Papers by Robert Woodbury
CAADRIA proceedings
Much of the available collaboration support tools focus on sharing of documents and managing proj... more Much of the available collaboration support tools focus on sharing of documents and managing projects that require planned activities. These tools fall short in meeting principle of least effort or taking into account of the reality of complex work patterns. We propose DiNa framework and system architecture for a topic centric as opposed to document-centric collaboration system using readily available devices. DiNa aims to complement existing approaches. Our primary goal is to seek answers for how these devices can better support collaboration without overloading the workflow. After a literature review and role-playing exercises, the prototypes we developed demonstrate new interaction techniques for defining topics and address them in collaborators' own terms. It uses different visualizations of the artefacts and their association with the topics, among which is a scalable timeline interface accessible from different platforms, to make the artefacts collected more meaningful in a given context. In this paper we present our recent prototype as a proof-of-concept and its initial evaluations followed by the lessons learnt from our studies on supporting collaboration in the wild. The evaluation outcome is suggestions for improving DiNa-based systems for effective collaboration.
eCAADe proceedings
The original application for approval and letter of approval are filed with the relevant offices.... more The original application for approval and letter of approval are filed with the relevant offices. Inquiries may be directed to those authorities.
Building inhabitants act more complexly than architects, engineers and designers assume. Inhabita... more Building inhabitants act more complexly than architects, engineers and designers assume. Inhabitant actions vary depending on comfort preferences, body type, clothing preference, cultural habits, knowledge of building science, controls, awareness of sustainable practices and contingencies of life. These parameters are not definitive: there might be more of which we are not aware. The more people involved, the more complexity increases. This paper summarizes inhabitants’ adaptive strategies in residential buildings through a qualitative study on 14 households in Vancouver. It elucidates inhabitants’ comfort preferences, barriers to sustainable adaptation and the adaptive impact of a proposed system Light Weight Look Ahead Options (LWLA).
Communications in Computer and Information Science, 2019
The existing research on design space exploration favors the exploration of multiple parallel des... more The existing research on design space exploration favors the exploration of multiple parallel designs, however the act of exploring a design space is still to be integrated in the design of new digital media. We conducted an experiment to understand how designers navigate through large numbers of design alternatives generated from parametric models. We analyzed the data with a purpose-built visualization tool. We observed that participants changed the task environment and took design actions, frequently combining these into action combinations. Five tasks emerged from our analysis: Criteria Building, Criteria Testing, Criteria Applying, Reflection and (Re)Setting. From our analysis, we suggest several features for future systems for interacting with design alternatives.
SIMULATION, 2015
Although the Discrete Event System specification (DEVS) has over recent decades provided systems ... more Although the Discrete Event System specification (DEVS) has over recent decades provided systems engineers with a scalable approach to modeling and simulation, the formalism has seen little uptake in many other disciplines where it could be equally useful. Our observations of end-user programmers confronted with DEVS theory or software suggest that learning barriers are largely responsible for this lack of utilization. To address these barriers, we apply ideas from human–computer interaction to the design of visual interfaces intended to promote their users’ effective knowledge of essential DEVS concepts. The first step is to propose a set of names that make these concepts easier to learn. We then design and provide rationale for visual interfaces for interacting with various elements of DEVS models and simulation runs. Both the names and interface designs are evaluated using the Cognitive Dimensions of Notations framework, which emphasizes trade-offs between 14 aspects of informati...
International Journal of Architectural Computing, 2015
It is well accepted that search is an effective model for design. Newell and Simons' Human In... more It is well accepted that search is an effective model for design. Newell and Simons' Human Information Processing model is foundational to this view. Designers use symbols and structures to express, store, off-load, recall, and manage their work. They mix general and detailed elements, organize their problem-space differently, seek ways to identify repetitive tasks, and utilize external media. An integral aspect of design-search is the comparison of alternatives, because the goal is usually to come close, if not fully satisfy, a set of requirements. Searching problem-spaces with currently available tools is challenging due to a number of issues related to creating and comparing alternative representations of one's thought process and outcome. In this paper, we present Alt.Text, a prototype that we developed to explore strategies for supporting design search. While Alt.Text only handles text-based documents, we believe that many of its features can be generalized to the domai...
