Papers by Evangelos Kapros
Fitts' Law is, more often than not, thought of as standard knowledge in the field of Human-Comput... more Fitts' Law is, more often than not, thought of as standard knowledge in the field of Human-Computer Interaction. However, in many occasions, interface components are being built by professionals with little or no knowledge of HCI principles (e.g., software menus are often being built by software developers with no designer input). How much appreciation of Fitts' Law exists among developers, and how does it affect our collaboration with them and the software they build and we use? To help answer this question, a survey among 65 designers and developers was conducted, as well as an analysis of the Computer Science undergraduate curricula from 94 internationally high-ranked universities. The contribution of this paper is twofold: firstly, treating Fitts' Law as an Open Educational Resource and, secondly, the analysis identified gaps that extend beyond HCI Education and fall in the sphere of Epistemology.
State-of-the-art synthesizers provide numerous controllers through which the user may create a gr... more State-of-the-art synthesizers provide numerous controllers through which the user may create a great variety of sounds. The real-time control of so many parameters though, is often problematic for the user. The goal of our work has been to study the physical and remote control of such audial parameters. For this purpose, a system was developed that processes video input and recognizes movements of the user's body parts (movement of hands, head etc.) and translates them as change in some audial parameters of an electronic music instrument (tone, cutoff, etc.). Also, basic techniques of digital audio synthesis were studied and a prototype synthesizer was developed that is controlled physically and remotely. The study didn't limit itself in technical details, but contained study of the human psyche and cognition, as much for the audial, as also for the video part of the implementation of the system.
Computers are increasingly mediating the way people make decisions, including those that can have... more Computers are increasingly mediating the way people make decisions, including those that can have an effect on conflict and peace. In addition, recent research provides empirical data on the factors that affect the likelihood of armed conflict. These conditions provide an unprecedented opportunity to the human-computer interaction community to play a role in preventing, deescalating, and recovering from conflicts. This SIG will be the first opportunity for CHI attendees to meet during the main part of the conference, share their ideas, and provide concrete ways to move forward with this line of research.
A cloud storage database has been developed for use in a Cochrane review: “Taxanes for the treatm... more A cloud storage database has been developed for use in a Cochrane review: “Taxanes for the treatment of platinum pre-treated epithelial ovarian cancer”. A database was needed for this review as a large amount of clinical variables are to be extracted from 129 identified studies and the subjects are to be subdivided into 16 different subgroups. There are 5 authors recruited to this Cochrane review, working at 4 different institutions. The database utilises cloud computing, such that the information is stored online and can be accessed from anywhere. In particular, it runs a database-as-a-service storage, uses a NoSQL data model, and is populated through a web-based user interface. Each study in our review must have the data extracted by 2 review authors. The database will crosscheck information entered by two authors and flag discrepancies that need to be resolved by discussion. Using an online database-as-a-service and cloud computing to query and compare data allows the elimination...
Background: An online database was needed for the Cochrane review “Taxanes for the treatment of p... more Background: An online database was needed for the Cochrane review “Taxanes for the treatment of platinum pre-treated epithelial ovarian cancer” for several reasons. Firstly, a large amount of clinical parameters were to be extracted from 68 identified studies and the data was to be subdivided into 16 different subgroups. Secondly, there were 6 authors performing data extraction for this Cochrane review, working at 4 different institutions. Therefore data could not be entered and stored centrally at one institution. Objectives: Development of a cloud computing database accessible online for all authors performing data extraction. Methods: The database utilises cloud computing, such that the information is stored online and can be accessed from anywhere and is populated through a web-based user interface. Results: Using an online database-as-a-service and cloud computing to query and compare data allows the elimination of transaction concurrency conflicts. That is, the 2 authors can s...
Usability of Educational Technology APIs: Findings and Guidelines
This paper describes a project that reviewed the usability of existing Educational Technology App... more This paper describes a project that reviewed the usability of existing Educational Technology Application Programming Interfaces (EdTech APIs). The focus was on web-based APIs and the portals through which these are offered to developers. After analysing the state of art with regard to existing EdTech APIs and after conducting a literature review on API usability, a survey was circulated among developers and CTOs of EdTech organisations. The results of the aforementioned three steps were triangulated and resulted in usability guidelines for EdTech APIs. The contribution of this project is twofold: firstly, the production of a concrete set of EdTech API usability guidelines and, secondly, their implementation in a proof-of-concept a portal for two different EdTech offerings.
