CHI 2011, Bill Buxton, and the Buxton Collection: Explore 35 years of interactive devices, online!

Bill Buxton is a researcher at Microsoft who focuses on Human-Computer Interaction and is known for his work in user experience design and natural user interfaces such as multi-touch surfaces.   His talk at the recent CHI 2011 conference, held in Vancouver, Canada, was an overview of the Buxton Collection, an on-line historical archive of interactive input devices spanning over the past 35 years.  


It was interesting to note that at the time of the presentation, the Vancouver Conference Center, where the conference was taking place, was having serious problems with the network/internet connections, and as a consequence, Buxton was not able to demonstrate the on-line version of his collection as planned.  

Not to worry.  The physical version of the Buxton's archive was on display during the conference, along with Buxton, who was happy to tell the story behind every device and gadget in the archive, with much enthusiasm. The slideshow below provides a glimpse of the Bill Buxton archive displayed at CHI 2011:

My Buxton Collection Slideshow, CHI 2011, Vancouver, Canada

Buxton's archive of gadgets comes with a rich history, accumulated over the years. Much of this history, until now, has resided in Buxton's head.   Holding and touching the items in the archive while listening to Buxton's passionate stories about each one, was unlike anything I had ever experienced.  His archive is a labor of love, and the interactive, on-line version of the Buxton Collection is his way of sharing his knowledge with the world.


During his talk, Buxton pointed out that in computer science programs, students are not required to have much exposure to the "history of ideas" in the field.  Huge chunks of work are often ignored in the literature,  and in some cases, the wheel is unknowingly reinvented, and this is something that must be addressed within the CHI community, according to Buxton. 


I agree.

RELATED
Previous IMT posts about Bill Buxton
Bill Buxton's Presentation Video: "A Little Tale about Touch" (Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, 2010)
Two good articles by Bill Buxton: The Mad Dash Towards Touch Technology; The Long Nose of Innovation
Buxton Collection
Buxton Collection, PivotViewer
Back to the Past: Bill Buxton Shows Off 36 Years of Tech Devices
Microsoft News Center, 5/9/11
Microsoft's Bill Buxton exhibits gadget collection 35 years in the making
Donald Melanson, engadget, 5/9/11
Bill Buxton's Haptic Input References (pdf)
Bill Buxton's website
Multi-touch Systems that I Have Known and Loved (Bill Buxton)
CES 2010: NUI with Bill Buxton

On Engineering and Design: An Open Letter Microsoft Research Principal Scientist Bill Buxton calls for engineers and user experience designers to learn to appreciate one another

Bill Buxton, Bloomberg Businessweek, 4/29/09

Play with Dynamic Views of my Blog: Snapshot, Mosaic, Timeslide, Sidebar, and Flipcard via the Chrome Browser

I've never been comfortable locked into the linear format of a blog.   Although I get excited about the latest emerging technologies, interfaces, and interaction design, and want to keep up with the breaking news,  I am also very much interested in the stories behind the technologies.  I want to share history of ideas leading up to innovative research and new ways of conceptualizing the way people create (and use) technology.    I want to share stories about the people related to the technology - those who create it, and those who use it.  I also want to share stories related to context-  including ways various technologies are transforming and converging, and how all of this mix is impacts the bigger picture.


I have often wondered how I could provide visitors to my blog an opportunity to discover the depth, breadth, and richness of my labor of love for the past 5 years.  From what I can tell, this might be possible through the use of the new Dynamic Views extension for the Chrome browser.   


If you are interested in exploring this topic further, take a look at the links and video below. I've also provided screenshots of my blog, with corresponding links to the various dynamic views of the Interactive Multimedia Technology blog.


Fresh new perspectives for your blog
Antin Harasymiv, Blogger Buzz, 3/31/11
Dynamic Views, the Chrome Extension
Mike Lawther, Blogger Buzz, 4/4/11


Information about dynamic views from Blogger:
All about dynamic views for readers
All about dynamic views for authors






Here are examples of the various views of my blog provided by the Dynamic Views extension for the Chrome browser.  I've included direct links for each view for those of you who do not have the extension.  (I am not sure if the links will work in other browsers.)


