Here are examples of messages in the Grafitter format:

• #mood(happy) Just had ice cream.

• A long day #work( 11) And it’s not even done yet.

• Relaxing lunch with friends. #lunch(amy, bob, jim)

 

The Grafitter format is designed to be distinct and easy to input. First, the format is distinct enough to simplify parsing of the data. Since there is no central server (the Grafitter format can be embedded in Twitter, blogs, sharing Web sites, and so on), there is no preprocessing of the data to prepare it for visualization. Instead, parsing is done client-side, thus parsing has to be efficient.

The second consideration is that since users might use the format several times a day over several days and weeks, it must be easy to enter. We leverage Twitter hashtags because many people already use them.

While there are three main avenues for reporting personal behavioral information to Grafitter, the format can be supported in other social media, too.

received by the bot are sent to the Grafitter site, which stores the messages. Users can access graphs of their messages using their instant messaging screen name at http://grafitter.com/im/ screen_name.

On the path to greater self knowledge, Grafitter makes it easy to report daily personal behavioral information by connecting with various social media in different contexts. The tool automatically culls data from these sources so that users may reflect on visualizations of their collected behavioral information, and perhaps get to “know thyself” just a little better.

Twitter

Users can use the Grafitter format while sending messages with Twitter. Since Twitter supports SMS (Short Message Service) and there are Twitter clients for mobile devices and desktop computers, users can enter their personal behavioral information using the Grafitter format using multiple devices. When users are ready to see visualizations of the data they have collected, they can go to http:// grafitter.com/tw/twitter_name. The Grafitter site gets the data from Twitter using the Twitter API.

 

Embedding Data While Sharing We use Delicious as an example of embedding data while sharing because it has a robust API for accessing data and plenty of users. When sharing a bookmark on Delicious, users can enter Grafitter-formatted information in the “Notes” field of the Delicious form. We use the “Notes” field to preserve the title of the bookmarked page in the “Title” field and to avoid cluttering the users’ set of Delicious tags. Since Delicious tags are space-separated, entering a valid Grafitter format such as “#mood(very happy)” into the “Tags” field will be parsed by Delicious as two unseemly tags “#mood(very” and “happy)”. Visualizations of Grafitter-formatted data on Delicious are seen at http://grafitter.com/dl/delicious_name.

Biographies

Ian Li ( [e-mail]) is a PhD student in the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University. His research interests are in ubiquitous computing, visualizations, interaction design, and social web. He has combined these interests to develop personal informatics systems that help people gain self-knowledge by collecting and reflecting on information about themselves.

Anind Dey ( [e-mail]) is a professor in the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, where he recently started directing the HCII PhD program. His research interests lie at the intersection of human-computer interaction and ubiquitous computing, focusing on how to make novel technologies more usable and useful. In particular, he builds tools that make it easier to build useful ubiquitous computing applications and supporting end users in controlling their ubiquitous computing systems.

Jodi Forlizzi ( [e-mail]) is a professor in the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University. She is an interaction designer contributing to design theory and practice. Her theoretical research examines theories of experience and emotion as they relate to interaction design. Her other research and practice centers on notification systems ranging from peripheral displays to social robots, with a special focus on the social aspects of these systems.

Instant Messaging Bot We also created an instant messaging bot to which users can send Grafitter-formatted messages. The bot can be reached at [e-mail] using any Jabber-enabled client, such as iChat and Google Talk. An IM bot on the AIM network can also be reached at [e-mail]. The IM bot is built using the IMified service ( imified.com), which runs bots on several IM networks, such Jabber/ GTalk, AIM, Yahoo!, and MSN. The messages