Voice controlled web browsers allow users to navigate by speaking the text of a link or an associated number instead of clicking with a mouse. One such browser is Conversa, by Conversational Computing. This within subjects study with 18 subjects compared voice browsing with traditional mouse-based browsing. It attempted to identify which of three common hypertext forms (linear slide show, grid/tiled map, and hierarchical menu) are well suited to voice navigation, and whether voice navigation is helped by numbering links. The study shows that voice control adds approximately 50% to the performance time for certain types of tasks. Subjective satisfaction measures indicate that for voice browsing, textual links are preferable to numbered links. Keywords Human-computer interaction, user interfaces, voice browsers, voice recognition, web browsing INTRODUCTION Information contained on the World Wide Web is inaccessible to many people. The web is primarily a visual medium that requires a ...

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We consider the task of retrieving online information in mobile environments. We propose question answering as a more appropriate interface than page browsing for small displays. We assess different modalities for communicating using a mobile device with question-answering systems, focusing on speech. We then survey existing research in spoken information retrieval, present some new findings, and assess the feasibility of the endeavor. 1

Abstract. The two visual systems hypothesis in neuroscience suggests that pointing without visual feedback may be less affected by spatial visual illusions than cognitive interactions such as judged target location. Our study examined predictions of this theory for target localization on a large-screen display. We contrasted pointing interactions under varying levels of visual feedback with location judgments of targets that were surrounded by an offset frame. As predicted by the theory, the frame led to systematic errors in verbal report of target location but not in pointing without visual feedback for some participants. We also found that pointing with visual feedback produced a similar level of error as location judgments, while temporally lagged visual feedback appeared to reduce these errors somewhat. This suggests that pointing without visual feedback may be a useful interaction technique in situations described by the two visual systems literature, especially with large-screen displays and immersive environments. 1

Computer users with motor impairments find it difficult and, in many cases, impossible to access PC functionality through the physical keyboard-and-mouse interface. Studies show that even able-bodied users experience similar difficulties when interacting with mobile devices; this is due to the reduced size/usability of the input interfaces. Advances in speech recognition have made it possible to design speech interfaces for alphanumeric data entry and indirect manipulation (cursor control). Although several related commercial applications exist, such systems do not provide a complete solution for arbitrary keyboard and mouse access, such as the access needed for, say, typing, compiling, and executing a C++ program.

We present a new interface technique which augments a 3D user interface based on the physical manipulation of tools, or props, with a touchscreen. This hybrid interface intuitively and seamlessly combines 3D input with more traditional 2D input in the same user interface. Example 2D interface tasks of interest include selecting patient images from a database, browsing through axial, coronal, and sagittal image slices, or adjusting image center and window parameters. Note the facility with which a touchscreen can be used: the surgeon can move in 3D using the props, and then, without having to put the props down, the surgeon can reach out and touch the screen to perform 2D tasks. Based on previous work by Sears, we provide touchscreen users with visual feedback in the form of a small cursor which appears above the finger, allowing targets much smaller than the finger itself to be selected. Based on our informal user observations to date, this touchscreen stabilization algorithm allows ta...

A model of complimentary behavior has been suggested based on arguments that direct manipulation and speech recognition interfaces have complimentary strengths and weaknesses. Specifically, anecdotal arguments have been given that direct manipulation interfaces are best used for specifying simple actions when all references are visible and the number of references is limited, while speech recognition interfaces are better at specifying more complex actions when references are numerous and not visible. Based on these observations, an empirical study has been proposed to evaluate speech recognition as a complimentary input channel in multimodal direct manipulation/speech recognition environments. It is hypothesized that this complimentary behavior is only true under certain conditions related to reference attributes and the interface tasks. The particular focus of this proposal is to study the effects of reference visibility, reference number, and task integration to characterize the co...