This study evaluated the versatility of the MoJoXlab in conducting clinical movement analysis using inertial sensors from various manufacturers, including low-cost, non-proprietary, and open-protocol wearable options. Data were collected from 15 healthy participants who performed a range of clinically relevant activities and exercises using two sets of sensors. Dynamic time warping analysis of the sensor signals suggested that the collected dataset could be used for further algorithm development. The findings demonstrate that the current iteration of MoJoXlab can perform movement analysis using quaternions from sensors of any manufacturer. However, the accuracy of the resulting joint angles is not yet suitable for clinical applications across all sensor types, and only Xsens and NGIMU sensors are currently supported. This study also explored the potential for reducing the number of sensors required by MoJoXlab, which currently uses seven sensors to calculate joint angles for three joints (hip, knee and ankle) on both sides of the body. The creation of a comprehensive databank for lower limb movement analysis algorithms was an additional outcome of this work. Further research and development are necessary to expand MoJoXlab’s support for multiple sensor manufacturers and improve the accuracy of joint angle calculations for clinical applications.

For those with chronic conditions, such as Type 1 diabetes, smartphone apps offer the promise of an affordable, convenient, and personalized disease management tool. However, despite significant academic research and commercial development in this area, diabetes apps still show low adoption rates and underwhelming clinical outcomes. Through user-interaction sessions with 16 people with Type 1 diabetes, we provide evidence that commonly used interfaces for diabetes self-management apps, while providing certain benefits, can fail to explicitly address the cognitive and emotional requirements of users. From analysis of these sessions with eight such user interface designs, we report on user requirements, as well as interface benefits, limitations, and then discuss the implications of these findings. Finally, with the goal of improving these apps, we identify 3 questions for designers, and review for each in turn: current shortcomings, relevant approaches, exposed challenges, and potential solutions.

Type 1 diabetes is a potentially life-threatening chronic condition that requires frequent interactions with diverse data to inform treatment decisions. While mobile technologies such as blood glucose meters have long been an essential part of this process, designing interfaces that explicitly support decision-making remains challenging. Dual-process models are a common approach to understanding such cognitive tasks. However, evidence from the first of two studies we present suggests that in demanding and complex situations, some individuals approach disease management in distinctive ways that do not seem to fit well within existing models. This finding motivated, and helped frame our second study, a survey (n=192) to investigate these behaviors in more detail. On the basis of the resulting analysis, we posit Fluid Contextual Reasoning to explain how some people with diabetes respond to particular situations, and discuss how an extended framework might help inform the design of user interfaces for diabetes management.

Current design guidelines for conventional tangible systems suggest that the representational significance of tangible tokens is an important consideration in the design of tangible interaction, especially in collaborative contexts. Such advice might be assumed to imply that nomadic tangible systems that employ improvised tokens are liable to have highly impaired usability. In this paper we describe a proof of concept experiment for Kolab, a nomadic tangible interaction system that permits any surface to be appropriated as a collaborative tabletop, and which affords the use of a wide range of appropriated artifacts as improvised tangibles. We demonstrate an approach for realizing the necessary interaction techniques combining tangibles and hand gestures using a fusion of image and depth sensing. We present the results of a user study showing that while users' choices of artifacts were seen to follow an unexpected pattern, various artifacts were appropriated and improvised as tangibles, and the system was found to be both usable and well able to support user collaboration.

This paper introduces a tool known as the Haptic Drum Kit, which employs four computer-controlled vibrotactile devices, one attached to each wrist and ankle. In the applications discussed here, haptic pulses are used to guide the playing, on a drum kit, of rhythmic patterns that require multi-limb co-ordination. The immediate aim is to foster rhythm skills and multi-limb coordination. A broader aim is to systematically develop skills in recognizing, identifying, memorizing, retaining, analyzing, reproducing, and composing polyphonic rhythms. We consider the implications of three different theories for this approach: the work of the music educator Dalcroze (1865-1950 [1]; the entrainment theory of human rhythm perception and production [2,3]; and sensory motor contingency theory [4]. In this paper we report on a design study; and identify and discuss a variety of emerging design issues. The study demonstrates that beginning drummers are able to learn intricate drum patterns from haptic stimuli alone

Musical harmony is considered to be one of the most abstract and technically difficult parts of music. It is generally taught formally via abstract, domain-specific concepts, principles, rules and heuristics. By contrast, when harmony is represented using an existing interactive desktop tool, Harmony Space, a new, parsimonious, but equivalently expressive, unified level of description emerges. This focuses not on abstract concepts, but on concrete locations, objects, areas and trajectories.

