A Formal Study of a Visual Language for the Visualization of Document Type Definition

This formal study proposes a transformational approach to the definition of general purpose visual languages based on hierarchical structures, addressing more specifically DTD visualization as its application area. We show that such visual languages can be constructed through progressive refinement of a syntax based on nested/juxtaposed rectangles. Several transformation stages, which can all be formally characterized, produce a high quality visual representation which expresses the fundamental properties of the original structure. Moreover, this approach opens some perspectives in proving visual properties through standard mathematical tools such as inductive proofs, thus establishing some practical links between visual language theory and classical language theory

VXT: Visual XML Transformer

The ever growing amount of heterogeneous data exchanged through the Internet, combined with the popularity of XML, make structured document transformations an increasingly important application domain. Most of the existing solutions for expressing XML transformations are textual languages, such as XSLT or DOM combined with a general-purpose programming language. Several tools build on top of these languages, providing a graphical environment and debugging facilities. Transformations are however still specified in a textual way using the underlying language (often XSLT), thus requiring users to learn it. We believe that visual programming techniques are well-suited to representing XML structures and make the specification of transformations simpler. We propose a visual language for the specification of XML transformations in an interactive environment based on a zoomable user interface toolkit and on two target languages specialised in structure transformations: Circus and XSLT

GraphDiaries: Animated Transitions and Temporal Navigation for Dynamic Networks

International audienceIdentifying, tracking and understanding changes in dynamic networks are complex and cognitively demanding tasks. We present GraphDiaries, a visual interface designed to improve support for these tasks in any node-link based graph visualization system. GraphDiaries relies on animated transitions that highlight changes in the network between time steps, thus helping users identify and understand those changes. To better understand the tasks related to the exploration of dynamic networks, we first introduce a task taxonomy, that informs the design of GraphDiaries, presented afterwards. We then report on a user study, based on representative tasks identified through the taxonomy, and that compares GraphDiaries to existing techniques for temporal navigation in dynamic networks, showing that it outperforms them in terms of both task time and errors for several of these tasks

Visualizing Dense Dynamic Networks with Matrix Cubes

Best PosterInternational audienceVisualizing static networks is already difficult, but exploring dynamic networks is even more challenging due to the complexity of the tasks involved; one visual encoding will hardly fit all tasks effectively, hence multiple complementary views are needed. We introduce the Matrix Cube, a visualization and navigation model for dynamic networks that results from stacking adjacency matrices, one for each time step in the network. It builds on our familiarity with cubes in the physical world and offers intuitive ways to look at, manipulate and decompose them. We describe a set of operations to decompose the Matrix Cube and interact with the resulting views

Side Pressure for Bidirectional Navigation on Small Devices

International audienceVirtual navigation on a mobile touchscreen is usually performed using finger gestures: drag and flick to scroll or pan, pinch to zoom. While easy to learn and perform, these gestures cause significant occlusion of the display. They also require users to explicitly switch between navigation mode and edit mode to either change the viewport's position in the document, or manipulate the actual content displayed in that viewport, respectively. SidePress augments mobile devices with two continuous pressure sensors co-located on one of their sides. It provides users with generic bidirectional navigation capabilities at different levels of granularity, all seamlessly integrated to act as an alternative to traditional navigation techniques, including scrollbars, drag-and-flick, or pinch-to-zoom. We describe the hardware prototype, detail the associated interaction vocabulary for different applications, and report on two laboratory studies. The first shows that users can precisely and efficiently control SidePress; the second, that SidePress can be more efficient than drag-and-flick touch gestures when scrolling large documents

Dé-augmentation de la réalité augmentée visuelle

We anticipate a future in which people frequently have virtual content displayed in their field of view to augment reality. Situations where this virtual content interferes with users' perception of the physical world will thus be more frequent, with consequences ranging from mere annoyance to serious injuries. We argue for the need to give users agency over virtual augmentations, discussing the concept of de-augmenting augmented reality by selectively removing virtual content from the field of view. De-augmenting lets users target what actually interferes with their perception of the environment while keeping what is of interest. We contribute a framework that captures the different facets of de-augmentation. We discuss what it entails in terms of technical realization and interaction design, and end with three scenarios to illustrate what the user experience could be in a sample of domestic and professional situations.Nous anticipons un avenir dans lequel les gens auront fréquemment du contenu virtuel affiché dans leur champ de vision pour augmenter la réalité. Les situations où ce contenu virtuel interfère avec la perception du monde physique par les utilisateurs seront donc plus fréquentes, avec des conséquences allant du simple désagrément à des accidents graves. Nous soutenons la nécessité de donner aux utilisateurs la possibilité d'agir sur les augmentations virtuelles, en discutant du concept de dé-augmentation de la réalité augmentée par la suppression sélective du contenu virtuel du champ de vision. La dé-augmentation permet aux utilisateurs de cibler ce qui interfère réellement avec leur perception de l'environnement tout en conservant ce qui est intéressant. Nous proposons un cadre qui capture les différentes facettes de la dé-augmentation. Nous discutons de ce que cela implique en termes de réalisation technique et de conception de l'interaction, et nous terminons par trois scénarios pour illustrer ce que pourrait être l'expérience de l'utilisateur dans des situations domestiques et professionnelles

A Web-based Dashboard for the High-level Monitoring of ALMA

International audienceThe ALMA radio-telescope's operations depend on the availability of high-level, easy-to-understand status information about all of its components. The ALMA Dashboard aims at providing an all-in-one-place near-real-time overview of the observatory's key elements and figures to both line and senior management. The Dashboard covers a wide range of elements beyond antennas, such as pads, correlator and central local oscillator. Data can be displayed in multiple ways, including: a table view, a compact view fitting on a single screen, a timeline showing detailed information over time, a logbook, a geographical map

Towards More Usable Dataset Search: From Query Characterization to Snippet Generation

Reusing published datasets on the Web is of great interest to researchers and developers. Their data needs may be met by submitting queries to a dataset search engine to retrieve relevant datasets. In this ongoing work towards developing a more usable dataset search engine, we characterize real data needs by annotating the semantics of 1,947 queries using a novel fine-grained scheme, to provide implications for enhancing dataset search. Based on the findings, we present a query-centered framework for dataset search, and explore the implementation of snippet generation and evaluate it with a preliminary user study.Comment: 4 pages, The 28th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (CIKM 2019

Exploratory Visualization of Astronomical Data on Ultra-high-resolution Wall Displays

International audienceUltra-high-resolution wall displays feature a very high pixel density over a large physical surface, which makes them well-suited to the collaborative, exploratory visualization of large datasets. We introduce FITS-OW, an application designed for such wall displays, that enables astronomers to navigate in large collections of FITS images, query astronomical databases, and display detailed, complementary data and documents about multiple sources simultaneously. We describe how astronomers interact with their data using both the wall's touch-sensitive surface and handheld devices. We also report on the technical challenges we addressed in terms of distributed graphics rendering and data sharing over the computer clusters that drive wall displays