A Domain Knowledge Driven Approach for User Interface Software Development

A domain knowledge driven user interface development approach is described.As a conceptual design of the user interface,the domain knowledge defines the user interface in terms of objects,actions and their relationships that the user would use to interact with the application system.It also serves as input to a user interface management system (UIMS) and is the kernel of the target user interface.The principal ideas and the implementation techniques of the approach is discussed.The user interface model,user interface designer oriented high-level specification notatiopn,and the transformation algorithms on domain knowledge are presented.     

User interface design for decision support systems: A self-adaptive approach

This paper presents a self-adaptive approach to user interface design. The primary philosophy of this design is that the user interface must be aware of the changes in its user's behavior and then adapt to it. Three different default policies are proposed to control the adaptation of a user interface: fixed default, dynamic default, and no default. Performance of these policies are compared for various patterns of usage. Mechanisms that determine the optimal default value to reduce the unnecessary effort are also discussed.     

Identifying FMS repetitive patterns for efficient search-based scheduling algorithm: A colored Petri net approach

The multiple lot size scheduling problem plays a crucial role in minimizing production and setup costs in order to respond to constant fluctuations in customer demands. However, the computational cost to optimize a scheduling problem increases as the lot size of jobs increases, leading to a scalability problem for most scheduling algorithms. This paper presents an efficient search approach based on colored Petri net (CPN) formalism that addresses the state explosion problem of reachability graphs used for finding the optimal solutions to scheduling problems. To reduce the memory requirements, the proposed approach exploits the structural equivalence found in the reachability graphs of flexible manufacturing systems’ (FMS) CPNs to discard states once they are no longer needed to explore the state space. The hypothetical structural equivalence is attributed to the repetitive patterns identified in the execution of manufacturing processes when the lot sizes of jobs are scaled for FMS whose underlying layout configuration is fixed. We present the concept of structural equivalence based on duplicate state detection for FMS of different lot sizes and give sufficient conditions under which the structural equivalence obtained from a few lot size (smaller) instances holds for the same FMS of a larger size. The approach is validated experimentally on different FMS examples which confirm that the behavior of an FMS of any large lot size can be inferred from the FMS of a smaller size. Experimental results indicate that this work performs better than prior search methods and obtains optimal schedules of FMS with large lot sizes. Also, we show that the approach is applicable to FMS problems of similar configurations where the problem size differ by the number of jobs, resources and operations.     

PROFIBUS现场总线FMS协议研究

以开放式系统互联模型ISO/OSI为参考,详细描述了PROFIBUS现场总线报文规范协议的结构,包括物理层的数据传输技术、数据链路层的报文通信格式、应用层的FMS服务以及用户接口中定义的FMS行规。研究了PROFIBUS-FMS的总线配置,在此基础上提出了以协议芯片SPC4为核心,开发FMS智能从站的方法,并就FMS从站的软件流程进行了阐述。     

基于模型的用户界面代码自动生成

基于模型的用户界面开发环境(MB_UIDEs)旨在通过使用某种特定的方法给设计人员提供一种更加系统的用户界面开发途径。文章介绍的就是一个新的基于FMP模型的用户界面开发环境。文中主要介绍它的系统机构,代码生成模型,代码生成过程中所采用的技术和算法等。它能够自动地生成交互系统的源代码,当然也包括图形用户界面的源代码。     

Genetic algorithms for match-up rescheduling of the flexible manufacturing systems

Scheduling plays a vital role in ensuring the effectiveness of the production control of a flexible manufacturing system (FMS). The scheduling problem in FMS is considered to be dynamic in its nature as new orders may arrive every day. The new orders need to be integrated with the existing production schedule immediately without disturbing the performance and the stability of existing schedule. Most FMS scheduling methods reported in the literature address the static FMS scheduling problems. In this paper, rescheduling methods based on genetic algorithms are described to address arrivals of new orders. This study proposes genetic algorithms for match-up rescheduling with non-reshuffle and reshuffle strategies which accommodate new orders by manipulating the available idle times on machines and by resequencing operations, respectively. The basic idea of the match-up approach is to modify only a part of the initial schedule and to develop genetic algorithms (GAs) to generate a solution within the rescheduling horizon in such a way that both the stability and performance of the shop floor are kept. The proposed non-reshuffle and reshuffle strategies have been evaluated and the results have been compared with the total-rescheduling method.     

A comparative performance analysis of deadlock avoidance control algorithms for FMS

A deadlock condition for flexible manufacturing systems is characterized by a set of parts, which have been processed but cannot be discharged by a set of machines or buffers. To avoid such problems, it is necessary to adopt suitable control policies which limit the resource allocation in the system, thus affecting the overall system performance. In the present work, we address the problem of evaluating and comparing the performance of deadlock avoidance control policies applied to FMS. The problem is discussed for both untimed and timed models, and for models both with and without deadlock avoidance control policies. Different control algorithms, among the most common in the literature, have been considered. Imperfect deadlock avoidance control policies are also considered. In addition, some indices are proposed to assess the structural properties of FMS with respect to deadlock occurrence and their performance. Two different application examples are analyzed, with the help of a commercial simulation package. Finally, an adaptive algorithm which can learn from system evolution to avoid deadlocks is illustrated.     

