This paper presents a novel virtual reality (VR) authoring tool designed to simplify the creation of human-robot interaction (HRI) studies. The tool was developed to lower the technical barriers in VR development and allows researchers to simulate complex robot interactions without the need for advanced programming skills. It incorporates key HRI methods such as the Wizard of Oz (WoZ) technique, eye-tracking and motion tracking, and provides a comprehensive platform for data collection and study customization. A technical user study with computer scientists was carried out to evaluate the technical applicability of the tool. The participants confirmed the user-friendliness, flexibility and accessibility of the tool and furthermore found the tool efficient and expressed a strong interest in using it for future research. The results underline the tool's potential to expand the use of VR in HRI research, especially for non-technical researchers.

The Experience Sampling Method (ESM) is a popular research method found in many fields to gather rich insights into participants' thoughts, emotions, and daily routines near the moment they happen. During the last decade, many technologically advanced ESM tools emerged that combine manually entered self-reports with automatically collected data from device sensors. In fact, it became difficult to keep track of them. We compiled a survey of ESM and its tools addressing technological capabilities for developers, study design opportunities for study administrators, and answering usability for study participants. It comprises data from 30 systems, applications, and toolkits, which are used for ESM studies. We present our results on the current state of the art from these main user perspectives, list general shortcomings, and give recommendations for future ESM tools.

Mid-air pointing gestures enable drivers to interact with a wide range of vehicle functions, without requiring drivers to learn a specific set of gestures. A sufficient pointing accuracy is needed, so that targeted elements can be correctly identified. However, people make relatively large pointing errors, especially in demanding situations such as driving a car. Eye-gaze provides additional information about the drivers' focus of attention that can be used to compensate imprecise pointing. We present a practical implementation of an algorithm that integrates gaze data, in order to increase the accuracy of pointing gestures. A user experiment with 91 participants showed that our approach led to an overall increase of pointing accuracy. However, the benefits depended on the participants' initial gesture performance and on the position of the target elements. The results indicate a great potential to support gesture accuracy, but also the need for a more sophisticated fusion algorithm.

Various on-the-road situations can make additional demands on the driver that go beyond the basic demands of driving. Thereby, they influence the appropriateness of in-vehicle input modalities to operate secondary tasks in the car. In this work, we assess the specific impacts of situational demands on gaze, gesture and speech input regarding driving performance, interaction efficiency and subjective ratings. An experiment with 29 participants in a driving simulator revealed significant interactions between situational demands and the input modality on secondary task completion times, perceived suitability and cognitive workload. Impairments were greatest when the situational demand addressed the same sensory channel as the used input modality. This was reflected differently in objective and subjective data depending on the used input modality. With this work, we explore the performance of natural input modalities across different situations and thereby support interaction designers that plan to integrate these modalities in automotive interaction concepts.

Building multi-touch multi-user applications for Shared Interactive Surfaces is a complex endeavour that requires fundamental knowledge in touch enabling hardware, gesture recognition, graphical representation of digital information and multi-user interaction. While several specialised toolkits help developers in this effort, we identified a variety of challenges with these toolkits, as for example the lack of cross-platform support, the limited number of touch-enabled multi-user widgets, missing documentation, and lacking community support -- all raising the barriers to entry. In this paper, we present TUIOFX, a toolkit for developing multi-touch, multi-user applications for Shared Interactive Surfaces in Java, which tackles all of the identified problems. The sophisticated implementation of TUIOFX adds support for TUIO-enabled hardware and multi-user interaction under the hood of JavaFX, and leaves the well-learned JavaFX API for the developers fully intact -- thus allowing particularly novices a very quick start. In this paper we provide the technical insights, in the concepts and their elegant implementation.