SNAPSHOT
http://interactivemultimediatechnology.blogspot.com/view/snapshot

MOSAIC
http://interactivemultimediatechnology.blogspot.com/view/mosaic
TIMESLIDE
http://interactivemultimediatechnology.blogspot.com/view/timeslide
SIDEBAR
http://interactivemultimediatechnology.blogspot.com/view/sidebar
FLIPCARD
http://interactivemultimediatechnology.blogspot.com/view/flipcard

RELATED
Quotes from the Dynamic Views extension page:

"Blogger now provides five new dynamic views for public blogs. These new views use the latest in web technology, including AJAX, HTML5 and CSS3, to deliver a host of benefits:


Infinite scrolling: read more posts without having to reload or click to a second page
New layouts:       different views suited to different types of blogs
Speed:                 download images as you view them, not all at once in advance
Interactivity:         there are now more ways to experience and engage with blog content"


"This extension notifies you if you're on a Blogger blog and lets you quickly view the blog content in one of the new five dynamic views. Simply click on the Blogger icon when it appears, select the view, and you'll be redirected appropriately."

Program- CHI 2011 Child Computer Interaction: 2nd Workshop on UI Technologies and Educational Pedagogy

CHILD COMPUTER INTERACTION: 2ND WORKSHOP ON UI TECHNOLOGIES AND THEIR IMPACT ON EDUCATIONAL PEDAGOGY

May 7, 2011

In conjunction with CHI 2011, Vancouver, Canada

PROGRAM (Draft)

9:00am – 09:05am       Introduction


9:05am - 10:05am        Paper Session I (8min presentation, 4min Discussion)


Evaluating Pervasive Classrooms


• Son Do-Lenh et al.:   Classroom-experience evaluation: An ecological approach to evaluating pervasive technologies in classroom
• Kathryn Rounding et al.:   Evaluating Interfaces with Children
• Dan Morris et al.:   Using Machine Learning to Scaffold Artistic Creativity in Education
• Tamara Polajnar et al.:   Enabling Picture-based Querying and Learning with the JuSe Interface
• Hamed Alavi et al.:   Lantern 2.0: A Pervasive Scripting Tool


10:05am - 11:00am  Coffee Break and Preparation time for short talks


11:00am - 12:10pmPaper Session II (8min presentation, 4min Discussion)


Collaboration in Math: Fears, Myths, and Insights


• Nicola Yull et al.: Pass the iPad: Comparing collaboration on paper and screen
• Veronika Irvine et al.: Math Education: A Creative Approach


• Group talk: Math and Embodied Agents
a.  Kristina Richter et al.: Bridging Diagnosis and Learning for Mathematics Education in Classroom Setting
b.  Lisa Anthony et al.: Handwriting Interaction for Math Tutors: Lessons for HCI in Education
c.  Andrew Jensen et al.: Using Embodied Pedagogical Agents and Direct Instruction to Augment Learning for Young Children with Special Needs


• Group talk: Dispelling Myths About the Next Generation Classroom
a.   Alex Thayer et al.: The Myth of the Paperless School: Replacing Printed Texts with E-readers
b.  Sharon Oviatt: Designing Digital Tools for Thinking, Adaptive Learning and Cognitive Evolution
c.  Alexandra Dunn et al.: Designing Classroom Technology to Meet the Needs of All


• Group talk: Games, Wearables and Fun Learning.
a.  Christiane Moser et al.:    Child-Centered Game Development
b.  Lizbeth Escobedo et al.:  Blue’s Clues: An Augmented Reality Positioning System
c.  Si Jung Kim et al.:   Wearable Story: A Story Telling Jacket for Young Children to Improve Their Independent Physical and Learning Activities


12:10pm - 1:30pm Lunch


1:30pm - 2:30pm Paper Session (10 min presentation, 5min Discussion)


Tangibles and Tabletops
•   Izdihar Jamil et al.: Communication Patterns in Collaborative Peer Learning around Interactive Table
•   Aura Pon et al.: Graspable Music and Vuzik: Music Learning and Creativity using an Interactive Surface
•   Ahmed Kharrufa et al.: Learning at interactive surfaces and designing for reflection
•   Cristina Sylla et al.: TOK – a Tangible Interface for Storytelling


• Group talk: Tables and Tangibles
• a.Robert Sheehan: Constructionism, Programming and Touch Interfaces
• b.  Orit Shaer et al.: Making the Invisible Tangible: Learning Biological Engineering in Kindergarten
• c.  Sebastien Kubicki: Evaluation of an interactive table with tangible objects: Application with children in a classroom
• d.  Cristina Emilia Costa et al.: I-Theatre: developing narratives skills in kindergarten children
• e.  Wooi Boon Goh et al.: Potential Challenges in Collaborative Game Design for Inclusive Settings


2:30pm - 3:00pm  Coffee Break


3:00pm - 4:00pm  Breakout Discussion (What are future challenges? Next years workshop?)