Interactive visualization for testing Markov Decision Processes: MDPVIS

Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) are a formulation for optimization problems in sequential decision making. Solving MDPs often requires implementing a simulator for optimization algorithms to invoke when updating decision making rules known as policies. The combination of simulator and optimizer are subject to failures of specification, implementation, integration, and optimization that may produce invalid policies. We present these failures as queries for a visual analytic system (MDPVIS). MDPVIS addresses three visualization research gaps. First, the data acquisition gap is addressed through a general simulator-visualization interface. Second, the data analysis gap is addressed through a generalized MDP information visualization. Finally, the cognition gap is addressed by exposing model components to the user. MDPVIS generalizes a visualization for wildfire management. We use that problem to illustrate MDPVIS and show the visualization's generality by connecting it to two reinforcement learning frameworks that implement many different MDPs of interest in the research community.     

基于MVC模式的Web用户界面建模

分析了企业信息系统的Web用户界面开发特性,研究了当前主流前端框架的MVC(模型-视图-控制器)设计模式应用,针对Web前端开发需求及最佳实践方法,提出了一种符合MVC用户界面开发最佳实践的组件化Web用户界面建模方法.设计一套抽象和描述Web用户界面组件的UML(统一建模语言)概要文件,从界面数据模型、界面组件模型到界面交互模型等3个方面完成Web用户界面建模.以一个装修行业定制型ERP(企业资源计划)系统为例,通过用户界面建模实践,验证了本建模方法的可行性、易用性和有效性.     

On the interaction between plan recognition and intelligent interfaces

Plan recognition is an active research area in automatic reasoning, as well as a promising approach to engineering interfaces that can exploit models of user's plans and goals. Much research in the field has focused on the development of plan recognition algorithms to support particular user/system interactions, such as found in naturally occurring dialogues. However, two questions have typically remained unexamined: 1) exactly what kind of interface tasks can knowledge of a user's plans be used to support across communication modalities, and 2) how can such tasks in turn constrain development of plan recognition algorithms? In this paper we present a concrete exploration of these issues. In particular, we provide an assessment of plan recognition, with respect to the use of plan recognition in enhancing user interfaces. We clarify how use of a user model containing plans makes interfaces more intelligent and interactive (by providing an intelligent assistant that supports such tasks as advice generation, task completion, context-sensitive responses, error detection and recovery). We then show how interface tasks in turn provide constraints that must be satisfied in order for any plan recognizer to construct and represent a plan in ways that efficiently support these tasks. Finally, we survey how interfaces are fundamentally limited by current plan recognition approaches, and use these limitations to identify and motivate current research. Our research is developed in the context of CHECS, a plan-based design interface.     

Rapid Prototyping of Adaptable User Interfaces

User interface adaptation has been proposed in recent years as a means to achieve personalized accessibility and usability of user interfaces. Related user interface architectures, as well as a variety of related development method and tools, have also been elaborated. Admittedly, however, despite the recognized validity of the approach, which has been proved in practice in a series of prototype systems, the wider adoption and uptake of user interface adaptation approaches are still limited. One of the identified obstacles is the complexity intrinsic in designing such interfaces and the need of radically revising the current user interface design practice to account for (a) the alternative designs required for adaptation, (b) the parameters involved in driving adaptations (i.e., selecting among alternatives at a given point during interaction), and (c) the logic of adaptation at runtime. This article proposes a twofold tool-based support strategy for user interface adaptation development, based on (a) an adaptation development toolkit and related widget library, which directly embeds lexical level adaptations into common interactive widgets, and (b) embedding such a library in a common integrated development environment, thus allowing designers to define and view alternative adaptations at design time and create adaptable user interfaces through traditional prototyping. The aforementioned approach has been implemented in the domain of adaptable applications for older users, producing tools that are currently in use in the development of a large suite of interactive applications in various domains. The approach presented in this article is claimed to be the first and so far unique supporting rapid prototyping of adaptable user interfaces, thus minimizing the divergence between typical development practices and user interface adaptation development.     

SX/Tools - An Open Design Environment for Adaptable Multimedia User Interfaces

In this paper a brief review of user interface management systems (UIMSs) and their advantages is given. Shortcomings of current UIMSs and open requirements imposed by industrial application areas are outlined. Among the most important requirements are uniform design mechanisms independent of interaction media, techniques, and styles as well as a straight forward end-user adaptability of user interfaces. A new approach to interactive interface construction, called “direct composition”, is introduced. In this approach all interface objects contain the means for their own modification and design and therefore offer consistent interaction techniques for both the construction and usage of user interfaces. Moreover, end-user adaptability is an inherent feature of direct composition interfaces. The user interface design environment SX/Tools is described to exemplify specific properties of user interface management systems following the principle of direct composition. The impacts of direct composition on user interface design include a uniform interface development process covering tool development, interface development, and “on-usage” interface adaptation. It is argued that the direct composition approach can overcome many of the problems with traditional UIMSs.     

