Navigating the Aural Web

poster abstractThe current paradigm of web navigation poses great obstacles to users in two eyes-free scenarios: mobile computing and information access for the visually-impaired. The common thread of these scenarios is the inability to efficiently navigate complex information architectures, due to the mechanical and cognitive limitations emerging while listening to instead of looking at information and navigation prompts. New paradigms for aural navigation design are still unexplored, yet they are crucial to address increasingly important requirements. Inspired by the effective practice of human-to-human aural dialogues, we present a work-in-progress research funded by a 3-year NSF grant that introduces innovative design strategies for aural navigation in complex information architectures typical of the web. Specifically, in this exhibit we introduce and demonstrate design patterns supporting aural back navigation in large collections, aimed at improving the efficiency and usability of aural navigation. Current evaluation thrusts of the new navigation techniques involve blind users accessing the web through screen readers and sighted users using a mobile application prototype

Runtime resource management for lifetime extension in multi-core systems

The availability of numerous, possibly heterogeneous, processing resources in multi-core systems allows one to exploit them to optimize performance and/or power/energy consumption. In particular, strategies have been defined to map and schedule tasks on the system resources, with the aim of optimizing the adopted figure of merit, at design time, if the working context is known in advance and relatively stable, at run time when facing changing/unpredictable working conditions. However, it is important to be aware that such strategies may have an impact on the overall lifetime of the system because of aging and wear-out mechanisms. Therefore such management strategies, generally adopted for handling performance and power consumption aspects, should be enhanced in order to consider such issues. Furthermore, specific Dynamic Reliability Management (DRM) policies have been devised to deal with lifetime issues in multi-core systems, acting mainly on the workload distribution (and eventually on architectural knobs, such as voltage/frequency scaling) to mitigate the stress caused by the running applications. Here we will focus on DRM strategies, whose goal is pursuing the improvement of lifetime reliability by means of load distribution policies that identify the resource where to map a new application entering the system, or where to periodically migrate tasks to balance stress. More precisely, a selection of state-of-the-art solutions will be presented and analysed, with respect to the achieved expected lifetime, evaluated when considering the first failure as well as the sequence of failures leading to the system being unable to fulfill the user's performance of service requirements

Navigating the Aural Web: Listening-based Back Navigation in Large Architectures

poster abstractThe current paradigm of web navigation structures interaction around the visual channel and thus poses obstacles to users in two eyes-free scenarios: mobile computing and information access for the visually-impaired. The common thread of these scenarios is the inability to efficiently navigate complex information architectures due to the limited perceptual bandwidth of the aural channel. To address this problem, we are conducting a long-term research program aimed at establishing novel design strategies for aural navigation in complex information architectures typical of the web. As first line of results, we introduce topic- and list-based back: two navigation strategies to enhance aural browsing. Both are manifest in Green-Savers Mobile (GSM), an aural mobile site. A study (N=29) compared both solutions to traditional back mechanisms. Our findings indicate that topic- and list-based back enable faster access to previous pages, improve the navigation experience and reduce perceived cognitive load. To expand this line of work, we have also completed the evaluation of topic- and list-based back with blind and visually-impaired users of screen readers (N=10). The preliminary findings of the study, conducted in close collaboration with the Indiana School for the Blind in Indianapolis are promising. Topic- and list-based back decrease the number of web pages visited in aural browsing, and increase the self-rated navigation experience with respect to traditional back mechanisms. The proposed designs apply to a wide range of content-intensive, ubiquitous web systems. This research is based upon work supported by the NSF under the 3-year grant IIS-1018054 “Navigating the Aural Web” and two Research Experience for Undergraduate (REU) supplement grants

