Human-Computer Interaction
An important part of educational technologies is the interaction between students and educational software. I'm interested in the use of information visualization techniques, and usability analysis.
Contents
Information visualization techniques
R-Zoom
Description
R-Zoom is a Focus+Context information visualization technique. It has been integrated in the WinHIPE IDE to facilitate program and algorithm animation construction.
With R-Zoom, the user can obtain a global view of the execution of a program -the context- while accessing to the details of a specific execution stage -the focus-. R-Zoom is designed to keep visual appearance and location of the focus and the context elements as far as possible.
Last work
Our last work has been a comparative evaluation against an overview+detail approach to solve the same problem: global view of execution + detailed view of a specefic execution stage. We carried out this evaluation in a functional programming course during one session. Results showed that experienced users where significantly more effective and efficient if they use R-Zoom. Also users' satisfaction is absolutly better for R-Zoom.
Due to these results we are developing a generic Java API with the features of R-Zoom. It is designed as a Java Layout called RZ-Layout
Conclusions & further readings
Current conclusions:
- Adding focus+context features to zoom and pan interfaces has improved effectiveness and efficiency. These improvenments are significantly better than those achieved with the addition of overview+detail features.
- Users felt more confortable with the focus+context augmented interface.
Further readings:
- Description of the R-Zoom technique.
- Evaluation details in Engineering the User Interface From Research to Practice.
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RZ-Layout
Description
RZ-Layout is a generic API to display information in large scale workspace. This system has been written in Java and implements a new layout, which works with a new and generic component named RZ-Component. Distribution of the components which are added to a container is the main task of the RZ-Layout.
RZ-Component is an interface that has certain methods which must be written by the API's user. The most important feature of the RZ-Component is the fact of having two different ways to display. Thanks to this, RZ-Layout can choose which RZ-Component's display show. The fact of working with this type of component makes the layout to be generic, so it can display any kind of element.
Other people involved: this proyect wouldn't have been possible without the effort of Francisco J. Almeida-Martínez.
Last work
We have evaluated the use of RZ-Layout to develop a number interfaces. The expertise of the programmer was high.
Conclusions & further readings
Current conclusions:
- The effort dedicated to develop the interfaces is constant.
- Most of the development time is dedicated to the elements to be visualized rather than their layout.
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Other works & collaborations
Usability evaluations
I have participated in the design and execution of usability evaluations of some educational tools: SRec, AMO.