4:00pm - 4:45pm  Closing Keynote  TBA


4:45pm - 5:00pm  Closing Remarks


7:00pm   Optional Workshop Dinner


RELATED
Workshop Website
ACM-CHI 2011 Conference Website

Multitouch and Gesture News (Part I) : NUITEQ Updates

In this post, I'd like to share some news from NUITEQ, a privately held multi-touch software technology that is based in Sweden.  NUITEQ is known for Snowflake Suite, a multi-touch application that is used in a variety of situations.  


"NUITEQ is as happy as a kid in a candy shop to announce that it has released version upgrade 1.9.4 of its award-winning, industry leading multi-touch software product Snowflake Suite" - Harry van der Veen, NUITEQ


The screen shot below gives a nice view of the range of applications that included in Snowflake Suite:



-Photo from NUITEQ


DEMONSTRATION OF SNOWFLAKE SUITE




RELATED
NUITEQ's CTO Mikael Bauer nominated for the Mer-IT award in the category IT-person of the year
NUITEQ Awarded CONNECT Norr Company of the Year 2011
NUITEQ's Partners
From the NUITEQ Gallery, via Harry van der Veen

Post from TechPsych blog: How about some iPad 2 apps for school psychology and related fields?

The video provides a recap of the iPad and highlights how it can be used in education, for students with special needs, in aviation, in doctor's offices, in the board room, in an art studio, in the kitchen - just about anywhere.


I wonder how an iPad could transform the work of a school psychologist!   I have a plenty of ideas, now that the iPad2 is out.  How can it help with RTI?  Progress monitoring?  Digital social stories?   Social skills activities?  Counseling? Behavior intervention?   Transition planning?  Assessment?  Communication? Productivity?  IEP collaboration and development?   


Wouldn't it be nice if there were a few iPad apps that could effectively support the work of school psychologists and those who work in similar fields? 

So much of what we use in our productivity work as school psychologists was built upon applications first developed in the mid-to-late 1990's,  at best.   There must be more efficient and effective solutions out there.     What can be done to move us forward?

Psychological and educational test publishers, can you hear me now?   


I have some ideas.

Why bother switching from GUI to NUI? - Asked and Answered by Josh Blake; My 2-cents; Stevie B’s Microsoft Research Video; Marco Silva’s NUI-HCI Presentation (and links)

In Chapter 1 of Natural User Interfaces in .NET,  Josh Blake asks and answers a question posed by many people who have been under the spell of keyboard input and GUI/ WIMP interaction: 


Why bother switching from GUI to NUI?  The answer?  Read Chapter 1 (pdf) of the book - the chapter is free.


Here are a few of my personal reasons:  
1.  I want to buy the next version of the iPad or something like it.
2.  I want to buy a new large-screen Internet HD TV.

3.  I want to buy a Kinect.

4.  I do NOT want to interact with my new TV with a Sony remote.  Too many tiny buttons!

5. I do NOT want to interact with my new TV with a keyboard,  because it reminds me of...work.

6.  Most importantly: 

I want to design apps for the people I care about, and others with similar needs:

    My mom.  

    My grandson.

Moms and dads with kids in tow.
People with special needs and/or health concerns, and the people who care and guide them.
Knowledge sharers and (life-long) learners....

RELATED

"Smart" Interactive Display Research

How Natural User Interfaces are changing Human Computer Interaction

 

View more presentations from Marco Silva

My YouTube Playlist:

Post-WIMP Explorers' Club Videos

"Natural user interfaces, gesture interaction, multi-touch, natural interaction, post WIMP examples and more... "

Interactive Multimedia Technology Post:
Interactive Touch-Screen Technology, Participatory Design, and "Getting It": Revisited

RELATED - and somewhat related   

Moms with Apps

Design for Care

SparkOn

NUI Group

UX Matters      "Why don't usability problems get fixed"

Encyclopedia:  Human Computer Interaction, Interaction Design, User Experience, Information Architecture, Usability and More (Interaction-Design.org)

Josh Blake's Blog: Deconstructing the NUI    Book: Chapter 1 (pdf)  Free!
Blake.NUI

"Blake.NUI is a collection of helpful controls, utilities, and samples useful for multi-touch and NUI development with WPF, Surface, and Silverlight."

