adaptive

We present a novel display metaphor which extends traditional tabletop projections in collaborative environments by introducing freeform, environment-aware display representations and a matching set of interaction schemes. For that purpose, we map personalized widgets or ordinary computer applications that have been designed for a conventional, rectangular layout into space-efficient bubbles whose warping is performed with a potential-based physics approach. With a set of interaction operators based on laser pointer tracking, these freeform displays can be transformed and elastically deformed using focus and context visualization techniques. We also provide operations for intuitive instantiation of bubbles, cloning, cut & pasting, deletion and grouping in an interactive way, and we allow for user-drawn annotations and text entry using a projected keyboard. Additionally, an optional environment-aware adaptivity of the displays is achieved by imperceptible, realtime scanning of the projection geometry. Subsequently, collision-responses of the bubbles with non-optimal surface parts are computed in a rigid body simulation. The extraction of the projection surface properties runs concurrently with the main application of the system. Our approach is entirely based on off the-shelf, low-cost hardware including DLP-projectors and FireWire cameras.

We propose a new evolutionary method of extracting user preferences from examples shown to an automatic graph layout system. Using stochastic methods such as simulated annealing and genetic algorithms, automatic layout systems can find a good layout using an evaluation function which can calculate how good a given layout is. However, the evaluation function is usually not known beforehand, and it might vary from user to user. In our system, users show the system several pairs of good and bad layout examples, and the system infers the evaluation function from the examples using genetic programming technique. After the evaluation function evolves to reflect the preferences of the user, it is used as a general evaluation function for laying out graphs. The same technique can be used for a wide range of adaptive user interface systems.