Information worlds continue to grow, posing daunting challenges for interfaces. This paper tries to increase our understanding of approaches to the problem, building on the Generalized Fisheye View framework. Three issues are discussed. First a number of existing techniques are unified by the commonality of what they show, certain fisheye-related subsets, with the techniques differing only in how they show those subsets. Then the elevated importance of these subsets, and their generality, is used to discuss the possibility of non-visual fisheye-views, to attack problems not so amenable to visualization. Finally, several models are given for why these subsets might be important in user interactions, with the goal of better informing design rationales.

This paper introduces new interactive ways to create, manipulate and analyze shapes, even when those shapes do not have simple algebraic generators. This is made possible by using pixel-pattern rewrites to compute directly with bitmap representations. Such rewrites also permit the definition of functionality maps, bitmaps that specify the spatial scope of application functionality, and organic-widgets, implemented right in the pixels to have arbitrary form, integrated with the shape needs of the applications. Together these features should increase our capabilities for working with rich spatial domains.

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As human-computer interaction (HCI) expands its scope, the proper context for the design of information technology (IT) is increasingly an interconnected mosaic of responsive adaptive systems (MoRAS) including people's heads, organizations, communities, markets, and cultures. The introduction of IT not only perturbs the individual systems but also critically changes the coupling structure of the whole mosaic that comprises them. These various systems respond and adapt to these changes, in effect undertaking their own sort of "design" efforts, sometimes at odds with explicit intentions. The need to understand the role of all these different systems in the outcome explains why IT design has become an increasingly interdisciplinary effort. It is likely that our designs will be more successful if we become more mindful of this bigger picture. This article discusses the motivations for the MoRAS perspective; briefly sketches the MoRAS itself; and presents some tales that illustrate its dynamics, the role of IT within it, and the implications for the future trajectory of HCI. The article concludes with design implications and an agenda for furthering the framework.

Information worlds are getting ever more vast.We need, not only better environments for dealing with this vast scale, but better tools for authoring information in those environments.This paper describes a new type of tool for authoring objects in infinite pan/zoom (so-called "multiscale") environments, like PAD++.Called the MultiScale Editor (MuSE) it provides a direct way to manipulate objects in scale, simplifying important operations for authoring with large, multiscale information worlds.

In this paper, we introduce the problem of "desert fog," a condition wherein a view of an information world contains no information on which to base navigational decisions.We present a set of view-based navigational aids that allow navigators to find their way through desert fog in multiscale electronic worlds.Prototypes of these aids have been implemented in the Landmarking and ZTracker systems.We introduce the concept of critical zone analysis, a method of grouping objects according to their visibility in views of the information world rather than their spatial layout.This concept was derived from a formal analysis of desert fog using view-navigation theory.Our analysis informally extends view-navigation theory to accommodate spatial multiscale worlds and is detailed in the paper.

In view navigation a user moves about art information structure by selecting something in the current view of the structure.This paper explores the implications of rudimentary requirements for effective view navigation, namely that, despite the vastness of an information structure, the views must be small, moving around must not take too many steps and the route to any target be must be discoverable.The analyses help rationalize existing practice, give insight into the difficulties, and suggest strategies for design.

Big information worlds cause big problems for interfaces.There is too much to see.They are hard to navigate.An armada of techniques has been proposed to present the many scales of information needed.Space-scale diagrams provide an analytic framework for much of this work.By representing both a spatial world and its different magnifications explicitly, the diagrams allow the direct visualization and analysis of important scale related issues for interfaces.

Article Recommending and evaluating choices in a virtual community of use Share on Authors: Will Hill Bellcore, 445 South Street, Morristown, NJ Bellcore, 445 South Street, Morristown, NJView Profile , Larry Stead Bellcore, 445 South Street, Morristown, NJ Bellcore, 445 South Street, Morristown, NJView Profile , Mark Rosenstein Bellcore, 445 South Street, Morristown, NJ Bellcore, 445 South Street, Morristown, NJView Profile , George Furnas Bellcore, 445 South Street, Morristown, NJ Bellcore, 445 South Street, Morristown, NJView Profile Authors Info & Claims CHI '95: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing SystemsMay 1995 Pages 194–201https://doi.org/10.1145/223904.223929Online:01 May 1995Publication History 590citation5,263DownloadsMetricsTotal Citations590Total Downloads5,263Last 12 Months235Last 6 weeks30 Get Citation AlertsNew Citation Alert added!This alert has been successfully added and will be sent to:You will be notified whenever a record that you have chosen has been cited.To manage your alert preferences, click on the button below.Manage my AlertsNew Citation Alert!Please log in to your account Save to BinderSave to BinderCreate a New BinderNameCancelCreateExport CitationPublisher SiteGet Access

This paper introduces multitrees, a new type of structure for representing information.Multitrees are a class of directed acyclic graphs (DAGs) with the unusual property that they have large easily identifiable substructures that are trees.These subtrees have a natural semantic interpretation providing alternate hierarchical contexts for information, as well as providing a natural model for hierarchical reuse.The numerous trees found within multitrees also afford familiar, tree-based graphical interactions.

