Parallel exhibitions : empowering users to virtually and physically design customized museum exhibits

Digital content is ubiquitous in all parts of life today. In particular Web 2.0 technology changed the way of communication. It allows everybody to contribute to digital content and to reach a large audience. The possibility to contribute also has an effect on the desire to contribute to real world'' matters. At the same time an incredible amount of information is online accessible without any effort. In many cases this enables us to find specific information fast and without leaving our current location. This forces public knowledge places, like libraries or museums, to re-think their role as knowledge providers. These institutions have to become places of social interaction which provide meaningful collections of objects and information as well as space for creativity. Visiting a museum is a great experience. Seeing objects, which have texture and physical characteristics combined with the history and the story of the exhibit, is an adventure and beneficial for engagement with a certain topic. Museums store much more objects, than they can present. These exhibits are not accessible for the public and sometimes not even for research purposes. It is a challenging task for curators and museum professionals to select objects for a meaningful and appealing arrangement. Re-creating and re-arranging exhibits in museums is mostly prohibited for visitors, because shown exhibits are often one of a kind, expensive, or damageable. During the last decade museums build large databases to index their objects. In Parallel Exhibitions we make use of these databases to invite visitors to become co-curators in museums. We design and implemented an application, which allows museum visitors to contribute to the exhibition design. Curators can additionally include physical exhibition in the virtual interaction space to create a close relationship to other exhibits in the museum. To evaluate our concept and our application we conducted a field test in a museum as well as an online study. In addition we interviewed possible users and museums professionals. We observed a rich social interaction around our application in the field study and the studies confirm that visitors have an interest to contribute to exhibitions they are visiting, both locally and on social media

Improving the effectiveness of interactive data analytics with phone-tablet combinations

