Wave Menus: Improving the novice mode of Hierarchical Marking Menus Gilles Bailly 1,2 Eric Lecolinet 2 Laurence Nigay 1 LIG Grenoble 1 France 2 ENST Paris France

INTRODUCTION

Compound Marking Menus Hierarchical Marking Menus Compound marking Menus [Kurtenbach 93] Novice modeExpert mode Novice Mode

Compound Marking Menus Advantages –Circular design –Fluid transition –Scale independance Limitations –Screen space requirement –Number of commands Error rate in expert mode Ambiguous marks in expert mode

Multi-Stroke Marking Menus (Simple Hierarchical Marking Menus) Solution [Zhao 04] Instead of considering a spatial compound stroke, Multi-Stroke menus introduce a serie of simple strokes. Novice mode (1) (2) Expert mode

Multi-Stroke Marking Menus Require less physical input space in novice & expert modes –Overlapped marks Increase accuracy in expert mode Increase the number of items –No ambiguous gestures in expert mode [Zhao 04]

Multi-Stroke Marking Menus Interaction is degraded in novice mode To sum up, Multi-Stroke marking menus have several advantages that outperform Compound Marking Menus in expert mode. However…

Multi-Stroke Marking Menus and Novice Mode Menu parents are not visible Submenus cannot be previewed Multi-stroke Marking Menus Compound Marking Menus

Introduction NOVICE MODE

Why is the novice mode so important ? It is the first interaction mode –necessary step before the expert mode –By exploring the menu, users learn where the commands are It never disappears –Most commands are not often used –People with limited physical skills It co-exists with the expert mode –Reuse after a long lay-off period

Introduction Novice mode OBJECTIVES

Objectives A menu –As efficient as Multi-Stroke Marking Menus in expert mode –Efficient in novice mode –Usable with small screens A new technique: Wave Menus

Introduction Novice mode Objectives WAVE MENUS

Wave Menus (1/4) The main feature : Parent menus surround submenus 1)Menu appears 2)Menu is enlarged 3)Submenu appears 4)Final item is selected

Wave Menus (2/4) Exploration of the menu hierarchy: rapid scan of different submenus User looks for Paris: 1)Scan Cities 1 2)Scan Cities 2 3)Scan Cities 3 4)Select Paris

Wave Menus (3/4) Scale independance Fast animation to enlarge the root menu

Wave Menus (4/4) Submenus Previsualization –Rapid scan of possibilities Parent menus: –Always visible –Can be directly selected Visual stability of the focus of attention

Wave Menus (4/4) Few physical input space In expert mode, Wave Menus work exactly the same way as Multi-Stroke Menus (1) (2) Novice Mode Expert Mode

Introduction Novice mode Objectives Wave Menus Experiment

Comparison of novice mode efficiency –Compound Marking Menus –Multi-Stroke Marking Menus –Wave Menus –Inverted Wave Menus

Inverted Wave Menus Wave Menus: Children of the menu tree in the center Parents on the outmost rings Inverted Wave Menus Tree nodes are displayed in the opposite order Inverted Wave Menus

Task and Stimuli Exploration of a 2-level menu –Search cities Stimulus –A city name with his corresponding continent The city appears several times Ex, to find Paris in Europe, users must navigate in the three Europe submenus One target Menus to visit

Participants & Apparatus 12 volunteers Mouse rather than Stylus –Most of our users had no experience in using pen tablets –Mouse is much more commonly used

Experimental design 12 participants X 4 menu techniques X 3 submenu breadths (4,6 or 8 items) X 6 times = 864 menu selections

Results: Speed No effect on Reaction Time. Significant effect on Execution Time for menu techniques

Results: Speed No effect on Reaction Time Significant effect on Execution Time for menu techniques –Wave Menus are 18% faster than Multi-Stroke Marking Menus –Previsualization has a major effect in improving navigation. –11/12 subjects said that they could easily get lost in Multi-Stroke Marking menus.

Results: Speed No effect on Reaction Time Significant effect on Execution Time for menu techniques –With Inverted Wave Menus, Users complainted about the excessive distance between the items they had to read. –With Wave Menus, most users (10/12) said they were not bothered by the reversed hierarchy after sufficient learning time.

Results: Accuracy 97% 83%93%

Introduction Novice mode Objectives Wave Menus Experiment Conclusion

Importance of novice mode. Wave menus –As Efficient as Multi-Stroke Marking Menus in expert mode –As Efficient as Compound Marking Menus in novice mode –usable with small screens Future Work: Formalization of menu properties

? Thank you

3-Level Wave Menus