A few links: GizmoWatch's 10 Interactive User Interfaces for the Future, CNN's Eatocracy, EVA 2010 and More!

Here's a quick link to a recent Gizmowatch post, Ten Interactive User Interfaces for the Future.  Bharat, the authro, reviews a variety of interfaces, input methods, and interaction techniques, such as Skinput, a water-based touch screen, a muscle-computer interface, air gestures, brain-computer systems, and even a mud-tub interface.


I was fortunate to see some of these interaction techniques and interfaces when I attended CHI 2010 this past April, and plan to share some of my photos and video clips from the conference on this blog soon.


Totally Unrelated


Online connection for foodies
Eatocracy is a new website within the CNN pages that provides news- and more- about all things related to food. The categories on the site include "main", "news", "bite", "sip", "make", "think", and "buzz".  The best part, in my opinion, is the heirloom recipe collection index, where people can upload and share family recipies and the stories behind them.

Here is the description of Eatocracy from the website:

Eatocracy  "is your online home for smart, passionate conversation and information about food news, politics, culture. We'll highlight regional and family recipes, dive into restaurants and food shopping, chat with celebrity and local chefs, and show you what's for dinner around the world tonight. Grab a place at the table and read with your mouth full."

Enjoy!

(The above is a repost from The World is My Interactive Interface)

Coming Soon

--More about 3D TV and Interactive TV

--Highlights from CHI 2010 (better late than never!)

--My experiments- SMARTTable, a game, interactive timeline prototype pictures...

--A post about Lieven van Velthoven's interesting Post-WIMP explorations - here are some links that he recently sent me:

• 3D birthday invitation: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNOP5aIoS9o
• Virtual overgrowth in the real world: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuJPoUpBIKU
• Make race tracks for virtual cars with any real stuff you can find: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1K3og8qLcA
• Smoke Pong: Pong, ONLY for smokers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwrsVo5p2_E
• Webcam Airmouse: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57kTrKJHOjM 
• MusicalNodes: the visual music library: www.musicalnodes.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czQdhfA__UY (will be published at EVA2010)

As I took a peek at Lieven's video links, I noticed an interesting video mash-up Lieven created from the open-source code from the RadioHead's House of Cards music video and his One Million Particles app. I'll post them soon.

I'll try to get video, pictures, and commentary about EVA 2010.  EVA stands for Electronic Visualization and the Arts. "Electronic Information, the Visual Arts, and Beyond.

FYI

I'm in the process of sorting through and re-organizing my blogs, which have been around for over four years!  During this time, my blogs have attracted a growing number of readers. Because of this, I'd like to make things a bit user-centered.  So expect to see little changes here and there.  I promise I'll give my readers warnings in advance if I make any serious changes! 

If you are new to this blog, you should know that my blogs started out as on-line filing cabinets, open to the world.  Although there is a bit of overlap of material and some cross-posting between the blogs, they are arranged to serve as a paper-less way of keeping track of things that I've learned through my coursework, conference attendance, readings, and research. Since emerging technologies are high on my list of interests, I also use my blogs to share interesting things that cross my path.    

  

I changed the name of my World Is My Interface blog to The World Is My Interactive Interface.   "Off-the-desktop natural user interfaces, interaction, and user experience" are the main topics of the blog.  It sometimes includes information about ubiquitous computing and DOOH, otherwise known as Digital Out Of Home.

I plan to tinker with my TechPsych blog later on. It focuses on topics that are useful to psychologists, educators, special education teachers, speech and language therapists, health and wellness professionals, and parents.

Feel free to leave comments, as I welcome your input.

Beautiful Data: The Stories Behind Elegant Data Solutions (and a side trip of the color strata)

This is one of the books on my summer reading list.  I planned on buying this book last summer.  I got around to ordering it a few days ago, and today, it arrived in the mail.  


