Designers still often create a specific user interface for every target platform they wish to support, which is timeconsuming and error-prone. The need for a multi-platform user interface design approach that designers feel comfortable with increases as people expect their applications and data to go where they go. We present Gummy, a multiplatform graphical user interface builder that can generate an initial design for a new platform by adapting and combining features of existing user interfaces created for the same application. Our approach makes it easy to target new platforms and keep all user interfaces consistent without requiring designers to considerably change their work practice.

Abstract. Specifying user interfaces consists in a fundamental activity in the user interface development life cycle as it informs the subsequent steps. Good quality specifications could lead to a user interface that satisfies the user’s needs. The user interface development life cycle typically involves multiple actors possessing all their own particular inputs of user interface artifacts expressed with their own formats, thus posing new constraints for integrating them into comprehensive and consistent specifications of a future user interface. This paper introduces a design technique where these actors can introduce their artifacts by sketching them in their respective input format so as to integrate them into one or multiple output formats. Each artifact can be introduced in a particular level of fidelity (ranging from low to high) and switched to an adjacent level of fidelity after appropriate refining. Refined artifacts are then captured in appropriate models stored in a model repository. In this way, coevolutionary design of user interfaces is introduced, defined, and supported by a collaborative design tool allowing multiple inputs and multiple outputs. This design paradigm is exemplified on a case study and has been tested in an empirical study revealing how designers appreciate it.

The creation of complex virtual worlds has expanded from the domain of designers and animators to that of general users with no background in computer graphics. Example applications are military simulations, urban planning, landscape design, search and rescue simulations, and social media technologies such as “Second Life”. In many cases the user wants to create content containing hundreds or thousands of similar objects. Modelling and placing each individual object is infeasible and new ways must be found to allow users to easily specify the distribution of a large number of objects. In this paper we introduce a sketch-based approach for crowd modelling, which is intuitive and suitable for different input devices such as mice, sketch pads, and touch screens (Windows 7). We derive design requirements by analysing real environments and by testing users ’ abilities to characterise crowds and collections/accumulations of objects. Based on these requirements we formulate a model-by-example approach in which users sketch a sample distribution of objects and our tool computes the complete “population ” of objects over a domain specified with a sketched contour. In order to deal with different distribution patterns we first characterise the input and then use clustering and texture synthesis to replicate the characteristics over the domain. Initial results demonstrate that the tool gives plausible results for random, regular and clustered input and that it can be used in a wide variety of modelling applications. 1

Abstract. In this paper we introduce MuiCSer, a conceptual process framework for Multi-disciplinary User-centred Software Engineering (UCSE) processes. UCSE processes strive for the combination of basic principles and practices from software engineering and user-centred design approaches in order to increase the overall user experience with the resulting product. The MuiCSer framework aims to provide a common understanding of important components and associated activities of UCSE processes. As such, the conceptual framework acts as a frame of reference for future research regarding various aspects and concepts related to this kind of processes, including models, development artefacts and tools. We present the MuiCSer process framework and illustrate its instantiation in customized processes for the (re)design of a system. The conceptual framework has been helpful to investigate the role of members of a multi-disciplinary team when realizing artefacts in a model-based approach. In particular process coverage of existing artefact transformation tools has been studied.

When creating applications that should be available on multiple computing platforms, designers have to cope with different design tools and user interface toolkits. Incompatibilities between these design tools and toolkits make it hard to keep multi-device user interfaces consistent. This paper presents Jelly, a flexible design environment that can target a broad set of computing devices and toolkits. Jelly enables designers to copy parts of a user interface from one device to another and to maintain the different user interfaces in concert using linked editing. Our approach lowers the burden of designing multi-device user interfaces by eliminating the need to switch between different design tools and by providing tool support for keeping the user interfaces consistent across different platforms and toolkits.

This paper provides an overview of the ways that sketches function as informal representation tools, especially when used in design contexts. We then consider the tension between this essentially informal practical function of sketches, and two different factors that drive toward formalization. These are 1) the need for a computational interpretation, and 2) the desire to specify visual formalisms as scientific, critical or technical tools. 1. The Thesis Sketches are informal. Or at least, an informal definition would suggest that they are. Nevertheless, we wish to question the several respects in which formality might be judged, and pick apart the

This research aims to simplify the creation of applications for mobile platforms by developing a high-level and platform independent model of an application, and automatically transforming this high-level model to platform specific code. The research method is a combination of the model-driven development (MDD) approach in software development and application of techniques in the field of human-computer interaction (HCI) particularly on usercentered system design. This research involves developing a graphical modeling language which is specific to mobile applications, and coming up with a generic algorithm for the conversion of this graphical model into code. The main focus of the research however, will be on the design of the graphical model, and the interaction techniques which will allow non-expert people1

Multi-device user interface design mostly implies creating a suitable interface for each targeted device, using a diverse set of design tools and toolkits. This is a time consuming activity, concerning a lot of repetitive design actions without support for reusing this effort in later designs. In this paper, we propose D-Macs: a design tool that allows designers to record their design actions across devices, to share these actions with other designers and to replay their own design actions and those of others. D-Macs lowers the burden in multi-device user interface design and can reduce the necessity for manually repeating design actions. ACM Classification: H5.2 [Information interfaces and presentation]:

In current mobile user interface design tools, it is time consuming to export a design to the target device. This makes it hard for designers to iterate over the user interfaces they are creating. We propose Gummy-live, a GUI builder for mobile devices allowing designers to test and observe immediately on the target device each step they take in the GUI builder. This way, designers are stimulated to iteratively test and refine user interface prototypes in order to take the target device characteristics into account. I.

This paper presents a new approach to sound composition for soundtrack composers and sound designers. We propose a tool for usable sound manipulation and composition that targets sound variety and expressive rendering of the composition. We first automatically segment audio recordings into atomic grains which are displayed on our navigation tool according to signal properties. To perform the synthesis, the user selects one recording as model for rhythmic pattern and timbre evolution, and a set of audio grains. Our synthesis system then processes the chosen sound material to create new sound sequences based on onset detection on the recording model and similarity measurements between the model and the selected grains. With our method, we can create a large variety of sound events such as those encountered in virtual environments or other training simulations, but also sound sequences that can be integrated in a music composition. We present a usability-minded interface that allows to manipulate and tune sound sequences in an appropriate way for sound design.