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With the increasing number of available mixed reality devices, adapting web pages and applications into an Augmented (AR) or Virtual Reality (VR) space can become challenging and resource-demanding especially within a 3D environment. While other recent explorations tackle the idea of converting websites into full 3D experiences, we set out to bridge the gap between transformations by enabling users to alter the layout in a 3D space while keeping its 2D look and feel. This paper builds on and contributes to a comprehensive literature review of multi-modal and distributed user interfaces, context of use, plasticity, and meta-user interfaces (Meta-UI). We propose a collection of methods and options the user can apply via a contextual Meta-UI to customize a Web interface in an AR or VR space. We created and tested high-fidelity prototypes where participants interact and evaluate a Web application's interface in various contexts: on a laptop, a pair of AR glasses, and a VR headset. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last decade, we have seen an increasing number of solutions for distributed user interfaces (DUIs). This paper provides a detailed overview of existing DUI approaches and classify the different solutions based on the granularity of the distributed UI components, the supported interaction space as well as their support for the distribution of state. After the analysis of existing solutions, we discuss a DUI scenario and derive a number of requirements for end-user DUI development. We propose an approach where users can author their customised user interfaces based on a hypermedia metamodel and the concept of active components. We further discuss possibilities for the configuration and sharing of customised distributed user interfaces by end users where the focus is on an authoring rather than a programming approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The price drop of digital displays during the last decade has promoted the use of coupled-display ecosystems. This paper proposes a model-based approach to develop applications that exploit these ecosystems. It introduces the concept of Distributable User Interface to define applications running on coupled-display ecosystems that enable users to distribute interaction objects (e.g., labels, buttons, panels and frames) across interaction surfaces (e.g., Web documents, frames and panels) using a set of distribution primitives. The Distributable User Interface concept is formalized in the User Interface Distribution meta-model, which is implemented using the Eclipse Modeling Framework to ensure the compliance of these models with the OMG standards. This paper also describes the graphical model editor to create, edit and validate User Interface Distribution models conforming to the proposed meta-model. The models created with the model editor are used as input parameters for the model-to-text transformation developed in Acceleo that generates the source code of Web applications supporting Distributable User Interfaces. The generated code runs on the User Interface Distribution Framework which is also presented in this paper. Finally, the On-line Photo Gallery application is the case of study presented to demonstrate the viability of the proposal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Improve the quantity and quality of information obtained from traditional Loewenstein Occupational Therapy Cognitive Assessment Battery systems to monitor the evolution of patients’ rehabilitation process as well as to compare different rehabilitation therapies.Methods: The system replaces traditional artefacts with virtual versions of them to take advantage of cutting edge interaction technology. The system is defined as a Distributed User Interface (DUI) supported by a display ecosystem, including mobile devices as well as multi-touch surfaces. Due to the heterogeneity of the devices involved in the system, the software technology is based on a client-server architecture using the Web as the software platform.Results: The system provides therapists with information that is not available (or it is very difficult to gather) using traditional technologies (i.e. response time measurements, object tracking, information storage and retrieval facilities, etc.).Conclusions: The use of DUIs allows therapists to gather information that is unavailable using traditional assessment methods as well as adapt the system to patients’ profile to increase the range of patients that are able to take this assessment.Implications for RehabilitationUsing a Distributed User Interface environment to carry out LOTCAs improves the quality of the information gathered during the rehabilitation assessment.This system captures physical data regarding patient’s interaction during the assessment to improve the rehabilitation process analysis.Allows professionals to adapt the assessment procedure to create different versions according to patients’ profile.Improves the availability of patients’ profile information to therapists to adapt the assessment procedure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are essential activities focused on learning. Its main objective is to stimulate cognitive abilities such as memory, reading, arithmetic, etc. However, performing these tasks is not always appealing to children. It is necessary to add a fun factor that motivates and encourages them to carry them out. In this paper we propose a playful system that mixes real and digital factors for children to easily and intuitively carry out tasks of cognitive stimulation and learning. The system uses distributed and tangible user interfaces. The users are responsible for creating and designing objects to interact with the system. The application runs on any mobile device and to interact with the system. The user must bring one of the objects created above. We have conducted a preliminary assessment to check the motivation generated for users to search and create their own interfaces, in addition the users' reaction regarding to the new form of interaction (tactile and tangible). [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Abstract: Emergency planning is an ongoing activity in which a multidisciplinary group of experts intermittently collaborate to define the most appropriate response to risks. One of the most important tasks of emergency planning is the review of plans as a way of maintaining, refining, and improving them. This review of plans is based on exchanging knowledge and experiences in order to take into account different perspectives and generate alternative solutions. An exploratory case study carried out within municipal organizations has disclosed how the application of rigid plan reviewing practices hinders team creativity and, consequently, effective decision-making. This paper presents a computer-based collaborative environment aimed at supporting unstructured team discussion during the post-hoc review of emergency plan. This collaborative environment allows emergency planning team members to share their view in a free manner by interacting with user interface components distributed across several input and output dimensions. The usage of the environment has proved how the application of new interactive technologies can create more dynamic work settings, fostering team creativity. