variablen, deren Wechselbeziehungen fĂŒr Nutzer nicht erkennbar sind. Auf Grund dieser KomplexitĂ€t können intelligente Alltagssysteme bewĂ€hrte Richtlinien zur Gestaltung von nutzerfreundlichen BenutzeroberïŹĂ€chen verletzen, beispielsweise Transparenz, Kontrollierbarkeit, und einfache Fehlerbehebung. Dies kann bei der Interaktion zu Unsicherheit fĂŒhren, die Nutzer auf dem Weg zu einem Ziel ĂŒberwinden mĂŒssen. Ich fĂŒhre eine Perspektive aus der Kognitionsforschung ein, nach welcher Nutzer dies durch Wissen tun. Die hier prĂ€sentierten Arbeiten haben zum Ziel, Nutzern beim Erlangen dieses Wissens zu helfen, oder NutzerverstĂ€ndnis von intelligenten Alltagssystemen zu unterstĂŒtzen, beispielsweise durch ErklĂ€rung, Kontrolle, Korrektur oder RĂŒckmeldung an das System. Hierzu leisten die vorgestellten Arbeiten hauptsĂ€chlich drei BeitrĂ€ge: Ich prĂ€sentiere zunĂ€chst eine Methode, um das NutzerbedĂŒrnis nach UnterstĂŒtzung zu ermitteln und entsprechende Lösungen zu informieren. Die Methode identiïŹziert dazu praktische Nutzerprobleme mit intelligenten Alltagssystemen im tĂ€glichen Gebrauch. In einer ersten Phase werden diese Probleme auf Grund von passiver Datenerhebung unter Verwendung automatisierter und manueller Analysemethoden extrahiert. In der zweiten Phase werden die ermittelten Problemedurch aktive Datenerhebung angereichert und validiert, um Lösungen zur UnterstĂŒtzung abzuleiten. Daneben berichte ich von der Anwendung dieser Methode, um Nutzerprobleme in vier verbreiteten kommerziellen intelligenten Alltagssystemen (Facebook, NetïŹix, Google Maps und Google Assistant) aufzudecken. Danach fĂŒhre ich ein konzeptuelles Framework ein, mit dem im Feld vorherrschende Annahmen, wie NutzerverstĂ€ndnis von intelligenten Alltagssystemen unterstĂŒtzt werden sollte, klassiïŹziert und differenziert werden können. Diese Annahmen beziehen sich darauf, welches Wissen Nutzer erlangen wollen, wie sie dieses Wissen erlangen, und um welche Art von Wissen es sich handelt. Durch das Framework können die jeweiligen Annahmen explizit gemacht werden. Es schafft so eine ĂŒbergreifende Struktur, die von der FĂŒlle und DiversitĂ€t der im Feld verwendeten BegrifïŹichkeiten abstrahiert. Das Framework kann anderen Forschern dabei helfen, sich ĂŒber bestehende AnsĂ€tze bewusst zu werden, und ihre eigene Arbeit zu verorten und zu reïŹektieren. Zum Dritten bringe ich eine Reihe von Fallbeispielen und Argumenten an, die explorieren, wie Nutzer angesichts von EinschrĂ€nkungen und AbwĂ€gungen in der Praxis unterstĂŒtzt werden können. Meine Forschung spiegelt dabei zwei mögliche Sichtweisen auf diese Frage wider, eine normative und eine pragmatische. Im Zuge einer kritischen Betrachtung der normativen Sichtweise zeigt diese Arbeit, dass ErklĂ€rungen ohne Informationsgehalt in Ă€hnlicher Weise Vertrauen in ein System hervorrufen können wie richtige ErklĂ€rungen. In diesem Zusammenhang wird weiterhin diskutiert, wie UnterstĂŒtzung gezielt zur TĂ€uschung von Nutzern missbraucht werden kann. Aus der pragmatischen Sichtweise geht in dieser Arbeit ein stufenförmiger partizipatorischer Designprozess hervor, der die verschiedenen Interessen in der Praxis Beteiligter berĂŒcksichtigt. Zudem wird in einer Studie untersucht, wie UnterstĂŒtzung von VerstĂ€ndnis mit der PrimĂ€raufgabe von Nutzern verknĂŒpft werden kann. Zusammenfassend nimmt diese Arbeit eine Perspektive auf Interaktion mit intelligenten Alltagssystemen ein, die Verstehen als grundlegenden Prozess auf dem Weg zu einem Nutzerziel begreift. Basierend darauf stelle ich eine Forschungsagenda vor, die die prĂ€sentierten Publikationen einschlieĂt und zudem Herausforderungen ĂŒber den Rahmen dieser Arbeit hinaus beinhaltet, wie beispielsweise die Einbeziehung vonâNutzer-Empowermentâ. Ich hoffe, dass diese Agenda, die vorgestellte Methode, das Framework und die Erkenntnisse aus der Exploration möglicher DesignansĂ€tze zukĂŒnftiger Forschung hilft, Interaktion mit intelligenten Systemen im Alltag zu gestalten â so, dass Nutzer sie besser und zu besseren Zwecken verwenden können