Nathan Yau,  the author of Flowing Data, was responsible for the first chapter, "Seeing Your Life in Data".   I'm a fan of the Flowing Data blog. Nathan shares quite a bit of interesting- and beautiful- information on his blog.  For example, his recent post, Strata of common and not so common colors, 





"The Color Strata includes the 200 most common color names (excluding black-white-grayish tones), organized by hue horizontally and relative usage vertically, stacked by overall popularity, shaded representatively, and labeled where possible. Besides filtering spam, ignoring cruft, normalizing grey to gray, and correcting the most egregious misspellings (here’s looking at you, fuchsia), the results are otherwise unadulterated."  - via Stephen, of Weather Sealed


After looking at all of the colors,  I followed Nathan's links and the links from his links (I love colorful rabbit holes!)... and found this graphic about the differences between girls and boys, from Doghouse Diaries, on the xkcd blog:

CNN's Interactive Map and Timeline of Iraq and Afghanistan Casualties "Home and Away"

Via Flowing Data and CNN

Nathan Yau, of Flowing Data, posted information and a link to CNN's interactive Casualties: Home and Away website. This website allows you to visually explore the casualty statistics of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, beginning with the first of the fallen in 2001. You can zoom into a region and see pictures and names of people.  The website provides a way for friends and family to share memories about their loved ones.

Home and Away also provides a "list view" option, shown in one of the pictures below.  Visitors to the site can sort by name or year of death.  Sliders on the map view provide a way of looking at the pattern of deaths over time.  It is sad, but this website makes us remember that war is real.  Deaths are not simply statistics.

CNN Afghanistan Crossroads Blog

Flowing Data
Home and Away

20 Educational (and free!) Multimedia Resources - via Innovative Interactivity Guest Blogger, Tim McLaughlin

Here is the link to the Innovative Interactivity blog post:

20 Educational (and free!) Multimedia Resources

Tabletop Conference in Banff: Martin Kaltenbrunner's post on the Tangible Interaction Frameworks blog

I'd like to share with you a link to a great post covering the recent Interactive Tabletops and Surfaces conference in Banff, Canada. The post was written by Martin Kaltenbrunner, author of the Tangible Interaction Frameworks blog, and is packed with info and interesting links:

Tabletop Conference in Banff

Martin was impressed by the iLabat the University of Calgary.  He also mentioned the work of researchers from the Media Computing Groupat RWTH Aachen University known for SLAP, and the Media Interaction Lab at the Upper Austria University of Applied Sciences, known for CRISTAL.

Info about Martin from his website:

"Martin Kaltenbrunner, co-founder of Reactable Systems, is a Ph.D. candidate at the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona, Spain. His research concentrates on tangible user interfaces and human computer interaction in general, topics he has been also teaching at the Kunstuniversität Linz, Universitat Pompeu Fabra and UCP Porto. Recently he has been mainly working on the human computer interaction concepts of the Reactable - an electronic musical instrument with a tangible user interface. He is author of the open source tangible interaction framework reacTIVision and the related TUIO protocol, which has been widely adopted for open source multi-touch applications."

RELATED

Previous Posts

Dreams about haptic overlays, Part Two:  SLAP- Bridging the Gap Between Virtual and Physical Controls on Tabletops

CRISTAL: One Giant Remote Control

For an overview of what Interactive Tabletops and Surfaces is about, take a careful look of the video from the 2008 conference, credits listed below:


Video Credits (in order of appearance, Tabletop 2008):
1. System Design for the WeSpace: Linking Personal Devices to a Table-Centered Multi-User, Multi-Surface Environment. Jiang, H., Wigdor, D., Forlines, C., Shen, C.
2. Group Coordination and Negotiation through Spatial Proximity Regions around Mobile Devices on Augmented Tabletops, Kray C., Rohs, M., Hook, J. Kratz, S.
3. Tabletop AgilePlanner: A Tabletop-Based Project Planning Tool for Agile Software Development Teams
Wang, X., Maurer, F.
4. TableTrays: Temporary, Reconfigurable Work Surfaces for Tabletop Groupware. Pinelle, D., Stach, T., Gutwin, C.
5. IntuPaint: Bridging the Gap Between Physical and Digital Painting. Vandoren, P., Laerhoven, T., Claesen, L., Taelman, J., Raymaekers, C., Reeth, F.
6. Experiences with Building a Thin Form-Factor Touch and Tangible Tabletop. Izadi, S., Butler, A., Hodges, S., West, D., Hall, M., Buxton, B., Molloy, M.
7. ShapeTouch: Leveraging Contact Shape on Interactive Surfaces, Cao, X., Wilson, A., Balakrishnan, R., Hinckley, K., Hudson, S.
8. PocketTable: Mobile Devices as Multi-Touch Controllers for Tabletop Application Development, Hafeneger, S., Weiss, M., Herkenrath, G., Borchers, J.
9. Presenting using Two-Handed Interaction in Open Space, Vlaming, L., Smit, J., Isenberg, T.
10. DepthTouch: Using Depth-Sensing Camera to Enable Freehand Interactions on and Above the Interactive Surface Benko, H., and Wilson, A.
11. Pokey: Interaction Through Covert Structured Light. Wren, C., Ivanov, Y., Beardsley, P., Kaneva, B., Tanaka, S.
12. Creating Malleable Interactive Surfaces using Liquid Displacement Sensing. Hilliges, O. Kim, D., Izadi, S.
13. Collaborative Interaction and Integrated Spatial Information and Services in Disaster Management, Fruijtiera, S., Dulkb, P., Diasc, E.