InterActive Reading: Understanding Strategies Learners Use to Study Multimedia Content in Tablet-Based Textbooks

poster abstractActive reading of educational textbooks is a complex meta-cognitive process. The traditional framework for active reading is conceptualized as the combination of three types of actions: annotation (e.g. highlighting and note taking), reorganization (e.g. outlining and summarizing) and browsing (e.g. studying annotations and outlines to prepare for future recall). However, as the traditional textbook paradigm evolves to include interactive, multimedia tablet-based products, dramatic changes are on the horizon for the ways in which educational content is delivered and consumed. Tablet devices allow textbook authors, publishers and developers to integrate multimedia content, such as video, audio, animations and interactive visualizations, with traditional expository text, designed as a browse-able book. However, existing tablet devices (i.e., iPad; Kindle Fire) only offer tools that support traditional active reading learning for text-based content. This research project reports findings of an exploratory qualitative study that examines what new active reading strategies emerge when learners engage with tablet-based multimedia textbooks. Participants were presented with one of two tablet textbooks developed using Apple’s iBook Author. The texts included a number of content forms, including traditional expository text, videos & animations, clickable keywords, image galleries, and interactive information graphics. Concept mapping tests were conducted to determine what students learned during their tablet study sessions, and semi-structured interviews were conducted to determine how easy or difficult it was for participants to actively study videos and animations. Early results suggest that the active learning tools developed for the tablet–namely, highlighting and bookmarking–are not sufficient for multimedia content and new tools must be developed to better support such activities. Future research and development are discussed

Understanding Visual Feedback in Large-Display Touchless Interactions: An Exploratory Study

Touchless interactions synthesize input and output from physically disconnected motor and display spaces without any haptic feedback. In the absence of any haptic feedback, touchless interactions primarily rely on visual cues, but properties of visual feedback remain unexplored. This paper systematically investigates how large-display touchless interactions are affected by (1) types of visual feedback—discrete, partial, and continuous; (2) alternative forms of touchless cursors; (3) approaches to visualize target-selection; and (4) persistent visual cues to support out-of-range and drag-and-drop gestures. Results suggest that continuous was more effective than partial visual feedback; users disliked opaque cursors, and efficiency did not increase when cursors were larger than display artifacts’ size. Semantic visual feedback located at the display border improved users’ efficiency to return within the display range; however, the path of movement echoed in drag-and-drop operations decreased efficiency. Our findings contribute key ingredients to design suitable visual feedback for large-display touchless environments.This work was partially supported by an IUPUI Research Support Funds Grant (RSFG)

Goal-driven requirements analysis for hypermedia-intensive Web applications

Requirements analysis for Web applications still needs to employ effective RE practices to accommodate some distinctive aspects: capturing high-level communication goals, considering several user profiles, defining hypermedia-specific requirements, bridging the gap between requirements and Web design, and reusing requirements for an effective usability evaluation. Techniques should be usable, informal, require little training effort, and show relative advantage to project managers. On the basis of the i * framework, this paper presents a proposal for defining hypermedia requirements (concerning aspects such as content, interaction, navigation, and presentation) for Web applications. The model adopts a goal-driven approach coupled with scenario-based techniques, introduces a hypermedia requirement taxonomy to facilitate Web conceptual design, and paves the way for systematic usability evaluation. Particular attention is paid to the empirical validation of the model based on the perceived quality attributes theory. A case study developed with industrial partners is discusse