Smartphones and tablet computer are ubiquitous in daily life. Many people carrying smartphones and tablet computers with them simultaneously. The multiplicity of different sized devices indicates the conflict between the maximal interaction space and a minimal bulkiness of the devices. This dissertation we extend the interaction space of mobile devices by adding mutual-spatial awareness to ordinary devices. By combining multiple mobile devices and using relative device placement as an additional input source we designed a mobile tabletop system for ad-hoc collaboration. With this setting we aimed to emulate the concept of so-called interactive tablecloth, which envisages every surface of a table top will become an interactive surface. To evaluate the concept we designed and implemented a working prototype, called MochaTop. To provide the mutual-spatial awareness we placed the mobile devices on an interactive table. For the future we believe in possibilities to replace the interactive table by technology integrated in the mobile device. In this study we used both one Android smartphone and one Android tablet as mobile devices. To track the position of the devices we used one Microsoft Surface2 (SUR40). The system is designed for exploring multimedia information and visual data representations by manipulating the position of two mobile devices on a horizontal surface. We present possible use-cases and environments. In a second step we discuss multiple low fidelity prototypes. The results are integrated in the development of MochaTop. The application MochaTop is designed as an example for exploring digital information. To influence the participants not too much by the content, we choose a common topic to present in MochaTop: coffee production and trade. We present the implementation of MochaTop and the conducted user study with 23 participants. Overall we could awaken interest for future systems by the study-participants and show that the system supports knowledge transfer. Furthermore we were able to identify design challenges for future development of mobile tabletops. These challenges concern mostly input feedback, interaction zones and three dimensional input.Smartphones und Tablet-Computer sind Teil unseres täglichen Lebens. Viele Menschen tragen sowohl Smartphone als auch Tablet-Computer ständig bei sich. Die Vielfalt an unterschiedlich großen Smartphones und Tablet-Computern zeigt einen Interessenskonflikt auf: Einerseits sollen mobile Geräte eine maximal große Interaktionsfläche bieten. Andererseits sollen die Geräte möglichst wenig sperrig sein. In dieser Studienarbeit wird der Interaktionsraum von mobilen Geräten durch gegenseitige räumliche Lage Wahrnehmung erweitert. Durch die Kombination von mehreren mobilen Geräten und der Nutzung von relativen Geräte-Positionen als zusätzliche Eingabemethode, gestalten wir ein mobiles Tabletop System für ad-hoc Zusammenarbeit. Somit emulieren wir das Konzept "interactive tablecloth", welches hervorsagt, dass sich alle Tische und Oberflächen zu digitalen Interaktionsflächen verwandeln werden. Um unser Konzept zu evaluieren entworfen und implementierten wir einen lauffähigen Prototype, genannt MochaTop. Um die gegenseitige räumliche Lage Wahrnehmung der mobil Geräte nutzen zu können, platzierten wir diese auf einem interaktiven Tisch. Für die Zukunft gehen wir davon aus, dass sich entsprechende Sensoren leicht in Smartphones und Tablet-Computer integrieren lassen. In dieser Arbeit verwenden wir sowohl Android Smartphones als auch Android Tablet-Computer. Um die Position des Smartphones und des Tablet-Computers zu ermitteln nutzen wir einen Microsoft Surface2 (SUR40). Das System ist entworfen um multimediale Informationen und graphische Datenrepräsentationen durch Positionsveränderung zweier Geräte zu erforschen. Wir stellen verschiedene Use-Cases und Einsatzumgebungen vor. In einem zweiten Schritt diskutieren wir verschiedene Prototypen. Diese Ergebnisse fließen anschließend in die Entwicklung von MochaTop ein. Die Anwendung MochaTop ist eine beispielhafter Prototype, um digitalen Inhalt erfahrbar zu machen. Um die Studienteilnehmer nicht zu sehr durch den präsentierten Inhalt zu beeinflussen, präsentieren wir in MochaTop ein alltägliches Thema: Kaffeeproduktion und -Handel. In dieser Arbeit stellen wir die Implantierung von MochaTop sowie die anschließende Benutzerstudie vor. Die Benutzerstudie führten wir mit 23 Probanden durch um unser System zu analysieren. Insgesamt stellten wir Interesse der Teilnehmer an den getesteten Techniken fest und konnten zeigen, dass unser System einen positiven Einfluss auf die Wissensvermittlung hat. Darüber hinaus konnten wir verschiedene Herausforderungen für weitere Entwicklungen identifizieren. Diese betreffen hauptsächlich das Eingabefeedback, interaktive Zonen und drei dimensionale Eingaben

Large displays and tablets:Data exploration and its effects on data collection

Data is pivotal to open government initiatives, where citizens are often expected to be informed and actively participate. Yet, it can be difficult for people to understand the meaning of data. Presenting data to the public in an appropriate way may also increase citizen's willingness to participate in data collection. Here we present a study which explores how large screens can support socially relevant data exploration. In a between subject laboratory experiment, we analysed how pairs of participants explored data visualisations on a high-resolution display (LHRD) and a tablet. Our results indicate that LHRDs are less cognitively demanding, while tablets offer more shared control of the interface. Data exploration had limited effect on increasing comfort with sharing personal data but helped increase perceptions of trustworthiness within the data collection process. We observed that appropriately visualised data on either platform has significant potential to increase the public's understanding of large data sets

The value of information cues for lifelog video navigation

With the advent of lifelogging cameras the amount of personal video material is massively growing to an extent that easily overwhelms the user. To efficiently review lifelog data, we need well designed video navigation tools. In this paper, we analyze which cues are most beneficial for lifelog video navigation. We show that the information kind determines the most appropriate cue in single cue systems, but that multicue approaches are more appreciated. These findings can inspire to design video players with multiple navigation cues, including time, place, persons, and events for easier and more efficient lifelog video retrieval

Modulation Linearity Characterization of Si Ring Modulators

Modulation linearity of Si ring modulators (RMs) is investigated through the numerical simulation based on the coupled-mode theory and experimental verification. Numerical values of the key parameters needed for the simulation are experimentally extracted. Simulation and measurement results agree well. With these, the influence of input optical wavelength and power on the Si RM linearity are characterized