Jumpintotomorrow website/blog

Someone sent me an email about the jumpintotomorrow blog and I thought I'd share the link here.

I haven't had much time to really explore the site, but it looks like it has quite a bit of information about new and interesting technologies.

"jumpintotomorrow is a site that lists, features and promotes technology from all the corners of the world, provided by the product creators themselves – and it’s updated every single day...We’re technology aficionados, technology professionals, enthusiasts, academics and people who believe in and recognize the power of truly innovative ideas. The kinds of ideas that make us stop and say “you gotta see this.” Those are the ideas that have a way of reaching out and inspiring other breakthrough thinking. By listing, collecting and celebrating this kind of work, we hope it will reach out to others the way it reached out to us."

ElderGadget Blog

Via Technology-Supported Human World Interaction

Today I came across the ElderGadget Blog when I was searching for technology that might be helpful to my father, who recently spent the last few weeks in an intensive care unit.

Here are a few things I found on the blog, including what I found when I followed a link to the bindependent website:

Smart Table: A Broadband Communication System for the Elderly


ID Studiolab, Delft University of Technology, NL
"The smart system is aimed to prevent possible social isolation between elderly people and their social contacts. It consists of the Smart Table and the Smart Messenger, which provide easy and intuitive way for elderly people to benefit from the advantage of communication technology and improve the satisfaction of their social activities."

"During the design research, a working prototype is made and evaluated by a user test. The Smart Table offers people a way to use broadband communication without the need for a computer. The television will be used for video communication (web-cam) and the table as user-interface. On the table contact persons can be selected and images and video can be shared. The elderly person can capture images that will be shared instantly. The contact person can select images from his or her computer, which will be projected on the table of the elderly person". (TU Delft - Faculty Industrial Design Engineering - Master Design for Interaction - Project Interactive Technology Design - Vincent Steurs & Juin-Yi Huang)


Demy Kitchen Safe Touchscreen Reader



Photo Watch


Clarity-C900: Amplified Big Button Cell Phone

911 Guardian: "Tiny wearable speakerphone"


Extra Large TV Remote Control

SmartShopper: Electronic grocery-list maker



Bierley's ColorMouse Video Magnifier

Voice Pod: Digital recording and playback system

RELATED

Live from CES - Dakim's Brain Fitness Keeps Seniors Sharp

Dakim Brain Games

Previous post: Ubiquitous Computing - Grandpa and grandkids use a webcam and Skype across the miles

YouTube Vlogger: Geriatric1927

Geriatric Gripes and Grumbles

Update on Accessibility and Interactive Games

It has been a while since I shared information about accessible games. If you are a parent of a child or teen with a disability, if you have a disability, or if you hope to keep on gaming through your golden years no matter what ails you, keeping an eye on innovations in this field is worth your time.

The following descriptions are from the IGDA Game Accessibility Special Interest Group blog:

Global Assisitive Technology Wiki - AbilityNet Gate

Via One Switch:
"AbilityNet have put together a wonderful open project called the Global Assisitve Technology Wiki or GATE for short. In their words:

"GATE is actually a Wiki, which is a piece of server software that allows users to freely create and edit Web page content using any Web browser. It's a little like Wikipedia, but just concentrating on assistive technology. GATE is very simple to use, with a control panel enabling you to add content and more. More about Wikis . . .