While cultural analytics has become a well-established visualization method for big image and vid... more While cultural analytics has become a well-established visualization method for big image and video data, the domains in which it has been used have focused on traditional media. Magazine covers, photography, manga, and video frames have been the main domains of exploration so far. In this paper, we propose cultural analytics as a means to analyze icons from software applications—these are not traditionally analyzed as media artifacts; however, new and interesting results may occur from treating them as traditional media. The aim is to better understand an application domain by analyzing the icons of its software applications.
As a case study, we visualized and analyzed the icons of 158,200 educational apps that were uploaded to Apple’s App Store from July 2008 to November 2014. The contribution of this project is twofold. Firstly, we demonstrate how analyzing the software icons of an application domain (in our case, education) can help researchers gain insights into the domain. Secondly, within cultural analytics we developed a visualization technique (“time-freeze” timeline) that helps follow a trail of an app’s icon through its updates. We anticipate the “time-freeze” timeline visualization to be useful for cultural analytics at large, as a way to present imagery that is updated, and not specifically for visualizing icons.
Conceptual independence: A design principle for the construction of adaptive information systems
This paper examines the problem of conceptual dependence, the coupling of software applications׳ ... more This paper examines the problem of conceptual dependence, the coupling of software applications׳ internal structures and logic with their underlying conceptual models. Although conceptual dependence is almost universal in information system design, it produces a range of unintended negative consequences including system inflexibility and increased maintenance costs. Many information systems contain components, such as database tables and classes, whose design reflects the entity types and relationships in underlying, domain-oriented conceptual models. When the models change, work is involved in altering the software components. For example, an e-commerce system might include tables and classes representing product types, customers and orders, with associated code in methods, stored procedures and other scripts. The structure of the entity types and their relationships will be implicit in the tables, classes and code, coupling the system to its conceptual model. Any change to the model (such as the introduction of a new entity type, representing order lines) invalidates existing structures and code, causing rework. In large systems, this rework can be time-consuming and expensive. Research shows that schema change is common, and that it contributes significantly to the high cost of software maintenance. We argue that much of the cost may be avoidable if alternative design strategies are used. The paper describes an alternative design approach based on the principle of conceptual independence, which can be used to produce adaptive information systems (AIS). It decouples the internal structures and logic of information systems from the domain-specific entity types and relationships in the conceptual models they implement. An architecture for AIS is presented which includes soft schemas (conceptual models stored as data), an end-user conceptual modelling tool, a set of archetypal categories (predefined semantic categories), and an adaptive data model which allows data to be stored without conceptual dependence. The archetypal categories allow domain-specific run time behaviour to be provided, despite the absence of domain-specific software structure and logic. An advantage of AIS over conventionally-designed applications is that each AIS can be used in a wide variety of domains. AIS offer the prospect of significantly reduced maintenance costs, as well as increased scope for the development and modification of systems by end users. Work to date on implementation of the AIS architecture is discussed, and an agenda for future research is outlined including development and evaluation of a fully-featured AIS. The paper discusses challenges to be overcome and barriers to adoption.
Updating database schemas without breaking the UI: modeling using cognitive semantic categories
Data management user interfaces are ubiquitous in information systems and web-based application... more Data management user interfaces are ubiquitous in information systems and web-based applications. From the oldest spreadsheet to the most modern database, end users and administrators alike have interacted with tabular data. Usually, each concept is represented by a table and columns. Change to the structure of each concept requires structural change to the tables and columns, which is costly. Tailor-made database and web applications may overcome this obstacle by designing UIs on top of the data layer, providing some degree of data independence. However, changes in their schemas do not automatically propagate into the user interface, and so their maintenance is expensive.
In this paper we present a user interface that lets the end user alter the schema without the need for programming skills, eliminating the need for expensive software maintenance. To this end we propose an automatically generated user interface to include schema and data management functions. We built and evaluated an Adaptive Information System user interface (AIS UI), incorporating schema evolution functionality. In usability testing, first-time users were able to perform various data management tasks equally fast or faster than users using Microsoft Access, and on average ~43% faster than users using Microsoft Excel. Task completion rates using the AIS significantly exceeded those using Microsoft Access and were comparable (>95%) with those using Microsoft Excel.
