On lions, impala, and bigraphs: modelling interactions in Ubiquitous Computing

As ubiquitous systems have moved out of the lab and into the world the need to think more systematically about how there are realised has grown. This talk will present intradisciplinary work I have been engaged in with other computing colleagues on how we might develop more formal models and understanding of ubiquitous computing systems. The formal modelling of computing systems has proved valuable in areas as diverse as reliability, security and robustness. However, the emergence of ubiquitous computing raises new challenges for formal modelling due to their contextual nature and dependence on unreliable sensing systems. In this work we undertook an exploration of modelling an example ubiquitous system called the Savannah game using the approach of bigraphical rewriting systems. This required an unusual intra-disciplinary dialogue between formal computing and human- computer interaction researchers to model systematically four perspectives on Savannah: computational, physical, human and technical. Each perspective in turn drew upon a range of different modelling traditions. For example, the human perspective built upon previous work on proxemics, which uses physical distance as a means to understand interaction. In this talk I hope to show how our model explains observed inconsistencies in Savannah and ex- tend it to resolve these. I will then reflect on the need for intradisciplinary work of this form and the importance of the bigraph diagrammatic form to support this form of engagement. Speaker Biography Tom Rodden Tom Rodden (rodden.info) is a Professor of Interactive Computing at the University of Nottingham. His research brings together a range of human and technical disciplines, technologies and techniques to tackle the human, social, ethical and technical challenges involved in ubiquitous computing and the increasing used of personal data. He leads the Mixed Reality Laboratory (www.mrl.nott.ac.uk) an interdisciplinary research facility that is home of a team of over 40 researchers. He founded and currently co-directs the Horizon Digital Economy Research Institute (www.horizon.ac.uk), a university wide interdisciplinary research centre focusing on ethical use of our growing digital footprint. He has previously directed the EPSRC Equator IRC (www.equator.ac.uk) a national interdisciplinary research collaboration exploring the place of digital interaction in our everyday world. He is a fellow of the British Computer Society and the ACM and was elected to the ACM SIGCHI Academy in 2009 (http://www.sigchi.org/about/awards/).

Ergonomía. Fundamentos para el desarrollo de soluciones ergonómicas

En este texto se presentan algunos conceptos y marcos teóricos útiles para el análisis del trabajo en ergonomía. El objetivo es mostrar los conceptos de base para el estudio del trabajo en la tradición de la ergonomía de la actividad, y analizar de manera general algunos de los modelos empleados para el análisis de una actividad de trabajo. Inicialmente se abordan los principios teóricos de la ergonomía y los principios que provienen de la fisiología, la biomecánica, la psicología y la sociología; también se presentan los acercamientos metodológicos empleados en esta misma perspectiva para el análisis de actividades de trabajo. Se parte del principio de que un estudio ergonómico del trabajo se puede llevar a cabo desde una doble perspectiva: la perspectiva analítica y la perspectiva comprensiva.

Las TIC y la sociedad de la información.

Resumen tomado de la publicación

Multi-level Input Fusion in multi-modal systems

Context-aware multimodal interactive systems aim to adapt to the needs and behavioural patterns of users and offer a way forward for enhancing the efficacy and quality of experience (QoE) in human-computer interaction. The various modalities that constribute to such systems each provide a specific uni-modal response that is integratively presented as a multi-modal interface capable of interpretation of multi-modal user input and appropriately responding to it through dynamically adapted multi-modal interactive flow management , This paper presents an initial background study in the context of the first phase of a PhD research programme in the area of optimisation of data fusion techniques to serve multimodal interactivite systems, their applications and requirements.

Evaluating a realistic agent in an advice-giving task

The aim of this study was to empirically evaluate an embodied conversational agent called GRETA in an effort to answer two main questions: (1) What are the benefits (and costs) of presenting information via an animated agent, with certain characteristics, in a 'persuasion' task, compared to other forms of display? (2) How important is it that emotional expressions are added in a way that is consistent with the content of the message, in animated agents? To address these questions, a positively framed healthy eating message was created which was variously presented via GRETA, a matched human actor, GRETA's voice only (no face) or as text only. Furthermore, versions of GRETA were created which displayed additional emotional facial expressions in a way that was either consistent or inconsistent with the content of the message. Overall, it was found that although GRETA received significantly higher ratings for helpfulness and likability, presenting the message via GRETA led to the poorest memory performance among users. Importantly, however, when GRETA's additional emotional expressions were consistent with the content of the verbal message, the negative effect on memory performance disappeared. Overall, the findings point to the importance of achieving consistency in animated agents. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Perspex machine VII: The universal perspex machine