Supporting users in understanding intelligent everyday systems
Intelligent systems have permeated many areas of daily life like communication, search, decision-making, and navigation, and thus present an important meeting point of people and artiïŹcial intelligence in practice. These intelligent everyday systems are in focus of this thesis. Intelligent everyday systems exhibit the characteristics of so-called complex systems as deïŹned in cognitive science: They serve ill-deïŹned user goals, change dynamically over time, and comprise a large number of interrelated variables whose dependencies are not transparent to users. Due to this complexity, intelligent everyday systems can violate established usability guidelines of user interface design like transparency, controllability and easy error correction. This may introduce uncertainty to interaction that users have to overcome in order to reach a goal. I introduce a perspective from cognitive science, where users do so through knowledge. The work presented in this thesis aims at assisting users in gaining this knowledge, or supporting users in understanding intelligent everyday systems, for example, through explanation, control, correction or feedback. To this end, the work included in this thesis makes three main contributions: First, I present a method for eliciting user need for support and informing adequate solutions through practical user problems with intelligent everyday systems in daily interaction. In a ïŹrst phase, the presented method uses passive data collection to extract user problems with intelligent everyday systems through a combination of automated and manual analyses. In the second phase, these problems are then enriched and validated through active data collection to derive solutions for support. In addition, I report on the application of this method to uncover user problems with four popular commercial intelligent everyday systems (Facebook, NetïŹix, Google Maps and Google Assistant). Second, I introduce a conceptual framework for categorising and differentiating prevailing notionsin the ïŹeld of how users should be supported in understanding intelligent systems related to what users seek to know, how they acquire knowledge, and what kind of knowledge they acquire. The presented framework can be used to make these notions explicit and thus introduces an overarching structure that abstracts from the ïŹeldâs fractured terminological landscape. It aims at helping other researchers become aware of existing approaches and locate and reïŹect on their own work. Third, I present a number of case studies and arguments as an exploration of how users can be supported in the face of real-world challenges and trade-offs. My research reïŹects two possible perspectives to approach this question, a normative and a pragmatic one. As part of a critical reïŹection on the normative perspective, the work shows that explanations without information can similarly foster user trust in a system compared to real explanations, and discusses how user support can be exploited to deceive users. From the pragmatic perspective emerges a stage-based participatory design process that incorporates different stakeholder needs and a study assessing how support can be interwoven with usersâ primary tasks. In summary, this thesis adopts a perspective on interaction with intelligent everyday systems, where understanding is a fundamental process