Pervasive interaction across displays

Digital screens are becoming more and more ubiquitous. Resolution and size are increasing, and, at the same time, prices for displays are falling. Large display installations are increasingly appearing in public spaces as well as in home and office environments. We expect this trend to continue, making wall-size displays commonplace in the next decade. With this development, all three classes of devices described by Mark Weiser - pads, tabs, and boards - will be mainstream. Pads (tablets), tabs (smartphones), and boards (displays) let us show and interact with data in different situations, because each device class is optimized for a certain use case. Consequently, the use of multiple devices becomes common—for example, the use of second screens while watching TV is becoming the norm. However, the use of multiple devices requires seamless transitions between devices, mechanisms for exchanging data, and the ability to move content from one device to another and to remotely access or control the data. Back in 1998, Michael Beigle and his colleagues proposed dynamically and automatically distributing Web-based content to different output devices in a smart environment. A few years later, Roy Want and his colleagues suggested using interfaces in our environment to interact with our personal data. Because mobile devices or notebooks often provide only a small screen for output and limited input techniques, they proposed using office screens or public displays to create a more enjoyable user experience. They also argued for having physical access to private data. These examples highlight that research in ubiquitous computing was already early on exploring interaction across pervasive devices, displays, and content. Current products support both visions. On one hand, there are devices that provide options to present remote data on a screen in the environment with the control residing on the mobile device. On the other hand, there are means to easily present content from mobile devices on remote displays. There are now also many cloud-based products for interacting with data on multiple devices. For example, Dropbox provides access to all text documents and images. Spotify lets you enjoy your favorite music on smartphones, tablets, notebooks, and music systems. Furthermore, people are starting to use mobile devices as remote controls for large screens, smart TVs, or music systems. All these examples show that streaming and connecting different devices ubiquitously are key technologies for smart environments. Here, we present a few commercially available technologies supporting this and provide an outlook on how displays might become a service themselves

Mid-Air gestures for window management on large displays

We can observe a continuous trend for using larger screens with higher resolutions and greater pixel density. With advances in hard- and software technology, wall-sized displays for daily office work are already on the horizon. We assume that there will be no hard paradigm change in interaction techniques in the near future. Therefore, new concepts for wall-sized displays will be included in existing products. Designing interaction concepts for wall-sized displays in an office environment is a challenging task. Most crucial is designing appropriate input techniques. Moving the mouse pointer from one corner to another over a longer distance is cumbersome. However, pointing with a mouse is precise and common-place. We propose using mid-air gestures to support input with mouse and keyboard on large displays. In particular, we designed a gesture set for manipulating regular windows

Pac-many: Movement behavior when playing collaborative and competitive games on large displays

Peer reviewe

Si photonic-electronic monolithically integrated optical receiver with a built-in temperature-controlled wavelength filter

We present a Si photonic-electronic integrated ring-resonator based optical receiver that contains a temperature-controlled ring-resonator filter (RRF), a Ge photodetector, and receiver circuits in a single chip. The temperature controller automatically determines the RRF temperature at which the maximum transmission of the desired WDM signal is achieved and maintains this condition against any temperature or input wavelength fluctuation. This Si photonic-electronic integrated circuit is realized with 0.25-µm photonic BiCMOS technology, and its operation is successfully confirmed with measurement

Interaction techniques for wall-sized screens

Large screen displays are part of many future visions, such as i-LAND that describes the possible workspace of the future. Research showed that wall-sized screens provide clear benefits for data exploration, collaboration and organizing work in office environments. With the increase of computational power and falling display prices wall-sized screens currently make the step out of research labs and specific settings into office environments and private life. Today, there is no standard set of interaction techniques for interacting with wall-sized displays and it is even unclear if a single mode of input is suitable for all potential applications. In this workshop, we will bring together researchers from academia and industry who work on large screens. Together, we will survey current research directions, review promising interaction techniques, and identify the underlying fundamental research challenges