In this paper, we introduce ephemeral interest groups for supporting informal communication. Ephemeral interest groups are electronic discussion groups that, in contrast to bulletin boards and the like, are short-lived and ad hoc. They are designed as a medium for informal discussions of items broadcast to a wider community. We have implemented a prototype system to explore ephemeral interest groups. We discuss the goals of the system, characterize its evolution over the last ten months of deployment, and sketch our plans for future developments.

This paper aspires to make three points: (1) that certain graphical interfaces are especially easy to learn and use, (2) that special graphical deduction / computation systems are possible, and (3) that perhaps points (1) and (2) are intimately related, i.e., that graphical interfaces may be especially useful because they engage special human graphical reasoning processes.

A new method for automatic indexing and retrieval is described. The approach is to take advantage of implicit higher-order structure in the association of terms with documents (“semantic structure”) in order to improve the detection of relevant documents on the basis of terms found in queries. The particular technique used is singular-value decomposition, in which a large term by document matrix is decomposed into a set of ca. 100 orthogonal factors from which the original matrix can be approximated by linear combination. Documents are represented by ca. 100 item vectors of factor weights. Queries are represented as pseudo-document vectors formed from weighted combinations of terms, and documents with supra-threshold cosine values are returned. Initial tests find this completely automatic method for retrieval to be promising. © 1990 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

This paper describes a new approach for dealing with the vocabulary problem in human-computer interaction. Most approaches to retrieving textual materials depend on a lexical match between words in users' requests and those in or assigned to database objects. Because of the tremendous diversity in the words people use to describe the same object, lexical matching methods are necessarily incomplete and imprecise [5]. The latent semantic indexing approach tries to overcome these problems by automatically organizing text objects into a semantic structure more appropriate for matching user requests. This is done by taking advantage of implicit higher-order structure in the association of terms with text objects. The particular technique used is singular-value decomposition, in which a large term by text-object matrix is decomposed into a set of about 50 to 150 orthogonal factors from which the original matrix can be approximated by linear combination. Terms and objects are represented by 50 to 150 dimensional vectors and matched against user queries in this “semantic” space. Initial tests find this completely automatic method widely applicable and a promising way to improve users' access to many kinds of textual materials, or to objects and services for which textual descriptions are available.

In a new method for automatic indexing and retrieval, implicit higher-order structure in the association of terms with documents is modeled to improve estimates of term-document association, and therefore the detection of relevant documents on the basis of terms found in queries. Singular-value decomposition is used to decompose a large term by document matrix into 50 to 150 orthogonal factors from which the original matrix can be approximated by linear combination; both documents and terms are represented as vectors in a 50- to 150- dimensional space. Queries are represented as pseudo-documents vectors formed from weighted combinations of terms, and documents are ordered by their similarity to the query. Initial tests find this automatic method very promising.

We want computer systems that can help us assess the similarity or relevance of existing objects (e.g., documents, functions, commands, etc.) to a statement of our current needs (e.g., the query). Towards this end, a variety of similarity measures have been proposed. However, the relationship between a measure's formula and its performance is not always obvious. A geometric analysis is advanced and its utility demonstrated through its application to six conventional information retrieval similarity measures and a seventh spreading activation measure. All seven similarity measures work with a representational scheme wherein a query and the database objects are represented as vectors of term weights. A geometric analysis characterizes each similarity measure by the nature of its iso-similarity contours in an n-space containing query and object vectors. This analysis reveals important differences among the similarity measures and suggests conditions in which these differences will affect retrieval performance. The cosine coefficient, for example, is shown to be insensitive to between-document differences in the magnitude of term weights while the inner product measure is sometimes overly affected by such differences. The context-sensitive spreading activation measure may overcome both of these limitations and deserves further study. The geometric analysis is intended to complement, and perhaps to guide, the empirical analysis of similarity measures. © 1987 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

In many contexts, humans often represent their own “neighborhood” in great detail, yet only major landmarks further away. This suggests that such views (“fisheye views”) might be useful for the computer display of large information structures like programs, data bases, online text, etc. This paper explores fisheye views presenting, in turn, naturalistic studies, a general formalism, a specific instantiation, a resulting computer program, example displays and an evaluation.

Previous work has shown that there is a major vocabulary barrier for new or intermittent users of computer systems. The barrier can be substantially lowered with a rich, empirically defined, frequency weighted index. This paper discusses experience with an adaptive technique for constructing such an index. In addition to being an easy way for system designers to collect the necessary data, an adaptive system has the additional advantage that data is collected from real users in real situations, not in some laboratory approximation. Implementation considerations, preliminary results and future theoretical directions are discussed.

The descriptors or categories assigned to entries in an information system form the basis of most retrieval mechanisms (e.g., menu or key word). These descriptors are the primary means of communication between system designers and end users. In this paper we analyze some of the factors which influence this communication link. Our goal is to uncover some psychological principles that will help us to understand naming and describing behavior and thus improve the communication between designers and users.