End-User Service Computing: Spreadsheets as a Service Composition Tool

In this paper, we show how spreadsheets, an end-user development paradigm proven to be highly productive and simple to learn and use, can be used for complex service compositions. We identify the requirements for spreadsheet-based service composition, and present our framework that implements these requirements. Our framework enables spreadsheets to send requests and retrieve results from various local and remote services. We show how our tools support different composition patterns, and how the style of declarative dependencies of spreadsheets can facilitate service composition. We also discuss novel issues identified by using the framework in several projects and education

Open Source Software: All You Do Is Put It Together

The authors propose an infrastructure for rapidly prototyping applications from open source software components. The Adaptable Multi-Interface Communicator infrastructure (AMICO) is based on ideas of middleware platforms for component integration, but it focuses on pragmatic aspects of OSS integration, often absent from many existing integration platforms. The authors also identify the key requirements of middleware for rapid prototyping with OSS components and illustrate their approach through two examples in complex scenarios

Universal Accessibility as a Multimodal Design Issue

In recent years, many research activities have focused on design that aims to produce universally accessible systems, taking into account special needs of various user groups. These special needs are associated with many user factors, such as impairments of speech, hearing or vision, cognitive limitations, aging, as well as with various environmental factors. Fields that address this problem, such as Usability, Universal Accessibility, Universal Design, or Inclusive Design have been developed as relatively independent domains, but they share many aspects with other human-computer interaction (HCI) disciplines. However, researchers and practitioners are often not aware of interconnections among concepts of universal accessibility and "ordinary" HCI. In view of this situation, in this article we show there is a fundamental connection between multimodal interface design and universal accessibility, and that awareness of these links can help both disciplines. Researchers from these areas may use different terminology, but the concepts they use often have essentially the same meaning. We propose a unified conceptual framework where these areas can be joined

Integrating heterogeneous open-source software into web browsers using AMICO:WEB

A web browser provides a uniform user interface to different types of information. Making this interface universally accessible and more interactive is a long term goal still far from being achieved. Universally accessible browsers require novel interaction modalities and additional functionalities, for which existing browsers tend to provide only partial solutions. Although functionality for web accessibility can be found as open-source and free software components, their reuse and integration is complex because they were developed in diverse implementation environments, following standards and conventions incompatible with the web. To enable the integration of existing partial solutions within a mainstream web browser environment, we have developed a middleware infrastructure, AMICO:WEB. This enables browser access to a wide variety of open source and free software components. The main contribution of AMICO:WEB is in enabling the syntactic interoperability between web extension mechanisms and a variety of integration mechanisms used by open-source and free software components. It also bridges the semantic differences between the high-level world of web XML-based APIs and the low-level APIs of the device-oriented world. We discuss the design decisions made during the development of AMICO:WEB in the context of web accessibility, using two typical usage scenarios: one describing a disabled user using a mainstream web browser with additional interaction modalities; another describing a non-disabled user browsing in a suboptimal interaction situation

Web browser accessibility using open source software

A Web browser provides a uniform user interface to different types of information. Making this interface universally accessible and more interactive is a long term goal still far from being achieved. Universally accessible browsers require novel interaction modalities and additional functionalities, for which existing browsers tend to provide only partial solutions. Although functionality for Web accessibility can be found as open source and free software components, their reuse and integration is complex because they were developed in diverse implementation environments, following standards and conventions incompatible with the Web. To enable the integration of existing partial solutions within a mainstream Web browser environment, we have developed a middleware infrastructure, AMICO:WEB. This enables browser access to a wide variety of open source and free software components. The main contribution of AMICO:WEB is in enabling the syntactic interoperability between Web extension mechanisms and a variety of integration mechanisms used by open source and free software components. It als

Vocabularies for description of accessibility issues in multimodal user interfaces

In previous work, we proposed a unified approach for describing multimodal human-computer interaction and interaction constraints in terms of sensual, motor, perceptual and cognitive functions of users. In this paper, we extend this work by providing formalised vocabularies that express human functionalities and anatomical structures required by specific modalities. The central theme of our approach is to connect these modality representations with descriptions of user, device and environmental constraints that influence the interaction. These descriptions can then be used in a reasoning framework that will exploit formal connections among interaction modalities and constraints. The focus of this paper is on specifying a comprehensive vocabulary of necessary concepts. Within the context of an interaction framework, we describe a number of examples that use this formalised knowledge

Vocabularies for description of accessibility issues in multimodal user interfaces

In previous work, we proposed a unified approach for describing multimodal human-computer interaction and interaction constraints in terms of sensual, motor, perceptual and cognitive functions of users. In this paper, we extend this work by providing formalised vocabularies that express human functionalities and anatomical structures required by specific modalities. The central theme of our approach is to connect these modality representations with descriptions of user, device and environmental constraints that influence the interaction. These descriptions can then be used in a reasoning framework that will exploit formal connections among interaction modalities and constraints. The focus of this paper is on specifying a comprehensive vocabulary of necessary concepts. Within the context of an interaction framework, we describe a number of examples that use this formalised knowledge

Designing interactive ambient multimedia applications: requirements and implementation challenges

Ambient intelligence opens new possibilities for interactive multimedia, leading towards applications where the selection, generation and playback of multimedia content can be directed and influenced by multiple users in an ambient sensor network. In this paper, we derive the basic requirements for a flexible infrastructure that can support the integration of multimedia and ambient intelligence, and enable rapid tailoring of interactive multimedia applications. We describe our implementation of the proposed infrastructure, and demonstrate its functionality through several prototype application

Designing interactive ambient multimedia applications: requirements and implementation challenges

Ambient intelligence opens new possibilities for interactive multimedia, leading towards applications where the selection, generation and playback of multimedia content can be directed and influenced by multiple users in an ambient sensor network. In this paper, we derive the basic requirements for a flexible infrastructure that can support the integration of multimedia and ambient intelligence, and enable rapid tailoring of interactive multimedia applications. We describe our implementation of the proposed infrastructure, and demonstrate its functionality through several prototype application