Mastering the requirements analysis for communication-intensive websites

Web application development still needs to employ effective methods to accommodate some distinctive aspects of the requirements analysis process: capturing high-level communication goals, considering several user profiles and stakeholders, defining hypermedia-specific requirements (concerning navigation, content, information structure and presentation aspects), and reusing requirements for an effective usability evaluation. Techniques should be usable by both stakeholders and the design team, require little training effort, and show relative advantage to project managers. Over the last few years, requirements methodologies applied to web-based applications have considered mainly the transactional and operational aspects typical of traditional information systems. The communicational aspects of web sites have been neglected in regards to systematic requirements methods. This thesis, starting from key achievements in Requirements Engineering (hereafter RE), introduces a model (AWARE) for defining and analyzing requirements for web applications mainly conceived as strategic communication means for an institution or organization. The model extends traditional goal and scenario-based approaches for refining highlevel goals into website requirements, by introducing the analysis of ill-defined user goals, stakeholder communication goals, and a hypermedia requirement taxonomy to facilitate web conceptual design, and paving the way for a systematic usability evaluation. AWARE comprises a conceptual toolkit and a notation for effective requirements documentation. AWARE concepts and notation represent a useful communication and analysis conceptual tool that may support in the elicitation, negotiation, analysis and validation of requirements from the relevant stakeholders (users included). The empirical validation of the model is carried out in two ways. Firstly, the model has been employed in web projects on the field. These case studies and the lessons learnt will be presented and discussed to assess advantages and limits of the proposal. Secondly, a sample of web analysts and designers has been asked to study and apply the model: the feedback gathered is positive and encouraging for further improvement.Lo sviluppo di applicazioni web necessita di strumenti efficaci per gestire alcuni aspetti essenziali del processo di analisi dei requisiti: l'identificazione di obiettivi di comunicazione strategici, la presenza di una varietà di profili utente e di stakeholders, le definizione di requisiti ipermediali (riguardanti navigazione, interazione, contenuto e presentazione), e il riuso dei requisiti per una pianificazione efficace della valutazione dell'usabilità. Sono necessarie tecniche usabili sia dagli stakeholders che dai progettisti, che richiedono un tempo breve per essere appresi ed usati con efficacia, mostrando vantaggi significativi ai gestori di progetti complessi. La tesi definisce AWARE (Analysis of Web Application Requirements) - una metodologia per l'analisi dei requisiti specifica per la gestione di siti web (ed applicazioni interattive) con forti componenti comunicative. La metodologia estende le tecniche esistenti dell''analisi dei requisiti basate su approcci goal-oriented e scenario-based, introducendo una tassonomia di requisiti specifica per siti web (che permette di dare un input strutturato all'attività di progetazione), strumenti per l'identificazione e l'analisi di obiettivi ill-defined (generici o mal-definiti) e di obiettivi comunicativi e supporto metodologico per la valutazione dell'usabilità basata sui requisiti dell'applicazione. La metodologia AWARE è stata valutata sul campo attraverso progetti con professionisti del settore (web designers e IT managers), e grazie ad interventi di formazione in aziende specializzate nella comunicazione su web

Active Reading Behaviors in Tablet-based Learning

Active reading is fundamental to learning. However, there is little understanding about whether traditional active reading frameworks sufficiently characterize how learners study multimedia tablet textbooks. This paper explores the nature of active reading in the tablet environment through a qualitative study that engaged 30 students in an active reading experience with two tablet textbook modules. We discovered novel study behaviors learners enact that are key to the active reading experience with tablet textbooks. Results illustrate that existing active reading tools do little to support learners when they struggle to make sense of and subsequently remember content delivered in multiple media formats, are distracted by the mechanics of interactive content, and grapple with the transient nature of audiovisual material. We collected valuable user feedback and uncovered key deficiencies in existing active reading tools that hinder successful multimedia tablet textbook reading experiences. Our work can inform future designs of tools that support active reading in this environment

A configurable board-level adaptive incremental diagnosis technique based on decision trees

Functional diagnosis for complex electronic boards is a time-consuming task that requires big expertise to the diagnosis engineers. In this paper we propose a new engine for board-level adaptive incremental functional diagnosis based on decision trees. The engine incrementally selects the tests that have to be executed and based on the test outcomes it automatically stops the diagnosis as soon as one or more faulty candidates can be identified, thus allowing to reduce the number of executed tests. Moreover, we propose a configurable early stop condition for the engine that allows to further reduce the number of executed tests leveraging the diagnosis accuracy. The effectiveness of the proposed approach has been assessed using a set of synthetic but realistic boards and three industrial boards