Very proud of my thesis student Maties Claesen, who has been nominated for the EOS thesis award! His work, “ZeroTraining: Extending Zero-Gravity Objects Simulation in Virtual Reality Using Robotics,” combines virtual reality and robotics to simulate weightless objects more realistically – crucial for astronaut training and space exploration. Maties demonstrated some impressive creative problem-solving skills, especially in combining diverse fields to tackle complex challenges with limited hardware resources.
Special thanks to Andreas Treuer, Martial Costantini, and Lionel Ferra at ESA for their support, valuable insights and feedback on this work. Andreas was particularly instrumental for this work by sharing his experiences and providing feedback throughout the project which was crucial in refining both the scope as well as the implementation of this work.
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Kris Luyten, XML-based User Interface Description LanguagesXML,
UIDL,
HCI,
EICS
This year marks 20 years since I co-organized the Workshop on User Interface Description Languages (UIDLs) during the Working Conference on Advanced Visual Interfaces, held in Gallipoli, Italy (May 25–28, 2004). Together with Marc Abrams, Jean Vanderdonckt, and Quentin Limbourg, we created an event that surpassed all expectations in terms of attendance, engagement, and the quality of contributions.
The early 2000s were a transformative period for the field of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). Researchers and practitioners alike were grappling with the challenge of building flexible, reusable, and context-aware user interfaces (UIs) that could adapt to the growing variety of devices and use cases. XML, with its ability to structure and abstract information, became the language of choice for UIDLs.
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Kris Luyten, AI-Spectra: A Visual Dashboard for Model Multiplicity to Enhance Informed and Transparent Decision-Makingpaper,
FAIR,
modelmultiplicity,
AUI,
infovis
In AI research, model multiplicity can help users better understand the diversity of AI predictions.
Our new system “AI-Spectra” provides a visual dashboard to harness this concept effectively. Instead of relying on a single AI model, AI-Spectra uses multiple models—each seen as an expert—to produce predictions for the same task. This helps users see not only what different models agree or disagree on, but also why these differences occur. Gilles Eerlings (a FAIR PhD student ) and Sebe Vanbrabant where the main contributors for this work and combined machine learning, model multiplicity and visualisations that focus on the characteristics of an AI model, instead of explaining the behaviour.
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Kris Luyten, Paper on Anthropomorphic User Interfacespaper,
FAIR,
AI,
HCI,
AUI
Anthropomorphic User Interfaces
Together with Eva Geurts, we explored Anthropomorphic User Interfaces (AUIs) and created a taxonomy that helps us to analyze, identify, and design appropriate AUIs. The paper is available here, and
our interactive tool that helps you to find related resources for specific aspects from our technology is available at this URL: https://anthropomorphic-ui.onrender.com.
Citation
@inproceedings{geurtsantropomorphic2024,title={Anthropomorphic User Interfaces: Past, Present and Future of
Anthropomorphic Aspects for Sustainable Digital Interface Design},author={Eva Geurts and Kris Luyten},booktitle={Proceedings of the European Conference on Cognitive Ergonomics 2024},articleno={31},numpages={7},keywords={Anthropomorphism, Human-like interfaces, Taxonomy, User interface design},location={Paris, France},series={ECCE '24},year={2024},publisher={Association for Computing Machinery},url={https://anthropomorphic-ui.onrender.com},doi={10.1145/3673805.3673831},isbn={9798400718243}}
Abstract
Interactions with computing systems and conversational services such as ChatGPT have become an inherent part of our daily lives. It is surprising that user interfaces, the gateways through which we communicate with an interactive intelligent system, are still predominantly devoid of hedonic aspects. There is little attempt to make communication through user interfaces intentionally more like communication with humans. Anthropomorphic user interfaces can transform interactions with intelligent software into more pleasant experiences by integrating human-like attributes. Anthropomorphic user interfaces expose human-like attributes that enable people to perceive, connect, and interact with the interfaces as social actors. This integration of human-like aspects not only enhances user experience but also holds the potential to make interfaces more sustainable, as they rely on familiar human interaction patterns, thus potentially reducing the learning curve and increasing user adoption rates. However, there is little consensus on how to build these anthropomorphic user interfaces. We conducted an extensive literature review on existing anthropomorphic user interfaces for software systems (past), in order to map and connect existing definitions and interpretations in an overarching taxonomy (present). The taxonomy is used to organize and structure examples of anthropomorphic user interfaces into an accessible collection. The taxonomy and an accompanying web tool provide designers with a reference framework for analyzing and dissecting existing anthropomorphic user interfaces, and for designing new anthropomorphic user interfaces (future).