This paper reports on Direct Combination, a new user interaction technique. Direct Combination may be viewed variously as: a systematic extension to Direct Manipulation; a concise navigational framework to help users find the operations they need; and as a framework to make a greater range and variety of operations available to the user, without overburdening user or interface designer. While Direct Combination may be seen as an extension of Direct Manipulation, it may also be applied to a wide range of user interaction styles, including even command line interfaces. Examples from various hypothetical systems and from an implemented system are presented. This paper argues that Direct Combination is applicable not just to problem seeking or design oriented domains (where the technique originated) but is generally applicable. A variety of new interaction styles for Direct Combination are presented. The generalisation of Direct Combination to the n-dimensional case is presented.

when it is closed.The core image is never permanently We have exploited and adapted Goldberg's LearningWorks changed; new classes are kept in LearningBooks.framework to produce an environment with new programming tools, visualization tools, and system simulations.The environment is designed to be used via plug-in modules, called LearningBooks, sets of classes and persistent objects, for which we have developed a pedagogic standard that includes, for example, an HTML browser and various

This paper describes how we have extended a module structure of the Smalltalk LearningWorks to provide a programming environment deigned for very large scale technology transfer. The ‘module’ is what we have termed the LearningBook, a set of classes and persistent objects, including an HTML browser, programming and visualization tools, and microworlds. The context for this development is a distance learning university course in object technology which has enrolled over 5,100 mature students in its first year – making it the largest such course in the world. While promoting a systems building approach, we have successfully added support for programming in the small and the needs of the isolated novice. Two principles have applied: (i) the programming environment and its modules fit into a consistent framework for personal management of study and (ii) details of complex facilities, such as the class library, are progressively disclosed as knowledge and sophistication grow. The paper shows how these principles have guided the exploitation of LearningBook modules. To provide context, relevant academic background is given. Early informal feedback is reported and a project currently underway to observe in detail how thousands of learners use the Smalltalk programming environment is sketched.

This paper identifies and describes a number of misconceptions observed in students learning about object technology. It identifies simple, concrete, measures course designers and teachers can take to avoid these misconceptions arising. The context for this work centres on an introductory undergraduate course and a postgraduate course. Both these courses are taught by distance education. These courses both use Smalltalk as an introduction to object technology. More particularly, the undergraduate course uses Smalltalk as a first programming language.Distance education can limit the amount and speed of individual feedback that can be given in the early stages of learning. For this reason, particular attention has been paid to characterizing measures for avoiding elementary misconceptions seen in beginning learners. At the same time we also address some misconceptions observed in postgraduate students. The pedagogical issues discussed are of particular importance when devising an extended series of examples for teaching or assessment, or when designing a visual microworld to be used for teaching purposes.

This paper describes key features of a new multimedia CD-ROM pack produced by television makers in collaboration with computer science educators --- by the BBC for the Open University Computing Department. The pack, The Object Shop, forms an early component of an undergraduate course which introduces object-oriented computing and software development to students new to computing. Building on the results of empirical evaluation, The Object Shop has been designed to help students with no programming experience to understand core object programming concepts. Throughout the CD-ROM, video, animated graphics and an underlying object-oriented simulation of a virtual shopping environment provide an accessible introduction to the central ideas of object-oriented programming. The key power of the multimedia approach is that the student-user is able to gain a sound operational understanding of concepts before learning the details of programming code or syntax. Users can continually monitor their progress through a series of task-based, assessed exercises.

We describe an initial pedagogy for an introductory computing and programming course which adheres to the object-oriented paradigm.Students must satisfy a prerequisite to be competent users of GUI operating systems and simple applications.The paper explains how their prior knowledge and skills are used to consider abstract object-oriented models of the systems they know before embarking on Smalltalk programming.A novel programming and learning environment which constrains visibility of Smalltalk is described.

This paper briefly describes the evolution and content of the Open University's new introductory course in Computing which has been designed for delivery internationally to over 3500 students per year. It replaces a conventional procedural programming course and introduces computing through object technology---specifically, through Smalltalk. Unlike its predecessor it is being designed to be accessible by non-computing majors and with an intention to address the gender imbalance in our student population. Multimedia technologies are used in the delivery of this distance learning course which is being developed by the course team for presentation in 1997.