towards reaching a user-set goal. On this basis, I introduce a research agenda for future work that incorporates the presented contributions and also includes challenges beyond the scope of this work, such as considering user empowerment. I hope that this agenda, along with the presented method, framework and design exploration, will help future work to shape interaction with intelligent everyday systems in a way that allows people to use them better, and to better ends and outcomes.Intelligente Systeme haben Einzug in viele Bereiche des tĂ€glichen Lebens wie Kommunikation, Informationssuche, EntscheidungsïŹndung, und Navigation erhalten und stellen damit einen wichtigen BerĂŒhrungspunkt von Menschen und kĂŒnstlicher Intelligenz in der Praxis dar. Solche intelligenten Alltagssysteme stehen im Fokus dieser Arbeit. Intelligente Alltagssysteme weisen die Charakteristika von sogenannten komplexen Systemen aus der Kognitionsforschung auf: Sie dienen unscharfen Nutzerzielen, verĂ€ndern sich dynamisch ĂŒber die Zeit, und beinhalten eine groĂe Anzahl an miteinander verknĂŒpften Variablen, deren Wechselbeziehungen fĂŒr Nutzer nicht erkennbar sind. Auf Grund dieser KomplexitĂ€t können intelligente Alltagssysteme bewĂ€hrte Richtlinien zur Gestaltung von nutzerfreundlichen BenutzeroberïŹĂ€chen verletzen, beispielsweise Transparenz, Kontrollierbarkeit, und einfache Fehlerbehebung. Dies kann bei der Interaktion zu Unsicherheit fĂŒhren, die Nutzer auf dem Weg zu einem Ziel ĂŒberwinden mĂŒssen. Ich fĂŒhre eine Perspektive aus der Kognitionsforschung ein, nach welcher Nutzer dies durch Wissen tun. Die hier prĂ€sentierten Arbeiten haben zum Ziel, Nutzern beim Erlangen dieses Wissens zu helfen, oder NutzerverstĂ€ndnis von intelligenten Alltagssystemen zu unterstĂŒtzen, beispielsweise durch ErklĂ€rung, Kontrolle, Korrektur oder RĂŒckmeldung an das System. Hierzu leisten die vorgestellten Arbeiten hauptsĂ€chlich drei BeitrĂ€ge: Ich prĂ€sentiere zunĂ€chst eine Methode, um das NutzerbedĂŒrnis nach UnterstĂŒtzung zu ermitteln und entsprechende Lösungen zu informieren. Die Methode identiïŹziert dazu praktische Nutzerprobleme mit intelligenten Alltagssystemen im tĂ€glichen Gebrauch. In einer ersten Phase werden diese Probleme auf Grund von passiver Datenerhebung unter Verwendung automatisierter und manueller Analysemethoden extrahiert. In der zweiten Phase werden die ermittelten Problemedurch aktive Datenerhebung angereichert und validiert, um Lösungen zur UnterstĂŒtzung abzuleiten. Daneben berichte ich von der Anwendung dieser Methode, um Nutzerprobleme in vier verbreiteten kommerziellen intelligenten Alltagssystemen (Facebook, NetïŹix, Google Maps und Google Assistant) aufzudecken. Danach fĂŒhre ich ein konzeptuelles Framework ein, mit dem im Feld vorherrschende Annahmen, wie NutzerverstĂ€ndnis von intelligenten Alltagssystemen unterstĂŒtzt werden sollte, klassiïŹziert und differenziert werden können. Diese Annahmen beziehen sich darauf, welches Wissen Nutzer erlangen wollen, wie sie dieses Wissen erlangen, und um welche Art von Wissen es sich handelt. Durch das Framework können die jeweiligen Annahmen explizit gemacht werden. Es schafft so eine ĂŒbergreifende Struktur, die von der FĂŒlle und DiversitĂ€t der im Feld verwendeten BegrifïŹichkeiten abstrahiert. Das Framework kann anderen Forschern dabei helfen, sich ĂŒber bestehende AnsĂ€tze bewusst zu werden, und ihre eigene Arbeit zu verorten und zu reïŹektieren. Zum Dritten bringe ich eine Reihe von Fallbeispielen und Argumenten an, die explorieren, wie Nutzer angesichts von EinschrĂ€nkungen und AbwĂ€gungen in der Praxis unterstĂŒtzt werden können. Meine Forschung spiegelt dabei zwei mögliche Sichtweisen auf diese Frage wider, eine normative und eine