Visual analytics tools provide powerful visual representations in order to support the sense-maki... more Visual analytics tools provide powerful visual representations in order to support the sense-making process. In this process, analysts typically iterate through sequences of steps many times, varying parameters each time. Few visual analytics tools support this process well, nor do they provide support for visualizing and understanding the analysis process itself. To help analysts understand, explore, reference, and reuse their analysis process, we present a visual analytics system named CzSaw (See-Saw) that provides an editable and re-playable history navigation channel in addition to multiple visual representations of document collections and the entities within them (in a manner inspired by Jigsaw [24]). Conventional history navigation tools range from basic undo and redo to branching timelines of user actions. In CzSaw's approach to this, first, user interactions are translated into a script language that drives the underlying scripting-driven propagation system. The latter allows analysts to edit analysis steps, and ultimately to program them. Second, on this base, we build both a history view showing progress and alternative paths, and a dependency graph showing the underlying logic of the analysis and dependency relations among the results of each step. These tools result in a visual model of the sense-making process, providing a way for analysts to visualize their analysis process, to reinterpret the problem, explore alternative paths, extract analysis patterns from existing history, and reuse them with other related analyses.
ACADIA proceedings
Designers work by creating alternatives. Current design media restrict this practice through thei... more Designers work by creating alternatives. Current design media restrict this practice through their near-universal adherence to a single-state document model. We describe the implementation of an online gallery system built as part of a research program to understand new media types for working with design alternatives in parametric modeling. The online gallery supports multiple commercially available parametric modelers. A user study shows a significant difference between two modes of gallery operation and a qualitative study describes user patterns in using the online gallery system.
Extended Abstracts of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design
Shape schema grammars generalize parametric shape grammars so that both rules and the objects to ... more Shape schema grammars generalize parametric shape grammars so that both rules and the objects to which they apply are expressed with shape schemata. This paper defines shape schema grammars. It starts with a notation for schemata in general and shape schemata in particular. Schema equality is shown to have at least three possible definitions, of which schema consistency is the most useful. A limited notion of shape schema maximality potentially reduces the size and redundancy of a given schema. Shape schema subpart is a multifunction returning all of the possible ways that one shape schema can be embedded in another. Shape schema difference and addition complete the basic mathematical operations over shape schemata required to define shape schema rules, grammars and languages.
Proceedings of the Canadian Engineering Education Association
The Canadian Design Research Network (CDRN) is a consortium of academic institutions and industri... more The Canadian Design Research Network (CDRN) is a consortium of academic institutions and industrial partners working together to improve design outcomes in Canadian society through research in design. The network is composed of specialized research clusters associated with major design schools across Canada and includes the key disciplines of architecture, landscape architecture, engineering, urban design, planning, industrial design, interaction design and human-computer interaction. The CDRN works collaboratively across disciplines, and in particular, with policy makers and computer scientists to foster a shared understanding of the concerns, perspectives and methodologies of all stakeholders in the design process
The International Journal of the Image, 2012
Film spaces can sometimes communicate narrative experiences to the viewers as strongly as those c... more Film spaces can sometimes communicate narrative experiences to the viewers as strongly as those conveyed through characters. Audiences have grasped the feeling of Blade Runner’s (Scott 1982) despair in a dystopian futuristic city, Alice’s nonsensical endeavors in Wonderland (Geronimi et al. 1951), Dorothy’s eventful adventures on the yellow brick road of The Wizard of Oz (Fleming 1939), WALL-E’s (Stanton 2008) loneliness in the midst of the garbage piles planet, and the gladiators’ feeling of diminishment in front of the grand coliseum in Gladiator (Scott 2000). By watching these spaces onscreen, one could glimpse the experience of being there without actually visiting these places. These film images portray architectural forms filled with experiences that play on emotions we strongly identify with, as we follow the protagonists venturing into these spaces. To better understand the types of spaces constructed in film and the experiences they convey, a number of film scenes with strong depictions of spatial exploration and architectural components were selected for analysis. We have coded for spatial archetypes with concern to two aspects: form and experience. Accordingly, we have identified spatial archetypes such as: open space, landmark, path, arcade, tunnel, clearance, layered space, grid, labyrinth, shaft, rotunda and court. Such findings can help assist the communication of spatial experience through moving images manifested in both architectural films and animations.
Architect South Australia, 1999
Selected and Expanded Papers from the Ifip Tc5 Wg5 2 Working Conference on Geometric Modeling For Product Realization, 1992
Geometric reasoning, the integration of geometric representation and inference in advanced comput... more Geometric reasoning, the integration of geometric representation and inference in advanced computer systems, is presented as an issue at the forefront of research in construction automation. The unique demands that construction automation poses on such reasoning are discussed. An architecture that provides a structure for geometric reasoning is presented and results from a prototype implementation are shown. A project to develop geometric reasoning in the construction domain of panelized building systems is introduced. Within this project, two exemplary applications, structural/architectural design and construction sequence planning, each supported by the same geometric reasoning facility, are being demonstrated.
Uploads
Papers by Robert Woodbury