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The combination and integration of services between mobile computing and context-aware applications responds to the use of mobile devices defining a wide range of distributed user interfaces to support social activities. In this paper, we propose a novel solution that combines social software with context awareness to improve users' interaction in public spaces. This approach is based on the concept of collaborative interactive panels where users share their opinions and ideas about environmental issues by performing natural gestures. And so, taking advantage of physical resources already available in public spaces combined with the use of well-known technologies, such as mobile devices and RFID, we extend the concept of social software from the Web to physical public scenarios, such as bus stations, squares, etc. As an example, we present a case of study that encourage citizens' participation in decisions related to the community environmental issues reducing the gap between the social software and users. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Building a distributed user interface (DUI) application should ideally not require any additional effort beyond that necessary to build a non-distributed interface. In practice, however, DUI development is fraught with several technical challenges such as synchronization, resource management, and data transfer. In this paper, we present three case studies on building distributed user interface applications: a distributed media player for multiple displays and controls, a collaborative search system integrating a tabletop and mobile devices, and a multiplayer Tetris game for multi-surface use. While there exist several possible network architectures for such applications, our particular approach focuses on peer-to-peer (P2P) architectures. This focus leads to a number of challenges and opportunities. Drawing from these studies, we derive general challenges for P2P DUI development in terms of design, architecture, and implementation. We conclude with some general guidelines for practical DUI application development using peer-to-peer architectures. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Currently, a lot of the tasks engaged by users over the Web involve dealing with multiple Web sites. Moreover, whilst Web navigation was considered as a lonely activity in the past, a large proportion of users are nowadays engaged in collaborative activities over the Web. In this paper we argue that these two aspects of collaboration and tasks spanning over multiple Web sites call for a level of coordination that require Distributed User Interfaces (DUI). In this context, DUIs would play a major role by helping multiple users to coordinate their activities whilst working collaboratively to complete tasks at different Web sites. For that, we propose in this paper an approach to create distributed user interfaces featuring procedures that are aimed to orchestrate user tasks over multiple Web sites. Our approach supports flexible process modeling by allowing users to combine manual tasks and automated tasks from a repertoire of patterns of tasks performed over the Web. In our approach, whilst manual tasks can be regarded as simple instructions that tell users how to perform a task over a Web site, automated tasks correspond to tools built under the concept of Web augmentation (as it augments the repertoire of tasks users can perform over the Web) called Web augmenters. Both manual and automated tasks are usually supported by specific DOM elements available in different Web sites. Thus, by combining tasks and DOM elements distributed in diverse Web sites our approach supports the creation of procedures that allows seamless users interaction with diverse Web site. Moreover, such an approach is aimed at supporting the collaboration between users sharing procedures. The approach is duly illustrated by a case study describing a collaborative trip planning over the Web. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Evolution in the context of use requires evolutions in the user interfaces even when they are currently used by operators. User Centered Development promotes reactive answers to this kind of evolutions either by software evolutions through iterative development approaches or at runtime by providing additional information to the operators such as contextual help for instance. This paper proposes a model-based approach to support proactive management of context of use evolutions. By proactive management we mean mechanisms in place to plan and implement evolutions and adaptations of the entire user interface (including behaviour) in a generic way. The approach proposed handles both concentration and distribution of user interfaces requiring both fusion of information into a single UI or fission of information into several ones. This generic model-based approach is exemplified on a safety critical system from space domain. It presents how the new user interfaces can be generated at runtime to provide a new user interface gathering in a single place all the information required to perform the task. These user interfaces have to be generated at runtime as new procedures (i.e. sequences of operations to be executed in a semi-autonomous way) can be defined by operators at any time in order to react to adverse events and to keep the space system in operation. Such contextual, activity-related user interfaces complement the original user interfaces designed for operating the command and control system. The resulting user interface thus corresponds to a distribution of user interfaces in a focus+context way improving usability by increasing both efficiency and effectiveness. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Natural user interfaces want to liberate the user from having to learn new concepts to interact with computers. They do that by taking advantage of our senses and our own knowledge about world in order to build the user interface. Physical user interfaces are a prominent example, where physical objects are enhanced to represent actions or information that the system must exchange with the user. One of the main drawbacks of physical user interfaces is often related with the difficulty to decouple system logic from the specific technology used to build the user interface, especially when multiple environments or scenarios should be supported. This paper presents an abstraction technology for user interaction devices that allows the building of physical user interfaces that are physically and logically decoupled from the system logic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Coupling mobile devices and other remote interaction technology with software systems surrounding the user enables for building interactive environments under explicit user control. The realization of explicit interaction in ubiquitous or pervasive computing environments introduces a physical distribution of input devices, and technology embedded into the environment of the user. To fulfill the requirements of emerging trends in mobile interaction, common approaches for system design need adaptations and extensions. This paper presents the adaptation and extension of the Model-View-Controller approach to design applications of remote, complementary, duplicated and detached user interface elements. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Because of recent advances in wireless communication technologies, the world of mobile computing is flourishing with a variety of applications. In this study, we present an integrated architecture for a personal digital assistant (PDA)-based mobile medical display system that supports collaborative work between remote users. We aim to develop a system that enables users in different regions to share a working environment for collaborative visualization with the potential for exploring huge medical datasets. Our system consists of three major components: mobile client, gateway, and parallel rendering server. The mobile client serves as a front end and enables users to choose the visualization and control parameters interactively and cooperatively. The gateway handles requests and responses between mobile clients and the rendering server for efficient communication. Through the gateway, it is possible to share working environments between users, allowing them to work together in computer supported cooperative work (CSCW) mode. Finally, the parallel rendering server is responsible for performing heavy visualization tasks. Our experience indicates that some features currently available to our mobile clients for collaborative scientific visualization are limited due to the poor performance of mobile devices and the low bandwidth of wireless connections. However, as mobile devices and wireless network systems are experiencing considerable elevation in their capabilities, we believe that our methodology will be utilized effectively in building quite responsive, useful mobile collaborative medical systems in the very near future. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: There is a growing demand for design support to create interactive systems that are deployed in ambient intelligent environments. Unlike traditional interactive systems, the wide diversity of situations these type of user interfaces need to work in require tool support that is close to the environment of the end-user on the one hand and provide a smooth integration with the application logic on the other hand. This paper shows how the model-based user interface development methodology can be applied for ambient intelligent environments; we propose a task-centered approach towards the design of interactive systems by means of appropriate visualizations and simulations of different models. Besides the use of these typical user interface models such as the task- and presentation-model to support interface design, we focus on user interfaces supporting situated task distributions and a visualization of context influences on deployed, possibly distributed, user interfaces. To enable this we introduce an environment model describing the device configuration at particular moment in time. To support the user interface designer while creating these complex interfaces for ambient intelligent environments, we discuss tool support using a visualization of the environment together with simulations of the user interface configurations. We also show how the concepts presented in the paper can be integrated within model-driven engineering, hereby narrowing the gap between HCI design and software engineering. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Summary: Objectives:: Ubiquitous computing with multiple interaction devices requires new interface models that support user-specific modifications to applications and facilitate the fast development of active workspaces. Methods:: We have developed NOSTOS, a computer-augmented work environment for clinical personnel to explore new user interface paradigms for ubiquitous computing. NOSTOS uses several devices such as digital pens, an active desk, and walk-up displays that allow the system to track documents and activities in the workplace. Results:: We present the distributed user interface (DUI) model that allows standalone applications to distribute their user interface components to several devices dynamically at run-time. This mechanism permit clinicians to develop their own user interfaces and forms to clinical information systems to match their specific needs. We discuss the underlying technical concepts of DUIs and show how service discovery, component distribution, events and layout management are dealt with in the NOSTOS system. Conclusion:: Our results suggest that DUIs – and similar network-based user interfaces – will be a prerequisite of future mobile user interfaces and essential to develop clinical multi-device environments. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

I-BLOCKS are an innovative concept of building blocks allowing users to manipulate conceptual structures and compose atomic actions while building physical constructions. They represent an example of enabling technologies for tangible interfaces since they emphasise physicality of interaction through the use of spatial and kinaesthetic knowledge. The technology presented in this paper is integrated in physical building blocks augmented with embedded and invisible microprocessors. Connectivity and behaviour of such structures are defined by the physical connectivity between the blocks. These are general purpose, constructive, tangible user interface devices that can have a variety of applications. Unlike other approaches, I-BLOCKS do not only specify a computation that is performed by the target system but perform at the same time the computation and the associated action/functionality. Manipulating I-BLOCKS does not only mean constructing physical or conceptual structures but also composing atomic actions into complex behaviours. To illustrate this concept, the paper presents different scenarios in which the technology has been applied: storytelling performed through the construction of physical characters exhibiting emotional states, and learning activities for speech therapy in cases of dyslexia and aphasia. The scenarios are presented; discussing both the features of the technology used and the related interaction design issues. The paper concludes by reporting about informal trials that have been conducted with children. It should be noted that, even if both trials represent application scenarios for children, the I-BLOCKS technology is in principle open to different kinds of applications and target users like, for example, games for adults or brainstorming activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]