OpenKinect Wiki

OpenKinect Community Founder Joshua Blake Comes Up With His Own Version of Win 7 Multitouch on Kinect   (Madhav K, KinectHacks 1/14/11)

Kinect SDK Could Open New Worlds for Motion-Controlled Interfaces (Mike Martin, TechNews World, 2/22/11)

Seth Sandler

Seth Sandler's Blog

Seth Sandler's  Ultimate List of Interactive Tables

Dan Saffer

Bill Buxton

Johnny Chung Lee's Procrastineering Blog
Adam Greenfield's Speedbird Blog

 (This is not an inclusive list.)


GUI to NUI Post-WIMP Manifesto:  TBA

NCSU D.H. Hill Library has a Perceptive Pixel Multitouch Display (updated)

NCSU 'sandbox' lets students touch the technology

Jay Price, Charlotte Observer, 2/22/11

"The Perceptive Pixel display wall, which was switched on this week, is the $100,000 centerpiece of the new Technology Sandbox at the D.H. Hill Library. The sandbox is a room of cutting-edge, interactive hardware that's aimed partly at familiarizing students with the latest high-tech hardware, particularly large displays and gesture-based computing. It was paid for with a federal grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services that is administered by the State Library of North Carolina."

Credit: Corey Lowenstein - clowenst@newsobserver.com

RELATED
Technology Sandbox introduces NCSU students to latest gadgets
WRAL Techwire, 8/25/10
New Learning Spaces for New Learning Styles (pdf)
Terry B. Hill, Mohan Ramaswamy,  NCSU

HUNT LIBRARY

North Carolina State University Libraries
Perceptive Pixel

Transit: Digital Video Dance Storytelling on Large Displays at the LAX Airport, by Scott Snibbe and Francesca Penzani

Scott Sona Snibbe, an interactive artist, created a large-scale video installation on twenty-nine connected HD displays that curved around at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at the LAX airport in 2010.   The video tells a story of groups of people traveling through an airport who eventually begin dancing in interesting ways.  

Francesca Penzani was the choreographer for this project. Noah Cunningham was responsible for the cinematography, editing, and post-production.




RELATED
SNIBBE INTERACTIVE
The Snibbe Interactive website has lots of great photos and videos of the company's work.

Thanks to Daniel Chen for sharing this video!

Personal and Ubiquitous Computing Upcoming Theme Issues- I love the topics!

I'm happy to share some information about the topics of upcoming theme issues planned for Personal and Ubiquitous Computing. The information below was taken from the PUC's Facebook page.  I added links to information about most of the managing editor for each theme.


"PUC is currently working with some of the leading researchers, research groups, conferences and workshops to produce theme issues around specific topics. Here are the issues we currently have in progress:"

• Automative User interfaces:  Albrecht Schmidt
• Multimodal Systems, Services and Interfaces for Ubiquitous Computing Zhiwen Yu
• Ambient Systems, Networks and Technologies:  Elhadi Shakhuki 
• Ubiquitous Computing & Ambient Intelligence: Jose Bravo 
• Extreme Navigation: David McGookin
• Adaptation and Personalization for Ubiquitous Computing: Zhiwen Yu (?)
• Pervasive Advertising: Joerg Mueller  
• A Persuasive Design Approach to Personal Health: Tom Djajadingrat
• Mobile Multimedia Processing: Michael Rohs  
• Cloud computing: Chunming Rong
• Smartphone Applications and Services for Pervasive Computing
• Personal Projection: Enrico Rukzio
• Mental Health and the Impact of Ubiquitous Technologies:  Venet Osmani
• Sensor Networks and Ambient Intelligence: Boon Chong Seet
• User-Driven RFID Applications and Challenges: Katerina Mitrokotsa
• Measuring behavior and interaction – methods and new application domains: E.I. Barakova

"For more details, check back in our Facebook Notes or contact the editor managing the theme issue."   - the editor's email addresses can be found on the PUC Facebook site.



Personal and Ubiquitous Computing


Note:  Ubiquitous Computing was one of my favorite graduate courses and I still can't get enough of it.   In my dreams, I would be happy just playing around with emerging technologies and experimenting with new applications, and nothing else, for a year or two, in and out of the lab.

A plug for Innovative Interactivity's Top 5 January Posts (Tracy Boyer)

Tracy Boyer's Innovative Interactivity (II) cover many topics that most likely would interest readers of this blog. She's conveniently listed the top five II blog posts for January.  Take a look!

1. Job opportunities, January 2011
2. NFB and The Goggles launch interactive documentary Pine Point
3. Adam Westbrook publicizes his top media predictions for 2011
4. Multimedia must-see: Climate Wisconsin
5. Selling Yourself: What’s your story?

