We describe our experiences of creating and using a wide variety of techniques and applications to support collaboration in virtual environments for different activities and user groups. Our aim is to offer plentiful and rich possibilities for interaction across and between both real and virtual environments.
The Pond is a desk-projection-based system for search, visualisation and transactions of data elements stored in local databases or on the Internet. Based on a 3D ecosystem metaphor, the Pond approach to querying, presenting and manipulating data elements differs considerably from more conventional information systems.
We describe a museum installation that explains the technical and mental process that sonar operators undergo when identifying underwater sounds in the surroundings of a submarine. The installation places the public in a cramped space composed of several coupled interactive stations offering different perspectives onto a virtual environment representing a part of the Baltic Sea. The virtual environment and its presentation within the installation are implemented as an application of the DIVE research toolkit. The installation has been on display in several museums on a daily basis for over a year. We describe the technical solutions that we have employed to realise the installation and some of our learning.
This paper describes how home appliances might be enhanced to improve user awareness of energy usage. Households wish to lead comfortable and manageable lives. Balancing this reasonable desire with the environmental and political goal of reducing electricity usage is a challenge that we claim is best met through the design of interfaces that allows users better control of their usage and unobtrusively informs them of the actions of their peers. A set of design principles along these lines is formulated in this paper. We have built a fully functional prototype home appliance with a socially aware interface to signal the aggregate usage of the user's peer group according to these principles, and present the prototype in the paper.
In this chapter we describe The Pond, a system used to search for and visualise data elements on an engaging tabletop display. The Pond uses methods of unencumbered interaction and audio feedback to allow users to investigate data elements, and supports shoulder-to-shoulder collaboration with the physical Pond artefact mediating the collaboration between those people gathered around it. The user interface is based on an ecosystem metaphor, presenting data elements in the form of shoals of aquatic creatures inside a virtual 3D pond.
In this paper we describe The Pond, a system used to search for and visualise data elements on an engaging tabletop display. The Pond uses methods of unencumbered interaction and audio feedback to allow users to investigate data elements, and supports shoulder-to-shoulder collaboration with the physical Pond artefact mediating the collaboration between those people gathered around it. The user interface is based on an ecosystem metaphor, presenting data elements in the form of shoals of aquatic creatures inside a virtual 3D pond. The Pond is an interactive system offering an appealing and novel way to search for and interchange information. We describe the motivation and design choices behind The Pond, the system as it stands today, details of its implementation, and observations from a study of The Pond in use.