Several earlier research efforts sought to achieve end-user design of interactive behavior. One involved making traditional programming (scripting) accessible to casual users through a highly visual editing environment. 3 In the system, users write a program using simple drag-and-drop operations without making syntax errors. Another involved using programming by demonstration5 for character animation17; in it, users demonstrate the desired interactive behavior of a character, with the system learning the pattern from the demonstration. Programming with visual replacement rules is a promising approach for defining a character’s interactive behavior. 4 The user specifies before-and-after pairs; at runtime, the system compares the scene configuration with the before patterns, replacing it with after patterns when the match is identified.

Though these experiments produced interesting initial results, designing the arbitrary interactive behavior of a virtual agent is often prohibitively difficult. We are particularly interested in teaching interactive behavior to physical agents (robots). End-user programming for robot behavior has been tested in some systems1 but is still limited to basic motions. Programming by demonstration for robots has also been reported but is used mainly for acquiring physical-manipulation skills. 2 Techniques developed in the user-interface-research community that should be applicable to human–robot interaction represent an interesting research direction.

Designing real-world objects. The systems outlined here were all designed for virtual representations; one can produce interesting graphics on the computer screen but cannot touch or use them in the real world. Then there’s development of end-user tools for designing physical objects (such as furniture and clothing). The idea is to help people custom-design the things they will use instead of having to buy manufactured products in stores. Objects designed by users themselves should satisfy their needs more directly and produce greater satisfaction.

Unlike professional designers, the
typical consumer generally lacks the
professional knowledge needed to de-
sign physical objects. Inexperienced
consumers could easily create a bag
that is not sturdy enough or a chair that
cannot stand up. One promising ap-
proach is to introduce physics into the
modeling process. Traditional model-
ing systems ignore physics, possibly
producing physically inappropriate re-
sults, as in, say, objects that penetrate
one another. It might be possible to
help users avoid these issues by con-
sidering physical principles within a
modeling system.

conclusion

This article introduced our efforts to make computer-graphics authoring accessible to the general public, making it as much a daily communication tool as word processing and presentation applications. What most defines our research is its focus on end users. This opens up new application possibilities for existing technologies while posing unique technological challenges for interface researchers and developers. We look forward to more computer-science researchers participating in this fertile field.

acknowledgments

I would like to thank Satoshi Matsuoka, Hidehiko Tanaka, John F. Hughes, Tomer Moscovich, Yuki Igarashi, Ma-neesh Agrawala, and Masahiko Inami for their contributions and comments.

 

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Takeo Igarashi ( [e-mail]) is an associate professor in the Department of Computer science in the Graduate school of Information science and Technology at The university of Tokyo.