Empowering L&D Managers through Customisation of Inline Learning Analytics
Popular learning management systems (LMS) often feature dashboards displaying various analytics. ... more Popular learning management systems (LMS) often feature dashboards displaying various analytics. This dashboard display might be suboptimal for some learning and development managers (L&D). Moreover, the analytics presented are often based on standardised quizzes or semesters, which might be unsuitable (e.g., informal learning, corporate education, etc.). Finally, each LMS has its bespoke reporting solution, thus making it difficult for L&D managers to monitor the situation across various LMSs. We propose an interactive system where an L&D manager can customise the data source, queries, filters, and visualisations of their LMSs, and display them inline. To this end, we have built EVADE, a system that allows L&D managers to capture data from various LMSs, analyse them, and embed related visualisations in each LMS. In this instance, we have integrated EVADE with a Moodle instance for corporate education, and Almanac, a tablet application for informal learning. In this paper we present EVADE and discuss how it can improve the L&D manager-LMS interaction.
Research on information systems (IS) has addressed, among others, the issue of change in IT proje... more Research on information systems (IS) has addressed, among others, the issue of change in IT projects. Current research at the Information Systems Laboratory, Trinity College Dublin, focuses on change caused by inflexibility, incompatibility
Computers are increasingly mediating the way people make decisions, including those that can have... more Computers are increasingly mediating the way people make decisions, including those that can have an effect on conflict and peace. In addition, recent research provides empirical data on the factors that affect the likelihood of armed conflict. These conditions provide an unprecedented opportunity to the human-computer interaction community to play a role in preventing, deescalating, and recovering from conflicts. This SIG will be the first opportunity for CHI attendees to meet during the main part of the conference, share their ideas, and provide concrete ways to move forward with this line of research.
State-of-the-art synthesizers provide numerous controllers through which the user may create a gr... more State-of-the-art synthesizers provide numerous controllers through which the user may create a great variety of sounds. The real-time control of so many parameters though, is often problematic for the user. The goal of our work has been to study the physical and remote control of such audial parameters. For this purpose, a system was developed that processes video input and recognizes movements of the user's body parts (movement of hands, head etc.) and translates them as change in some audial parameters of an electronic music instrument (tone, cutoff, etc.). Also, basic techniques of digital audio synthesis were studied and a prototype synthesizer was developed that is controlled physically and remotely. The study didn't limit itself in technical details, but contained study of the human psyche and cognition, as much for the audial, as also for the video part of the implementation of the system.
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Papers by Evangelos Kapros
As a case study, we visualized and analyzed the icons of 158,200 educational apps that were uploaded to Apple’s App Store from July 2008 to November 2014. The contribution of this project is twofold. Firstly, we demonstrate how analyzing the software icons of an application domain (in our case, education) can help researchers gain insights into the domain. Secondly, within cultural analytics we developed a visualization technique (“time-freeze” timeline) that helps follow a trail of an app’s icon through its updates. We anticipate the “time-freeze” timeline visualization to be useful for cultural analytics at large, as a way to present imagery that is updated, and not specifically for visualizing icons.
In this paper we present a user interface that lets the end user alter the schema without the need for programming skills, eliminating the need for expensive software maintenance. To this end we propose an automatically generated user interface to include schema and data management functions. We built and evaluated an Adaptive Information System user interface (AIS UI), incorporating schema evolution functionality. In usability testing, first-time users were able to perform various data management tasks equally fast or faster than users using Microsoft Access, and on average ~43% faster than users using Microsoft Excel. Task completion rates using the AIS significantly exceeded those using Microsoft Access and were comparable (>95%) with those using Microsoft Excel.
As a case study, we visualized and analyzed the icons of 158,200 educational apps that were uploaded to Apple’s App Store from July 2008 to November 2014. The contribution of this project is twofold. Firstly, we demonstrate how analyzing the software icons of an application domain (in our case, education) can help researchers gain insights into the domain. Secondly, within cultural analytics we developed a visualization technique (“time-freeze” timeline) that helps follow a trail of an app’s icon through its updates. We anticipate the “time-freeze” timeline visualization to be useful for cultural analytics at large, as a way to present imagery that is updated, and not specifically for visualizing icons.
In this paper we present a user interface that lets the end user alter the schema without the need for programming skills, eliminating the need for expensive software maintenance. To this end we propose an automatically generated user interface to include schema and data management functions. We built and evaluated an Adaptive Information System user interface (AIS UI), incorporating schema evolution functionality. In usability testing, first-time users were able to perform various data management tasks equally fast or faster than users using Microsoft Access, and on average ~43% faster than users using Microsoft Excel. Task completion rates using the AIS significantly exceeded those using Microsoft Access and were comparable (>95%) with those using Microsoft Excel.