We present MagnetiCode, a new tagging mechanism that allows for physical mobile interaction. MagnetiCode tags can be captured and decoded by every compass-equipped mobile phone. They rely on a novel approach of transmitting binary IDs in form of a pulsed magnetic field. MagnetiCode therefore is able to substitute static tagging mechanisms like QR codes or RFID tags, in situations where visual tags are not appropriate or the expected number of users with NFC-enabled devices is poor. We confirm the general feasibility of our approach in a study.

Visual analytics involves complex analytical processes that can often benefit from collaboration. Many researchers have explored co-located synchronous systems to help support collaborative visual analytics; however, the process can often be long and require a series of sessions. Providing support for asynchronous collaboration in visual analytics systems can help divide the problem between several analysts across many sessions to ensure that they can effectively work together toward a solution. Currently, visual analytics systems offer limited support for asynchronous, multi-session work [1]. In this workshop, we seek to bring together researchers from both the CSCW and Visual Analytics communities to discuss avenues for supporting asynchronous collaboration in visual analytics system.

Cooperative systems supporting remote teams are based on distributed software architectures. Underneath most of these architectures is the Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4), which acts as technological backbone. Despite its strengths, the IPv4 also entails challenges for developers of such systems for getting system messages through firewalls without increasing latency and bringing delays for users. In this paper we introduce the Robust Cooperation Suite for communication, coordination, and collaboration, as well as its Robust Trav mechanism for effective and efficient NAT traversal.

Awareness support in cooperative environments has been a research issue in the area of distributed systems for computer-supported cooperative work for more than two decades. Measuring its effectiveness remains a complex task since it is difficult to grasp awareness in situ. Consequently, techniques and tools are required generating results while a user's awareness is still present. The Standardized Coordination Task Assessment (SCTA) and its tool the SCTA Tracer use freeze probes to query participants at specific points in time while working on a common task measuring and recording response times, performance, and errors. The result is visualized in a four quadrant system distinguishing illusive, ineffective, inefficient, and ideal systems. The SCTA Tracer guides awareness support researchers and designers to focus their effort on essential concepts already at early development stages. This paper shows how a smart selection of tools and techniques is integrated for this complex task.

In this paper we present the PRIMIExperience system, proposing the use of instant messaging as a mean for carrying out cost-effective Experience Sampling studies with a minimised setup effort.

The ICT for Development (ICTD) research field still lacks a generic architecture approach unifying software development tasks in ICTD research. With a common approach technical ICTD research could evolve from single point solutions narrowed to one specific use case or technology towards a shared approach following the common goal of providing ICT access in ICTD use case scenarios. In this paper we present the replication of the Bottom Billion Architecture (BBA) in a second use case scenario. The BBA was developed and evaluated in a procurement use case in South Africa. The replication takes place in a cashew supply chain in Ghana whose current inefficient paper based organization hampers collaborative business with the established economy. The BBA prototype has been deployed for a five month pilot phase with about 400 participating cashew farmers. With this successful replication of the same architecture in two different use case scenarios we are now able to evaluate its capabilities to serve as a generic architecture for various technical ICTD use case scenarios.

Group recommender systems provide groups of users with shared recommendations. They have great potential for easing group decision processes, while at the same time entailing new technological and user-centred challenges. In this paper we present the GroupRecoPF platform providing developers with support for building scalable and user-friendly group recommender systems. It leverages on advanced concepts for group recommendation merging strategy exploration, performance optimisation, session persistence and mobility, as well as open interfaces.

Movie recommender systems simplify the movie selection by providing movie suggestions based on the respective user's personal taste. Most of the current systems address individual users, support stationary use, and require pre-configuration. In this paper we present an approach for group recommendations for movies based on a novel group recommender process model for ad-hoc groups with on-demand recommendations.

