Hunter Gatherer is a tool that lets Web users carry out three main tasks: (1) collect components from within Web pages; (2) represent those components in a collection; and (3) edit those collections. We report on the design and evaluation of the tool and contextualize tool use in terms of our research goals to investigate possible shifts in information interaction practices resulting from tool use

Modjeska, David

schraefel, m.c.

Wigdor, Daniel

Zhu, Yuxiang

English

Southampton (e-Prints Soton)

Hunter Gatherer: Within-Web-Page Collection Makingm.c. schraefel1, David Modjeska2, Daniel Wigdor1, Yuxiang Zhu11Department of Computer Science | 2Faculty of Information StudiesUniversity of TorontoToronto, Canada[mc | yuxiang | dwigdor]@dgp.toronto.edu; modjeska@fis.toronto.eduABSTRACTHunter Gatherer is a tool that lets Web users carry out threemain tasks: (1) collect components from within Web pages;(2) represent those components in a collection; and (3) editthose collections. We report on the design and evaluation ofthe tool, and contextualize tool use in terms of our researchgoals to investigate possible shifts in information interactionpractices resulting from tool use.KEYWORDSInteraction design, information gathering, information man-agement, information sharing, attention, collectionsINTRODUCTIONStudies of Web-based information interaction (such as [2],[4])  have generally dealt with a page as the smallest unit ofinterest. Our task analysis indicates: (1) that Web userswant to collect information items found within Web pagesfor a variety of purposes, such personal research, ongoingreference, or resource sharing, but that (2) users onlyinfrequently make such collections, in large part because ofpoor interaction support for this activity. For instance,bookmarks referencing entire pages often capture more thanthe desired data; this forces users first to load and then tosift through multiple pages to find desired material. Texteditors cause users to shift attention between two tasks -information gathering in the browser and informationmanagement in the editor. With editors, users often neglectto label a collected component with a title or URL (from thesource page); this makes later access to the original materialdifficult, reducing the collection’s value over time. Wedeveloped Hunter Gatherer (HG) for two reasons: first, tosupport such within-page collection making, and second,through observing tool use, to investigate  how user-determined sub-page component capture might affectinformation interaction practices.HG (Fig. 1) blends the transparency of bookmark capturefor selecting components, with editor support for revisingcollections. For each component, HG also automates theinclusion of a contextual, editable header and grabs theURL of the source page, so that users can return to thesource document at any time.  Our goal for HunterGatherer’s interaction design is to let users easily determinethe information activity that they wish to focus on:gathering, management or contemplation of the collection.Hunter Gatherer is the result of iterative user-based design,surveys and evaluation. This paper briefly summarizesrelated work in Web-based collection management, thendescribes HG’s interaction design, and presents the mostrecent version of the artifact and its lab evaluation. Weconclude with next steps for using the tool  to address ourlarger research questions on possible shifts in interactionpractices.RELATED WORKWhen we focus on information gathering on the Web, wehighlight the process of “information triage” [2].  Whilethere has been much work done on the management of Web-based document collections, there has been less work on theinteraction activity of first capturing the triaged informationand then placing it into a collection. Accordingly, our workhas focused on the latter process.With respect to similar, existing research and commercialtools, there are several of particular interest: WebBooks [1],Data Mountain [3], and TopicShop [4]. Each of these toolsfocuses on the Web page as the smallest unit of capture.Even with browser-integrated editors, such as Front Page,URL information and headers are not captured; file man-agement is generally local. Commercial tools such asWebForia, which do capture components, are platform spe-cific applications requiring management separate from theFigure 1. Hunter Gather. The Collection Window (fore-ground) presents all gathered elements, while a List Viewappears (upper left) for monitoring the Collection as it isbeing built; lower left are the components’ source pages.Short Talk: Web Tools and Applications                                                                      CHI   changing the world, changing ourselves     Copyright is held by the author/owner(s). CHI 2002, April 20-25, 2002, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA. ACM 1-58113-454-1/02/0004. 826browser. Web Squirrel, inspired by Spatial Hypertext, sup-ports the idea of components within pages, but capturesneither URLs nor non-textual information. None of thiswork specifically considers the interaction of moving con-tent from one context (browser) to another (collection).HUNTER GATHERER DESIGN PROCESSBased on our task analysis, we determined 3 requirementsfor Hunter Gatherer.  (1) To make the addition of compo-nents to collections as transparent as highlighting text. (2)To support user-driven focus shift among component selec-tion, addition, monitoring, and management. (3) To givecollected  components enough contextual information toprovide immediate value to the user.Description of the Tool and InteractionHG is browser-based, server-side tool requiring no addi-tional software on the user’s part. This integration with thebrowser minimizes divided attention forced by shifting be-tween  browser and editor for gathering and management.HG lets users select parts of Web pages, and by pressing akeyboard command, add the selected component to a col-lection. The Collection is another Web page. (Fig 1,foreground). Each element in the Collection appears withthe URL to its source page, as well as a default, editableheader, based on the source page title and keywords in theselection. The user can peripherally monitor the collectionas it is built: a background window (Fig. 1, upper left)shows the automatically generated name of each componentas it is added to the collection. The list can also be used tosort, delete or rename components (the user can also per-form these revisions directly in the Collection page).  HGdoes not copy data into a collection; it creates references forthe components instead. The URL for a Collection pagecontains references to each of its components. RepresentingCollections in a URL makes them easy to share, e.g., send-ing the URL via email. Throughout the collection process,the user rather than tool interaction determines task focus:hunt for information, select and add components from thosesources, or edit the contents of a collection.EVALUATIONIn order to assess how Hunter Gatherer meets requirementsfor component collecting, focus shifting and immediatevalue, we ran a user study to assess the tool’s efficiency.Design and MethodologyWe performed a 2x2, within-subjects study to compare HGwith a text editor for the task of creating collections. Toreduce learning effects, we choose Microsoft Word as atool familiar to participants. The first factor in the experi-ment was tool (Hunter Gatherer vs. Word); the secondfactor was data set (Web pages in a university’s Chemistryvs. Physics departments). The study had 12 participants,representing a mix of technical and non-technical under-graduate and graduate students.To start each session, users received 15 minutes of trainingwith HG. Users were then asked to build two collections,each from a given bookmark set, to be clear enough for useby another person. Tool exposure order was counterbal-anced. To reduce potential learning effects, we preparedtwo similar sets of bookmarks, one each on the Chemistryand Physics programs at University of Toronto. The pagesin each set were taken from a single Web site.  Participantshad 5 minutes with each set of 3 bookmarks to familiarizethemselves with page contents. Participants then had 15minutes to build a collection from these bookmarks to (1)explain degree requirements for a subject minor, (2) list anddescribe required courses, and (3) show current instructors.Results and DiscussionA one-way within-subjects ANOVA showed a significanteffect of tool type (collection time (F = 5.730, p < .040) incomparing average component collection time using HGand Word. Participants required an average of 6.7 secondsusing HG and an average of 10.9 seconds using Word.In the post-evaluation questionnaire participants com-mented that sorting components in collections was easier inHG than in Word. Similarly, 10 of 12 users mentioned theautomatic capture of a component’s URL as HG’s strongestfeature.We have met the first design requirement - to make the ad-dition of a component as efficient as copying text from abrowser. Hunter Gatherer’s selection performance is alsosignificantly better than Word’s, and the HG method is alsomore effective than Word for component addition.CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE WORKEmpirical and anecdotal data indicate that Hunter Gathereris a promising tool for improving user interaction with Webresources. After tool enhancements based on the above re-sults, HG will also serve as a platform for a follow-up,longitudinal study to consider our main research questions:(1)  how facilitating capture of user-determined componentsmay change the way users think about information (e.g.,becoming active co-creators), and (2) what the conse-quences of such a shift may be. As a browser-integratedWeb-based tool, HG supports wide deployment for consid-ering these research questions in a significant population.REFERENCES1.  Card, S K., Robertson, G. G., York, W.  The WebBookand the Web Forager: an Information Workspace forthe WWW. Conf. Proc. on Human Factors in Comput-ing Systems (Van., Canada, April 13-18, 1996), 111.2.  Marshall, C. C. Shipman, F.M., Coombs, J.H. VIKI:Spatial Hypertext Supporting Emergent Structure. Pro-ceedings of the 1994 ACM European Conf. onHypermedia Technology, 1994, 13–23.3.  Robertson, G., Czerwinski, M., Larson, K. Robbins, D.,Thiel, D., van Dantzich, M. Data Mountain: Using Spa-tial Memory for Document Management. Proc. OfUIST ‘98, 11th Annual Symp. on UIST, 153-162.4.  Terveen, L., Hill, W., Amento, B. Constructing, Or-ganizing, and Visualizing Collections of TopicallyRelated Web Resources. ACM Trans. on Computer-Human Interact. 6, 1 (Mar. 1999), 67-94.minneapolis, minnesota, usa • 20-25 april 2002                                                                               Short Talk: Web Tools and Applications       827

Hunter gatherer: within-web-page collection making

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Southampton (e-Prints Soton)