pragmatische. Im Zuge einer kritischen Betrachtung der normativen Sichtweise zeigt diese Arbeit, dass ErklĂ€rungen ohne Informationsgehalt in Ă€hnlicher Weise Vertrauen in ein System hervorrufen können wie richtige ErklĂ€rungen. In diesem Zusammenhang wird weiterhin diskutiert, wie UnterstĂŒtzung gezielt zur TĂ€uschung von Nutzern missbraucht werden kann. Aus der pragmatischen Sichtweise geht in dieser Arbeit ein stufenförmiger partizipatorischer Designprozess hervor, der die verschiedenen Interessen in der Praxis Beteiligter berĂŒcksichtigt. Zudem wird in einer Studie untersucht, wie UnterstĂŒtzung von VerstĂ€ndnis mit der PrimĂ€raufgabe von Nutzern verknĂŒpft werden kann. Zusammenfassend nimmt diese Arbeit eine Perspektive auf Interaktion mit intelligenten Alltagssystemen ein, die Verstehen als grundlegenden Prozess auf dem Weg zu einem Nutzerziel begreift. Basierend darauf stelle ich eine Forschungsagenda vor, die die prĂ€sentierten Publikationen einschlieĂt und zudem Herausforderungen ĂŒber den Rahmen dieser Arbeit hinaus beinhaltet, wie beispielsweise die Einbeziehung vonâNutzer-Empowermentâ. Ich hoffe, dass diese Agenda, die vorgestellte Methode, das Framework und die Erkenntnisse aus der Exploration möglicher DesignansĂ€tze zukĂŒnftiger Forschung hilft, Interaktion mit intelligenten Systemen im Alltag zu gestalten â so, dass Nutzer sie besser und zu besseren Zwecken verwenden können
The state of peer-to-peer network simulators
Networking research often relies on simulation in order to test and evaluate new ideas. An important requirement of this process is that results must be reproducible so that other researchers can replicate, validate and extend existing work. We look at the landscape of simulators for research in peer-to-peer (P2P) networks by conducting a survey of a combined total of over 280 papers from before and after 2007 (the year of the last survey in this area), and comment on the large quantity of research using bespoke, closed-source simulators. We propose a set of criteria that P2P simulators should meet, and poll the P2P research community for their agreement. We aim to drive the community towards performing their experiments on simulators that allow for others to validate their results
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Analysing the requirements for monitoring and switching: A problem-oriented approach
Context-aware applications monitor changes in their environment and switch their behaviour in order to continue satisfying requirements. Specifying monitoring and switching in such applications can be difficult due to their dependence on varying environmental properties. Two problems require analysis: the detection of changes in the operating environment to assess their impact on requirements satisfaction, and the adaptation of application behaviour to ensure requirements satisfaction.
This thesis borrows from the world of problem-oriented software system development and product-lines to analyse monitoring and switching problems on one hand and contextual changes on the other. It proposes a shift of focus from treating monitoring and switching as activities to be analysed as part of the design, to treating them as part of the problem whose requirements are analysed. We claim three novel contributions: (1) we provide concepts and mechanisms for analysing monitoring and switching problems in context; (2) we formulate and prove two theorems for monitoring and switching, which define the necessary and sufficient conditions for monitoring a contextual variable and for switching application behaviour to restore requirements satisfaction when they are violated; and (3) we provide a tool for automated derivation of the conditions for monitoring and switching.