The progress of developing countries towards an information society has entailed a strong demand for Information and Communication Technology (ICT) access solutions that are able to cope with the infrastructural and cultural requirements specific to rural developing areas. Most software architectures developed in former ICTD projects realize ICT access limited to one specific concept like kiosk PCs or Smartphones or SMS applications. However, extensible and reusable architectures supporting multiple concepts are missing. In this paper, we present the Bottom Billion Architecture (BBA), a software architecture that supports various hardware (Desktop PCs, Smartphones, Feature and Non-Feature Phones), applications (native, Java, Mobile Web) and data channels (voice, signalling, data). Implemented in rural South Africa, the BBA was deployed within a real procurement use case, following a Living Lab approach. During a eight month pilot experiment the BBA proved to be an appropriate architecture concept to host an improved ICT enabled procurement process that saves time and money of the participating shops. To test and improve the generalizability of the BBA concept it will be replicated in an agricultural use case in rural Ghana.

Technical Information and Communication Technologies for Development (ICTD) research lacks appropriate research methods along the entire development lifecycle spanning design, development, deployment, evaluation and monitoring. Mobile HCI has a great set of research methods that have proven their suitability in mobile research. However, applying Mobile HCI research methods unchanged in technical ICTD will fail due to the specific cultural, infrastructural and governmental context of developing countries. In this workshop we want to bring together people who are active in Mobile HCI and ICTD research to elaborate on Mobile HCI methods and discuss their application for technical ICTD.

Media spaces provide users with flexible support for easy interaction with technology and with each other, both at the same place and over distance. From a technological perspective the development of these environments is often inefficient, since most environments are developed specifically, without any synergies or reuse of previous concepts and implementations. In this paper we present the cooperative media space PPPSpace that is based on powerful technical parallel and distributed software engineering concepts and at the same time easy to use for end-users.

Distributed physical user interfaces comprise networked sensors, actuators and other devices attached to a variety of computers in different locations. Developing such systems is no easy task. It is hard to track the location and status of component devices, even harder to understand, validate, test and debug how events are transmitted between devices, and hardest yet to see if the overall system behaves correctly. Our Visual Environment Explorer supports developers of these systems by visualizing the location and status of individual and/or aggregate devices. It visualizes the current event flow between devices as they are received and transmitted, as well as the event history. Events are displayable at various levels of detail. The visualization also shows the activity of applications that use these physical devices. The tool is highly interactive: developers can explore system behavior through spatial navigation, zooming, multiple simultaneous views, event filtering, details-on-demand, and time-dependent semantic zooming.

Abstract-In e-learning platforms the social interaction between students and teachers as well as among students is important for effective and efficient learning. Therefore, e-learning platforms need technological support for online presence and communication. In this paper we present the Presence in Learning Spaces (PILS) infrastructure, which provides advanced concepts for mutual presence information and seamless communication between online users based on an open implementation. Its novel concepts support course-specific mutual presence and communication, mutual communication awareness, and e-learning-specific online states. Its open implementation leverages remote control through course and user administration services, presence and communication control services, and data and inferencing services. The PILS infrastructure is part of the Adaptive Learning Spaces (ALS) platform, developed in the Adaptive Learning Spaces (ALS) EU-project.

Sensor-based infrastructures are important base technology for cooperative media spaces that support the natural interaction of users with their physical environment and with other users beyond the traditional keyboard and mouse. Sensor-based infrastructures basically capture data from sensors, store and process these data, and provide the data to clients. Several infrastructures have been developed; they all have their specific strengths in supporting either publish or subscribe, push or pull. In this paper we present a generic and advanced concept and implementation of a publish and subscribe mechanism for distributed sensor-based infrastructures that is sophisticated yet easy to configure and that is resource-saving through load balancing and provides push and pull. We exemplify this publish and subscribe mechanism in the CoLocScribe use case where we designed and developed advanced publish and subscribe for a cooperative media space.

In ubiquitous environments an increasing number of sensors capture information on users and an increasing number of actuators present information to users. In this paper we present CoDaMine-a novel approach for providing users with system-generated feedback and control in ubiquitous environments giving them the freedom they need while reducing their effort. Basically, CoDaMine captures and classifies users' online communication to learn about their social relationships in order to provide them with recommendations for interpersonal privacy and trust management.

