BulB - visualizing bulletin board activity

Visualisation is well known as an effective means of enriching user interaction with complex systems. Recent research with online communities has considered the application of visualisation tool support, with the intention of further improving communication between community members. This paper reviews existing work in this area with specific reference to the application of visualisation to improve user interaction within online forums such as bulletin boards. The paper then outlines work undertaken by the authors to develop a second-generation visualisation tool - 'BulB'

Developing bulletin board visualizations

Prevalent text-based representations within online communities and bulletin boards often make it difficult to contextualise the activity and interactions that are taking place. Visualisation techniques have been successfully applied in a range of domains to augment and enhance existing communication technologies such as bulletin boards. This paper presents a new approach to visualising bulletin board activity: BulB. The use of BulB visualisations enables users to gain an overall picture of bulletin board activity and develop an understanding of the overall interaction context

Fouille visuelle de données temporelles avec DataTube2

International audienceNous nous intéressons dans cet article à la fouille visuelle de données temporelles, où les données ont été mises sous la forme de n attributs dont les valeurs sont enregistrées pendant k instants. Après un état de l'art sur les différentes approches de visualisation de telles séries, nous présentons plus particulièrement une approche ayant reçue encore peu d'attention ("DataTube"). DataTube place les données dans un tube dont l'axe représente le temps. Nous étendons ensuite cette approche : tout d'abord nous définissons plusieurs modes de visualisations (couleurs, formes, etc) et nous ajoutons un axe temporel. Ensuite nous introduisons des interactions avec la possibilité de sélectionner des attributs et des instants, afficher des données complexes ou encore insérer des annotations sur la visualisation. Nous ajoutons une étape de classification non supervisée afin de regrouper dans la visualisation les attributs similaires. Enfin nous intégrons cette visualisation dans notre plateforme de fouille de données en réalité virtuelle VRMiner, avec un affichage stéréoscopique et des possibilités de navigation interactive. Nous appliquons cette visualisation sur plusieurs ensembles de données réelles et nous montrons qu'elle peut gérer jusqu'à 1,5 million de valeurs. Nous présentons également une évaluation utilisateur

"The Image of PLAZA" : an analysis of an academic community web space using Kevin Lynch's approach for "The image of the city"

Thesis (M.C.P.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning, 2004.Some pages folded.Includes bibliographical references (p. 111-113).This thesis is a case study of how the design issues of a community web space can be approached from the viewpoint of urban design not in terms of appearance but in terms of its functionality. An urban public place like a plaza and a community web space both serve their residents' social lives whether real or virtual. There have been many efforts to replicate public spaces into the virtual world. However, considering the completely different materials that compose both spaces, it may be not proper to duplicate just the visual appearance of a city in the virtual world. Therefore, in this thesis, using not the literal adoption of but the functional analogy of urban design, I analyze the legibility of a community web space, 'PLAZA'. This analogy can be divided into two parts. The first part utilizes Kevin Lynch's methodology for the analysis of "the Image of City". I examine the design of PLAZA using the public's mental image of PLAZA, as he used the citizens' image of cities to analyze city spaces. The second part uses physical urban space to interpret the relation between users' mental image of PLAZA and its design. Spatial concepts that are familiar in designing physical spaces are used for this analysis; Graphic, Location, Vitality of a place, and Accessibility. The result of this case study shows both similarities and dissimilarities between an urban public space and DUSP PLAZA for each spatial concept.by Jaecheol Kim.M.C.P

Enhancing social awareness at the workplace

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2007.Includes bibliographical references (p. 59-61).Social awareness in the workspace has been a classical architectural problem that has been tackled in various ways-ranging from architectural ways, such as the design of building atria, to technological ways, like connecting of two remote spaces using two-way audio-video tunnels. Any attempt at enhancing social awareness is fundamentally at odds with high levels of user privacy. In this document, we shall discuss a novel sensor network based approach to enhancing the social awareness of people while maintaining low levels of privacy invasiveness. We use a grid of motion sensors to collect anonymous information about activity in various locations of our prototypical workspace. The real time and historical components of the data are then visualized in six different ways. These visualizations are meant to be deployed as glanceable displays in public areas and personal workspaces to allow people to gain an almost subconscious awareness of the space around them. The system developed is evaluated through one on one critique interviews with users drawn randomly from the prototypical workspace. Finally the results of the evaluation are discussed and future directions for the research are outlined.by Ishwinder Kaur.S.M

Supporting Members of Online Communities Through the Use of Visualisations

Growing numbers of people around the world are using online communities to stay in touch with each other. Online communities are now widespread, enabling meaningful communication, around various domains of interest, between users who are separated by time and distance. Despite the increasing numbers of people using online communities, there are many examples of communities which suffer from problems of falling levels of contributions from members. This thesis investigates the main principles involved in creating successful online communities. It develops a taxonomy of community interactions that provides a framework for investigating techniques that have the potential to encourage member participation. Within standard text-based online communities, problems of information overload can be prevalent, with extensive user participation often required in order to get an overview of the interaction environment and context. This thesis proposes the use of facilitation techniques, in the form of visualisations, as a means of helping users get a better understanding of the interaction context, reducing the amount of time spent by users in the information-discovery phase. A range of new, complementary visualisations are developed and tested in order to assess their efficacy in helping users to complete tasks that they would be likely to undertake during their information-discovery phase. The results of the experiments show that not only do visualisations help users achieve more accurate results in conducting simple information-discovery tasks, but they also help in completing such tasks in a more efficient manner, shrinking the amount of time spent in the information-discovery phase. Different visualisations are also shown to be more useful in different circumstances, pointing to the fact that the needs and requirements of users, and the tasks they undertake, should be considered when designing the exact nature of any potential visualisation intended to support users of online communities

Visualizing the Crowds at a Web Site

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