Graphical User Interface (GUI) for Information Retrieval (IR)

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Graphical User Interface (GUI) for Information
Retrieval (IR)

• CS5604
• Wen-Hung Kuo

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Main Goal of GUI for IR

• The main goal of a GUI, as well as Human Computer
  Interaction (HCI) in general, is to make a system
  easy to learn and easy to use.
• The evaluation of an IR system has traditionally
  ignored the user interface aspect of its design.
• There are, however, recent advances in HCI for IR
  that look promising.

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Articles Used for Todays Presentation

• Interactive Information Retrieval Systems From
  User Centered Interface Design to Software
  Designby P. Mulhem and L. Nigay (1996)
• LyberWorld - A Visualization User Interface
  Supporting Fulltext Retrievalby Matthias Hemmje,
  Clemens Kunkel, and Alexander Willett (1994)

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Evaluating HCI for IR

• The experimental approach for designing HCI is
  used in the Mulhem/Nigay paper.
• IR does not attempt to solve problems or answer
  questions, it merely helps user to find
  information that may be useful.
• A users situation can be described by his/her
  cognitive space (work-task, interest domain,
  cognitive state, and the problem space).

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Theory of Action Model Applied to IR
Combining Normans Thoery of Action with the
cognitive space model, Mulhem/Nigay developed the
Thoery of Action model for IR (Figure 1)
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Theory of Action Model (Fig. 1)

• The semantic and articulatory distances must be
  traversed by the user.
• The goal of successful IR user interface is to
  reduce these distances

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What Do These Distances Mean?
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Coupling of Input and Output

• Even though in Figure 1 inputs and outputs are
  clearly distinguished, the input and output
  interfaces cannot be designed independently
  input/output are tightly coupled.
• Two ergonomic principles that show the tight
  coupling between input and output immediate
  feedback and equal opportunity principles.

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Immediate Feedback Principle

• Measures the rate of communication between the
  IRS and the user.
• In general, immediate response times are
  desirable.
• Partial responses are allowed in order to
  preserve immediate response time.

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Equal Opportunity Principle

• Distinction between inputs and outputs are
  blurred.
• The user has the choice of what is input and what
  is output.
• Outputs are re-used by user as inputs.

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Query Result in a Starfield Display Format
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The Pipe-Lines Model

• The Theory of Action Model identifies the mental
  and physical actions of the USER.
• The Pipe-Lines Model is a systems point of view
  of IRS processes.
• Pipe-Lines expands on the system processes that
  are not defined in the Theory of Action.

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The Pipe-Lines Model (cont.)
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LyberWorld

• Prototype IR user interface.
• Applying metaphors of spatial navigation, which
  allows visualization of an abstract information
  space, in this case fulltext retrieval.
• Presence of a spatial model provides natural
  interaction with user, reducing cognitive costs.

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What Needs to Be Visualized?

• Before designing an IR process for spatial
  navigation, an underlying conceptual model should
  be formulated
• Concepts to consider
• Content of the database
• Interest of the user
• Context of a retrieval session
• Result of the current dialog

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Spatial Concepts Explained

• The databases content space contains all the
  information stored in the database.
• The context space of a session is created during
  navigation within the content space.
• The interest space of the user contains all
  information that are relevant the users needs.
• The result space is the context space partition
  relevant to the users interest.

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Thinking Spatially is Not New

• The information spaces described above have been
  represented in various data models (document
  network, two level abstraction, knowledge-based
  network, vector-based approaches, etc.).
• All previous data models can be considered having
  spatial properties, but they are not explicitly
  visualized in the resulting systems user
  interface.
• For this paper, Hemmje/Kunkel/Willett decides to
  use a network representation to model relations
  between points in an information space

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What Does a Spatial Visualization Look Like?

• Two visualization tools discussed in article
  NavigationCones and RelevanceSpheres.
• Both are used in the LyberWorld prototype system.

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NavigationCones

• Developed to visualize the retrieval dialog and
  the extent to which the database has been
  searched.
• NavigationCones transforms a non hierarchical
  content network into a hierarchical Cone Tree to
  improve perception of complex and abstract
  information spaces in a text retrieval
  application.

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NavigationCones (cont.)
Comparison between original layout and after
conversion to Cone Tree layout
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RelevanceSpheres

• A tool that allows relevance judgment by
  visualizing the context space and the distance
  between its items.
• It transforms the content network into a spatial
  visualization displaying path lengths while
  preserving the numerical proportions between
  themselves.

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RelevanceSpheres (cont.)
Conversion of a content space network graph into
a circular graph
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RelevanceSpheres (cont.)
Figure 7 displays the attraction vectors defined
between a document and its paths. Figure 8
displays the generation of a documents position
in the sphere with respect to the whole search
paths vectors and the spheres center as anchor
point.
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Screenshots of LyberWorld
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Screenshots of LyberWorld (cont.)
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Screenshots of LyberWorld (cont.)
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Screenshots of LyberWorld (cont.)
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Conclusion

• The main goal of GUI/HCI is to make a system
  easier to learn and easy to use.
• IRS can benefit greatly from improved HCI
  interfaces.
• The advance in GUI/HCI development for IRS such
  as ones in the LyberWorld prototype shows that
  improvements in one (HCI) can increase the user
  performance of the other (IR)

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References

• LyberWorlda visualization user interface
  supporting fulltext retrievalAnnual ACM
  Conference on Research and Development in
  Information Retrieval Proceedings of the 17th
  annual international ACM SIGIR conference on
  Research and development in information retrieval
  Dublin, IrelandPages 249 259Year of
  Publication 1994ISBN0-387-19889-X
• Interactive information retrieval systems from
  user centered interface design to software
  designAnnual ACM Conference on Research and
  Development in Information Retrieval Proceedings
  of the 19th annual international ACM SIGIR
  conference on Research and development in
  information retrievalZurich, Switzerland Pages
  326 - 334   Year of Publication 1996
  ISBN0-89791-792-8