Paper and Poster Accepted for ACM VRST 2024: AR Pattern Guidance and VR Text Input Modalities
We are excited to announce that both our paper and poster have been conditionally accepted for presentation at the ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology (VRST) 2024, which will take place in Trier, Germany.
Paper: Evaluation of AR Pattern Guidance Methods for a Surface Cleaning Task
Our full paper titled “Evaluation of AR Pattern Guidance Methods for a Surface Cleaning Task.” has been conditionally accepted.
Paper accepted for ISMAR 2024: The Art of Timing in AR Guidance
We are excited to announce that our paper titled “The Art of Timing: Effects of AR Guidance Timing on Speed Control” (with Jeroen Ceyssens, Bram van Deurzen, Gustavo Rovelo Ruiz and Fabian Di Fiore) has been accepted for presentation at the 2024 IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality (ISMAR).
Abstract
Augmented Reality (AR) holds significant potential to facilitate users in executing manual tasks. For effective support, however, we need to understand how showing movement instructions in AR affects how well people can follow those movements in real life. In this paper, we examine the degree to which users can synchronize the speed of their movements with speed cues presented through an AR environment. Specifically, we investigate the effects of timing in AR visual guidance. We assess performance using a highly realistic Mixed Reality (MR) welding simulation. Welding is a task that requires very precise timing and control over hand and arm motion. Our results show that upfront visual guidance (before manual task execution) alone often fails to transfer the knowledge of intended speeds, especially at higher target speeds. Live guidance during manual task execution provides more accurate speed results but typically requires a higher overshoot at the start. Optimal outcomes occur when visual guidance appears upfront and continues during the activity for users to follow through.
I’m excited to announce the publication of a special issue I co-edited titled “Human-Centered Approaches to Worker Well-being in the Age of Industry 5.0” in Frontiers. This collection of papers explores diverse aspects of worker well-being within the Industry 5.0 framework, focusing on both physical and cognitive well-being while respecting workers’ privacy.
Key Highlights:
Industry 5.0 and Worker Well-being: The special issue examines how the Industry 5.0 paradigm complements technological advancements with an enhanced focus on human workers, addressing challenges in creating sustainable and healthy work environments.
Senne Bergmans made an extensive comparison of Threads, Fibers anc Coroutines for developing concurrent software as part of his Bachelor thesis, and made his comparison and code available for everyone to use. If you start creating concurrent software and aren’t sure what is the best solution for your specific context, these resources can help:
Model Multiplicity in Interactive Software Systems
We got a workshop paper accepted, presenting the initial work of Gilles Eerlings et al. We explore how model multiplicity can be a potential answer to reduce overtrust in AI, as well as avoid undertrust. Still a lot of work that lies ahead, but this seems like a promising direction.
Citation
@inproceedings{luyteneerlings-modelmultiplicity2024,author={Kris Luyten and Gilles Eerlings and Jori Liesenborgs and Gustavo {Rovelo Ruiz} and Sebe Vanbrabant and Davy Vanacken},title={Opportunities and Challenges of Model Multiplicity in Interactive Software Systems},booktitle={The Second Workshop on Engineering Interactive Systems Embedding AI Technologies},year={2024}}
Abstract
The proliferation of artificial intelligence (AI) in interactive systems has led to significant challenges in model integration, but also end-user-related aspects such as over- and undertrust. This paper explores how multiple AI models with the same performance and behavior but different internal workings—a phenomenon called model multiplicity—affect system integration and user interaction. We discuss the implications of model multiplicity for transparency, trust, and operational effectiveness in interactive software systems.
Our paper on the Conception, Approval and First Evaluation of a New Master Program Engineering Technology: Software Systems (Informatics) in Belgium, has been accepted for MIPRO 2024, the 47th ICT and Electronics Convention.