MIT MediaLab's DepthJS: Now your web page can interact with the Microsoft Kinect using Javascript (Link to code, more)

MIT Media Lab's DepthJS website

Info from the DepthJS website:
"Navigating the web is only one application of the framework we built - that is, we envision all sorts of applications that run in the browser, from games to specific utilities for specific sites. The great part is that now web developers who specialize in Javascript can work with the Kinect without having to learn any special languages or code. We believe this will allow a new set of interactions beyond what we first developed."


DepthJS is open source under the AGPL license. Code: https://github.com/doug/depthjs

RELATED
Gestures that your TV Will Understand (Features information about PrimeSense)
Tom Simonite, MIT Technology Review, 1/21/11


Hackers Take the Kinect to New Levels
Timothy Carmody, MIT Technology Review 12/2/10


Microsoft Kinect: How the device can respond to your voice and gestures
Erica Naone, MIT Technology Review, January/February 2011






Comment:
I went to Best Buy today and almost bought a Kinect.  Unfortunately, the demo hadn't come in yet, so I decided to wait until I could give it a try.  I'm curious to experiment with what it can do. 

Saturday Quick Links: Digital Signage and Digital Out of Home (DOOH), via The Digital Signage Insider, Digital Signage Today, and more

The links:

Walmart and Microsoft Talk Up Digital Signage at the NRF
Bill Gerba, The Digital Signage Insider, 1/14/11
Wirespring


NRF: Walmart unveils ROI data for in-store digital signage campaigns
James Bickers, Digital Signage Today, 1/10/11


"C-Tailing" (Converged Retailing)  - NCR
NRF: Convergent technologies on the retail horizon
Cherrhy Butler, Digital Signage Today, 1/11/11

RELATED
Connecting Your Business to Devices and Customers with Windows Embedded

View more presentations from Microsoft Windows Embedded.
Barb Edson, Sr. Director of Marketing, Windows Embedded

Here are a few resources related to this topic:

4th Workshop on Pervasive Advertising (topics)

The Web Outside: Exploring place-based social media 

(LocaModa blog)

LocaModa's whitepapers

Blogs:

Digital Signage Today

Daily DOOH

The Digital Signage Insider

COMMENT
Designers and developers need to think about off-the-desktop technologies as a new form of the web/internet.  Information architects who understand interactive media/transmedia, cross-display/device, cross-platform, and interaction design within a broader context are sorely needed in this space.  


The presentation below, by Chris Thorne, Lead Information Architect and User Experience Consultant working for the BBC, provides a good overview about this topic:

Ubiquitous IA (Information Architecture): Building for change and web 3.0 

View more presentations from christhorne.
Chris Thorne

Stay tuned!

Over the past months I've been gathering video and photos of my encounters and interactions with digital signage as a consumer/customer/user during my every-day activities such as shopping, traveling, vacationing, and so forth, which will be included in a post or series of posts in the near future.   


I have content related to interaction with various QR tags,  interactive kiosks, interactive displays and TV on a cruise ship, an interactive touch screen at J.C. Penny, and more.  If you are a regular reader of this blog, you know that my interests include user experience of DOOH, interactive displays in public spaces, and so forth.  


Note:  Despite all of the technological innovations in this converging field, issues related to context, usability, and accessibility are not consistently addressed from a broader systems point of view.

Gesture "multitouch" 12 x 7 interactive video wall provides tours of I/O Data Centers' facilities

I came across this demonstration of I/O DataCenter's 12 by 7 foot interactive video wall that makes playing around with views of data center modules...interesting! The display is a gesture-based "multi-touch" system. (I'll update this post when I get more information.)



Here is the description from the Datacenter YouTube channel:


"Instead of hauling a 40-foot long modular data center to a trade show, i/o Data Centers is taking a high-tech approach to customer tours of their i/o Anywhere modular data center. The i/o team has created a 12-foot by 7-foot touchscreen video wall to provide interactive tours of the company's facilities. Selecting a "hot spot" pops up a virtual data center, complete with cross sections and product info, following the concept of the touch screens in the sci-fi movie "Minority Report.""


FYI: I/O Data Centers has an application that runs on the Surface.

UPCOMING:
Stay tuned for my upcoming posts! 


News about LM3LABS (Previous post)
Interactive Surveillance CCeline Latulipe (technologist) Annabel Manning (artist)

Interactive Video

OpenKinect, NUI, NI

Games, serious games

3D, including glassless

Large interactive displays in public spaces

Convergence 2011
Telepresence Updates
RENCI, Charlotte Viz Lab