QUESTO: Interactive Construction of Objective Functions for Classification Tasks

Building effective classifiers requires providing the modeling algorithms with information about the training data and modeling goals in order to create a model that makes proper tradeoffs. Machine learning algorithms allow for flexible specification of such meta-information through the design of the objective functions that they solve. However, such objective functions are hard for users to specify as they are a specific mathematical formulation of their intents. In this paper, we present an approach that allows users to generate objective functions for classification problems through an interactive visual interface. Our approach adopts a semantic interaction design in that user interactions over data elements in the visualization are translated into objective function terms. The generated objective functions are solved by a machine learning solver that provides candidate models, which can be inspected by the user, and used to suggest refinements to the specifications. We demonstrate a visual analytics system QUESTO for users to manipulate objective functions to define domain-specific constraints. Through a user study we show that QUESTO helps users create various objective functions that satisfy their goals.     

微机机器人仿真系统PCROBSM

微机机器人仿真系统（ＰＣＲＯＢＳＭ）是一个适用于ＩＢＭ－ＰＣ及其兼容机的机器人仿真系统，该系统功能齐全，可以对机器人的运动学，轨迹规划，动力学，控制算法，力传感器和典型任务等进行仿真，它的主要特色在于具有丰富的机器人控制算法和轨迹规划算法，系统具有良好的用户界面，为用户设计，验证自己的轨迹规划和控制算法提供了方便的环境，如系统提供了机器人语言ＳＶＡＬ，三维示教和三维图显功能，同时为了更接近实用，系     

Sketch‐Based Editing Tools for Tumour Segmentation in 3D Medical Images

In the past years sophisticated automatic segmentation algorithms for various medical image segmentation problems have been developed. However, there are always cases where automatic algorithms fail to provide an acceptable segmentation. In these cases the user needs efficient segmentation editing tools, a problem which has not received much attention in research. We give a comprehensive overview on segmentation editing for three‐dimensional (3D) medical images. For segmentation editing in two‐dimensional (2D) images, we discuss a sketch‐based approach where the user modifies the segmentation in the contour domain. Based on this 2D interface, we present an image‐based as well as an image‐independent method for intuitive and efficient segmentation editing in 3D in the context of tumour segmentation in computed tomography (CT). Our editing tools have been evaluated on a database containing 1226 representative liver metastases, lung nodules and lymph nodes of different shape, size and image quality. In addition, we have performed a qualitative evaluation with radiologists and technical experts, proving the efficiency of our tools.     

Use of HTML forms in complex user interfaces for server-side applications

It is now commonplace to use forms within HTML documents to have server-based applications interact with remote users. However, these forms are, most of the time, rather simple and only allow a one time interaction between the user and the application. Forms are nevertheless very versatile and can be used to build rather complex user interfaces for server-side applications that involve multiple interaction loops. In this paper, we describe how our students used such forms to remotely control a symbolic debugger executing algorithms in the on-line version of a book used in their data structure course. After describing in detail how the user interface is built and how the students can interact with it, we focus on the limitations of this approach and how this interface could be enhanced with the use of more recent developments such as applets.     

Emotion recognition from physiological signals using wireless sensors for presence technologies

In this article we describe a new approach to enhance presence technologies. First, we discuss the strong relationship between cognitive processes and emotions and how human physiology is uniquely affected when experiencing each emotion. Secondly, we introduce our prototype multimodal affective user interface. In the remainder of the paper we describe the emotion elicitation experiment we designed and conducted and the algorithms we implemented to analyse the physiological signals associated with emotions. These algorithms can then be used to recognise the affective states of users from physiological data collected via non-invasive technologies. The affective intelligent user interfaces we plan to create will adapt to user affect dynamically in the current context, thus providing enhanced social presence.     

DistOpt: A Software Framework for Modeling and Evaluating Optimization Problem Solutions in Distributed Environments

We present a flexible software environment, named DistOpt, which is useful in building coarse-grain algorithms for solving optimization problems and simulating the solution of the resulting subproblems in multicomputer systems. It is based on a decomposition-coordination approach, by which large optimization problems can be split into subproblems, which are then easier to solve and can be solved in parallel. The object-oriented methodology on which DistOpt is based, and its graphical user interface, are well suited to modify, interface, and extend existing software modules with minimal impact. DistOpt is a flexible and innovative software environment that can be customized by the user in a short development time.     

基于ALV模型的CSCW用户界面设计

智能Agent越来越多地应用于用户界面设计。通过使用Agent,用户界面(也包括整个系统)就被分解为不同的可以互相通信的Agent。界面Agent作为用户与系统之间的中介,使得用户的输入不再是方法的调用,而是以通信的方式完成当前的任务。介绍了基于Agent的用户界面模型ALV,并以ALV模型为基础,结合XML技术,阐述了一种在CSCW环境下的DoctorCAD系统的Agent界面组件开发方法;重点阐述了在界面定制的实现方法,并提出了Personal Wizard的设计思想及方法。     

Loading flexible manufacturing systems: a heuristic approach

In this study, heuristic algorithms are developed for loading Flexible Manufacturing Systems. The heuristic approach is an efficient way of planning the FMS with multiple nonlinear loading objectives.