This wiki has been created by AbilityNet, the UK's largest provider of advice and information on all aspects of Access to technology. The purpose of the wiki is to provide live and up to date information on all aspects of Assistive Technology."

"A really good place to start is their Switch Systems entry here. They are lacking their own accessible games section so hopefully someone (maybe me) will take up the gauntlet for that soon."

Mystic Mine Multi-player One Switch Game

"Just released this February - Mystic Mine is now available to buy on-line at Koonsolo for $19.95 (use www.xe.com for a currency conversion). It is massive fun as a multi-player game and highly recommended by OneSwitch.org.uk. If I had an all time top 10 list of one-switch games this would be a strong contender to make the list. Free demo version available here. Sweet." -posted by One-Switch Games on the Game Accessibility blog

Subtitles: Increasing Game Accessibility (Link to GamaSutra article)

Sip/Puff Mobile Phone Games?

"Pantech is one of three giant mobile phone manufacturers in Korea, among them Samsung and LG. Pantech sold over 10 million phones internationally in 2008, and under the "Sky" brand in the local market. Now, it's about to launch a blow-controlled mobile phone, the IM-S410K, which is also known as the Sky Wind." "Looks like it's got potential for some fun accessible games using sip/puff control." Link Via: Thomas Westin at IGDA GASIG Mailing List, via OneSwitch Games

Stevie Wonder calls for accessible technology

"Stevie Wonder is calling for greater access in technology: "[technology] being more accessible is always a plus and I think really, for various companies ... making it exciting and accessible for people who can see, it would take very little to make it accessible to everyone. So I encourage all the manufacturers to do that."

"When you can ... make it accessible and make it possible, you should just include that in the overall picture. ". Link via: Mike Taylor of Excitim.

Accessible Games Controller Video



Games for Health Trailer

GASIG Links

• IGDA
• IGDA GASIG
• IGDA GASIG Mailing List
• AbleGamers
• Accessible Gaming Shop
• AGRIP
• Audio Games
• D-Gamer
• Deaf Gamers
• Game-Accessibility.com
• Games[cc]
• Help You Play
• OneSwitch.org.uk
• OneSwitch.org.uk Blog
• Pin Interactive
• Retro Remakes
• Robert Florio
• UA-Games
• 7-128 Software

Game Accessibility Forums

• AbleGamers
• Audio Games
• Deaf Gamers
• Eye Tracker Forum
• IGDA GASIG
• Game-Accessibility

Other Links from the GASIC blog:

• Alt-Controls.com
• AssistiveGaming.com
• COGAIN
• Future Making Serious Games
• Game Forward
• The Gaming Kitsune
• NAMCO Rehabilitainment
• Special Effect
• Tera-Kirk Blog

TechPsych: New technology, psychology, and education blog

I've created a new blog, open to posts and comments. The following is from the first post:

The TechPsych blog..... is primarily for school psychologists, educational technologists, school counselors, special education teachers, transition/school to work coordinators,curriculum specialists, and others who are interested in discussing how technology can be more effectively used in schools and other environments.

A primary focus of this blog will be sharing "how to", "what works" and "lessons learned" in several overlapping areas- the topics below are only suggestions:

• The use of technology to facilitate and promote school-wide intervention and prevention planning (academic, behavior, social skills) for all students, using a collaborative, multidisciplinary approach.
  
• The use of technology to facilitate needs assessment, individual and larger group progress monitoring, data analysis, to ensure "data-driven" decision-making processes.
  
• The use of technology for group interventions, including counseling, study skills, social skills and support/coping skills groups.
  
• The use of technology for collaboration and communication among colleagues, more specifically school-based problem solving teams, intervention/assistance teams, curriculum teams, etc.
• The use of technology to promote family/school communication, family involvement, parent education, distance learning opportunities, etc.
  
• Research-into-practice: This is an important component!
  

If you are working at a university, or if you are a graduate student, and you are doing some research in the schools that involves technology and something related to intervention, prevention, etc., this is the place to share your experiences and resources.