Tangible and embedded computing brings technology integrates digital technology in the physical environment of everyday life. Thereby, families in private households are increasingly researched and supported. In this paper we present the concept and implementation of the FamilyFaces---a contact management tool supporting families when managing their contacts and information disclosure, and we report on initial user feedback. FamilyFaces is based on a card-game metaphor on large displays to provide wide-spread access to family members, from teenagers to grandparents.

Social TV systems provide groups of TV spectators with technical support for colocated and geographically distributed TV watching and social interaction. This article provides a systematic overview of the design space of Social TV and suggests a technical framework for flexible Social TV providing groups of TV spectators with sophisticated yet easy-to-use support for colocated and geographically distributed TV watching and social interaction. It sketches a scenario of advanced Social TV and then reviews previous concepts and systems as well as studies on Social TV to come to an in-depth presentation of design dimensions of Social TV. It introduces the Cooperative Media Space for Social TV as a technical platform for flexible support of advanced Social TV along the identified design dimensions.

Early sensor-based infrastructures were often developed by experts with a thorough knowledge of base technology for sensing information, for processing the captured data, and for adapting the system's behaviour accordingly. In this paper we introduce the CollaborationBus application: a graphical editor that provides abstractions from base technology and thereby allows experts as well as non-experts to configure ubiquitous computing environments. By composing pipelines users can easily specify the information flows from selected sensors, via optional filters for processing the sensor data, to actuators changing the system behaviour according to their wishes. Users can compose pipelines for both home and work environments. An integrated sharing mechanism allows them to share their own compositions and to reuse and build upon others' compositions. Real-time visualisations help them understand the information flows through their pipelines. In this paper we present the concept and implementation of the CollaborationBus application

In distance communication, there is - despite technical progress in information and communication technology - still an asymmetry and tension between the contacter who spontaneously wants to approach the contactee over distance, and the contactee who wants to avoid inappropriate disruption. We have designed and developed MatchBase - a development suite for efficient context-aware communication. Context-aware communication aims to use computer hardware and software to mediate communication between contacters and contactees according to their actual context, where the contacters' context refers to their current situation and their motivation to initiate the communication and where the contactees' context refers to their current situation and availability. In this paper, we present the concept and the implementation of the MatchBase development suite.

In this paper FrameDrops is presented. FrameDrops is a mobile VideoBlog-it allows users to capture videos and pictures on the move with modern mobile phones, and to send these data with a comment and with information on the current geographical position to a FrameDrops server. FrameDrops servers automatically insert the data in a repository, and generate integrated interactive Web pages. FrameDrops can be used for various purposes where users want to easily capture information in-situ and share it with others.

An increasing number of computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW) software systems try to provide users with awareness information-information about the presence, activities, and availability of members of a community. However, most of these software systems are designed from a feature-oriented, rather than a human-oriented, point of view. In this article, a structured embedding of findings in social sciences is proposed. It reveals the variety of approaches in technology-driven CSCW developments featuring awareness, as well as the variety of empirical evidence in small-group research with respect to awareness. The authors have been looking at different aspects of awareness: the terminology used in both disciplines, the concepts that have been developed, and the different constructs that have evolved from empirical research. Finally, operational instances of awareness have been revisited. From these findings it can be concluded that awareness addresses different constellations of group settings, different types of individual behavior, and different contexts of use. These findings can be used by CSCW software system developers for postevaluation-that is, to identify empirical evidence for awareness features already implemented and to identify those already implemented features still lacking empirical evidence. The findings should also encourage social scientists to empirically investigate the usage of existing and envisioned software features in CSCW settings. Overall, the results should help to achieve a shift from technology-driven development toward human-centered design of collaborative communities, due to the envisioned integration of understandings and concepts.