The perspex machine arose from the unification of projective geometry with the Turing machine. It uses a total arithmetic, called transreal arithmetic, that contains real arithmetic and allows division by zero. Transreal arithmetic is redefined here. The new arithmetic has both a positive and a negative infinity which lie at the extremes of the number line, and a number nullity that lies off the number line. We prove that nullity, 0/0, is a number. Hence a number may have one of four signs: negative, zero, positive, or nullity. It is, therefore, impossible to encode the sign of a number in one bit, as floating-, point arithmetic attempts to do, resulting in the difficulty of having both positive and negative zeros and NaNs. Transrational arithmetic is consistent with Cantor arithmetic. In an extension to real arithmetic, the product of zero, an infinity, or nullity with its reciprocal is nullity, not unity. This avoids the usual contradictions that follow from allowing division by zero. Transreal arithmetic has a fixed algebraic structure and does not admit options as IEEE, floating-point arithmetic does. Most significantly, nullity has a simple semantics that is related to zero. Zero means "no value" and nullity means "no information." We argue that nullity is as useful to a manufactured computer as zero is to a human computer. The perspex machine is intended to offer one solution to the mind-body problem by showing how the computable aspects of mind and. perhaps, the whole of mind relates to the geometrical aspects of body and, perhaps, the whole of body. We review some of Turing's writings and show that he held the view that his machine has spatial properties. In particular, that it has the property of being a 7D lattice of compact spaces. Thus, we read Turing as believing that his machine relates computation to geometrical bodies. We simplify the perspex machine by substituting an augmented Euclidean geometry for projective geometry. This leads to a general-linear perspex-machine which is very much easier to pro-ram than the original perspex-machine. We then show how to map the whole of perspex space into a unit cube. This allows us to construct a fractal of perspex machines with the cardinality of a real-numbered line or space. This fractal is the universal perspex machine. It can solve, in unit time, the halting problem for itself and for all perspex machines instantiated in real-numbered space, including all Turing machines. We cite an experiment that has been proposed to test the physical reality of the perspex machine's model of time, but we make no claim that the physical universe works this way or that it has the cardinality of the perspex machine. We leave it that the perspex machine provides an upper bound on the computational properties of physical things, including manufactured computers and biological organisms, that have a cardinality no greater than the real-number line.

Generic control interface for networked haptic virtual environments

As Virtual Reality pushes the boundaries of the human computer interface new ways of interaction are emerging. One such technology is the integration of haptic interfaces (force-feedback devices) into virtual environments. This modality offers an improved sense of immersion to that achieved when relying only on audio and visual modalities. The paper introduces some of the technical obstacles such as latency and network traffic that need to be overcome for maintaining a high degree of immersion during haptic tasks. The paper describes the advantages of integrating haptic feedback into systems, and presents some of the technical issues inherent in a networked haptic virtual environment. A generic control interface has been developed to seamlessly mesh with existing networked VR development libraries.

Practical interface experiments with implant technology

In this paper results are shown to indicate the efficacy of a direct connection between the human nervous system and a computer network. Experimental results obtained thus far from a study lasting for over 3 months are presented, with particular emphasis placed on the direct interaction between the human nervous system and a piece of wearable technology. An overview of the present state of neural implants is given, as well as a range of application areas considered thus far. A view is also taken as to what may be possible with implant technology as a general purpose human-computer interface for the future.

MusiCam: an instrument to demonstrate chromaphonic synesthesia

Inspired by a type of synesthesia where colour typically induces musical notes the MusiCam project investigates this unusual condition, particularly the transition from colour to sound. MusiCam explores the potential benefits of this idiosyncrasy as a mode of human computer interaction (1-10), providing a host of meaningful applications spanning control, communication and composition. Colour data is interpreted by means of an off-the-shelf webcam, and music is generated in real-time through regular speakers. By making colour-based gestures users can actively control the parameters of sounds, compose melodies and motifs or mix multiple tracks on the fly. The system shows great potential as an interactive medium and as a musical controller. The trials conducted to date have produced encouraging results, and only hint at the new possibilities achievable by such a device.

An agent based approach to distributed task modeling for co-operative task support

This paper describes the design and implementation of an agent based network for the support of collaborative switching tasks within the control room environment of the National Grid Company plc. This work includes aspects from several research disciplines, including operational analysis, human computer interaction, finite state modelling techniques, intelligent agents and computer supported co-operative work. Aspects of these procedures have been used in the analysis of collaborative tasks to produce distributed local models for all involved users. These models have been used as the basis for the production of local finite state automata. These automata have then been embedded within an agent network together with behavioural information extracted from the task and user analysis phase. The resulting support system is capable of task and communication management within the transmission despatch environment.