Our approach is evaluated using two case studies of a proof of concept mobile phone productline and a logistics company that delivers and monitors products across the UK. We found the applications of the approach to be effective in analysing unforeseen requirements violations caused by changes in the systems operating environments. Furthermore, the monitoring and switching mechanisms derived from the analysis enabled the software to become, to some extent, context-aware
Ubiquitous Computing
The aim of this book is to give a treatment of the actively developed domain of Ubiquitous computing. Originally proposed by Mark D. Weiser, the concept of Ubiquitous computing enables a real-time global sensing, context-aware informational retrieval, multi-modal interaction with the user and enhanced visualization capabilities. In effect, Ubiquitous computing environments give extremely new and futuristic abilities to look at and interact with our habitat at any time and from anywhere. In that domain, researchers are confronted with many foundational, technological and engineering issues which were not known before. Detailed cross-disciplinary coverage of these issues is really needed today for further progress and widening of application range. This book collects twelve original works of researchers from eleven countries, which are clustered into four sections: Foundations, Security and Privacy, Integration and Middleware, Practical Applications
Enabling Artificial Intelligence Analytics on The Edge
This thesis introduces a novel distributed model for handling in real-time, edge-based video analytics. The novelty of the model relies on decoupling and distributing the services into several decomposed functions, creating virtual function chains (V F C
model). The model considers both computational and communication constraints. Theoretical, simulation and experimental results have shown that the V F C model can enable the support of heavy-load services to an edge environment while improving the footprint of the service compared to state-of-the art frameworks. In detail, results on the V F C model have shown that it can reduce the total edge cost, compared with a monolithic and a simple frame distribution models. For experimenting on a real-case scenario, a testbed edge environment has been developed, where the aforementioned models, as well as a general distribution framework (Apache Spark ©), have been deployed. A cloud service has also been considered. Experiments have shown that V F C can outperform all alternative approaches, by reducing operational cost and improving the QoS. Finally, a migration model, a caching model and a QoS monitoring service based on Long-Term-Short-Term models are introduced
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Exploring a capability-demand interaction model for inclusive design evaluation
Designers are required to evaluate their designs against the needs and capabilities of their target user groups in order to achieve successful, inclusive products. This dissertation presents exploratory research into the specific problem of supporting analytical design evaluation for Inclusive Design. The analytical evaluation process involves evaluating products with user data rather than testing with actual users. The work focuses on the exploration of a capability-demand model of product interaction as the basis for analytical inclusive evaluation. This model suggests that by comparing the measured sensory, cognitive and motor capabilities of a user population to the corresponding product demands, the degree of fit between users and products can be assessed.
The research problem was addressed by firstly examining theories of human function and performance together with existing sources of user capability data. It was found that user capability data was fragmented and lacking in terms of predicting design exclusion and difficulty at the population level. More fundamentally, however, it was found that the relationships between measured capability in populations with low functional capacity and real world task performance with products (such as errors, times and difficulty) were not well understood. Given that an understanding of these relationships are necessary to guide capability data collection and to drive valid and robust analytical evaluation methods, the research effort focused on exploring these relationships via empirical and analytical studies.
The research process culminated in an experimental study with nineteen users of various functional capability profiles performing tasks with four consumer products (a clock radio, a mobile phone, a blender and a vacuum cleaner). Measures of user capability were related to corresponding product demands (on those capabilities) and task outcome measures. A complex picture emerged, where linear relationships did not generally account for significant variance in task outcome measures. Further, it appeared that multiple capabilities were possibly interacting in unknown ways to support real world interaction. These indicative results point to the further investigation of multivariate and non-linear models for describing capability-demand relationships, and also the replication of similar studies with larger sample sizes to confirm the relationships observed. The resulting overall recommendation, therefore, is that there is a need to direct research efforts in this critical but largely unexplored area of capability-demand model building for Inclusive Design evaluation
Satellite Communications
This study is motivated by the need to give the reader a broad view of the developments, key concepts, and technologies related to information society evolution, with a focus on the wireless communications and geoinformation technologies and their role in the environment. Giving perspective, it aims at assisting people active in the industry, the public sector, and Earth science fields as well, by providing a base for their continued work and thinking
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