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| Author(s) |
Büring, T., Gerken, J., Reiterer, H. |
| Title |
User interaction with scatterplots on small screens - A comparative evaluation of geometric-semantic zoom and fisheye distortion |
| Abstract |
Existing information-visualization techniques that target small
screens are usually limited to exploring a few hundred items. In
this article we present a scatterplot tool for Personal Digital Assistants
that allows the handling of many thousands of items. The application's
scalability is achieved by incorporating two alternative
interaction techniques: a geometric-semantic zoom that provides
smooth transition between overview and detail, and a fisheye distortion
that displays the focus and context regions of the scatterplot
in a single view.
A user study with 24 participants was conducted to compare the usability
and efficiency of both techniques when searching a book
database containing 7500 items. The study was run on a pendriven
Wacom board simulating a PDA interface. While the results
showed no significant difference in task-completion times, a
clear majority of 20 users preferred the fisheye view over the zoom
interaction. In addition, other dependent variables such as user satisfaction
and subjective rating of orientation and navigation support
revealed a preference for the fisheye distortion. These findings
partly contradict related research and indicate that, when using a
small screen, users place higher value on the ability to preserve
navigational context than they do on the ease of use of a simplistic,
metaphor-based interaction style. |
| Download |
BuGeRe06b.pdf |
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