Thesis (M.S.)--Brigham Young University. Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 69-74).

Thesis (M.S.)--Ohio University, June, 2004. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references (p. 86-87)

Thesis (M. Sc.)--University of Canterbury, 2006. / Typescript (photocopy). Includes bibliographical references (leaves 83-89). Also available via the World Wide Web.

Thesis (M.S. in Information Systems)--Naval Postgraduate School, March 1992. / Thesis Advisor: Nakagawa, Gordon. "March 1992." Description based on title screen as viewed on March 4, 2009. Includes bibliographical references (p. 66).

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro / O objetivo deste trabalho é desvendar as relações entre as interfaces gráficas do usuário, dispositivos comunicacionais que são indispensáveis para a utilização massiva das tecnologias digitais na contemporaneidade, e os elementos lúdicos que, supostamente, compõem as suas estruturas básicas estéticas e de funcionamento. Explorar os modos de funcionamento dos ambientes virtuais através da leitura de suas pretensas características lúdicas é, pelo nosso enfoque, procurar entender a forma que o ser humano busca criar novas maneiras de se relacionar com as Tecnologias da Informação e da Comunicação (TICs) e, de algum modo, facilitar a utilização destes dispositivos. A partir desses pressupostos epistemológicos, podemos supor indícios de uma proximidade entre elementos lúdicos e os elementos contidos nas interfaces gráficas do usuário, que se encontrariam na própria composição destes programas. Assim, buscamos desenvolver algumas premissas que nos tragam referências de um ambiente de jogo em uma interface gráfica, e nos permitam observar a aparição, ou não, destes fenômenos lúdicos nos dispositivos computacionais. / This thesis intends to uncover the relations among the graphical user interfaces, essential communicational devices for a massive use of the contemporary digital technology, and the ludic elements that supposedly composes their aesthetical and operational structures. For the objectives of this research, to explore the operation methods of virtual environments is also an attempt to understand how the humans glance at novel ways to be related with the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and, somehow, facilitate the use of these devices. Through those epistemological suppositions, we can assume indications of proximity between the ludic elements and the elements refrained in the graphical user interfaces that would be in the mixture of these programs. Thereby, we try to develop some premises that bring us some references of a game look-alike ambient in a graphical interface, which would allow us to observe the supposed appearance of these ludical phenomena in computational devices.

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro / O objetivo deste trabalho é desvendar as relações entre as interfaces gráficas do usuário, dispositivos comunicacionais que são indispensáveis para a utilização massiva das tecnologias digitais na contemporaneidade, e os elementos lúdicos que, supostamente, compõem as suas estruturas básicas estéticas e de funcionamento. Explorar os modos de funcionamento dos ambientes virtuais através da leitura de suas pretensas características lúdicas é, pelo nosso enfoque, procurar entender a forma que o ser humano busca criar novas maneiras de se relacionar com as Tecnologias da Informação e da Comunicação (TICs) e, de algum modo, facilitar a utilização destes dispositivos. A partir desses pressupostos epistemológicos, podemos supor indícios de uma proximidade entre elementos lúdicos e os elementos contidos nas interfaces gráficas do usuário, que se encontrariam na própria composição destes programas. Assim, buscamos desenvolver algumas premissas que nos tragam referências de um ambiente de jogo em uma interface gráfica, e nos permitam observar a aparição, ou não, destes fenômenos lúdicos nos dispositivos computacionais. / This thesis intends to uncover the relations among the graphical user interfaces, essential communicational devices for a massive use of the contemporary digital technology, and the ludic elements that supposedly composes their aesthetical and operational structures. For the objectives of this research, to explore the operation methods of virtual environments is also an attempt to understand how the humans glance at novel ways to be related with the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and, somehow, facilitate the use of these devices. Through those epistemological suppositions, we can assume indications of proximity between the ludic elements and the elements refrained in the graphical user interfaces that would be in the mixture of these programs. Thereby, we try to develop some premises that bring us some references of a game look-alike ambient in a graphical interface, which would allow us to observe the supposed appearance of these ludical phenomena in computational devices.

La communauté du génie logiciel porte depuis ses débuts une attention spéciale à la qualité et la fiabilité des logiciels. De nombreuses techniques de test logiciel ont été développées pour caractériser et détecter des erreurs dans les logiciels. Les modèles de fautes identifient et caractérisent les erreurs pouvant affecter les différentes parties d’un logiciel. D’autre part, les critères de qualité logiciel et leurs mesures permettent d’évaluer la qualité du code logiciel et de détecter en amont du code potentiellement sujet à erreur. Les techniques d’analyses statiques et dynamiques scrutent, respectivement, le logiciel à l’arrêt et à l’exécution pour trouver des erreurs ou réaliser des mesures de qualité. Dans cette thèse, nous prônons le fait que la même attention doit être portée sur la qualité et la fiabilité des interfaces utilisateurs (ou interface homme-machine, IHM), au sens génie logiciel du terme. Cette thèse propose donc deux contributions dans le domaine du test et de la maintenance d’interfaces utilisateur : 1. Classification et mutation des erreurs d’interfaces utilisateur. 2. Qualité du code des interfaces utilisateur. Nous proposons tout d’abord un modèle de fautes d’IHM. Ce modèle a été conçu à partir des concepts standards d’IHM pour identifier et classer les fautes d’IHM ; Au travers d’une étude empirique menée sur du code Java existant, nous avons montré l’existence d’une mauvaise pratique récurrente dans le développement du contrôleur d’IHM, objet qui transforme les évènements produits par l’interface utilisateur pour les transformer en actions. Nous caractérisons cette nouvelle mauvaise pratique que nous avons appelée Blob listener, en référence à la méthode Blob. Nous proposons également une analyse statique permettant d’identifier automatiquement la présence du Blob listener dans le code d’interface Java Swing. / The software engineering community takes special attention to the quality and the reliability of software systems. Software testing techniques have been developed to find errors in code. Software quality criteria and measurement techniques have also been assessed to detect error-prone code. In this thesis, we argue that the same attention has to be investigated on the quality and reliability of GUIs, from a software engineering point of view. We specifically make two contributions on this topic. First, GUIs can be affected by errors stemming from development mistakes. The first contribution of this thesis is a fault model that identifies and classifies GUI faults. We show that GUI faults are diverse and imply different testing techniques to be detected. Second, like any code artifact GUI code should be analyzed statically to detect implementation defects and design smells. As for the second contribution, we focus on design smells that can affect GUIs specifically. We identify and characterize a new type of design smell, called Blob listener. It occurs when a GUI listener, that gathers events to treat and transform as commands, can produce more than one command. We propose a systematic static code analysis procedure that searches for Blob listener that we implement in a tool called InspectorGuidget. Experiments we conducted exhibits positive results regarding the ability of InspectorGuidget in detecting Blob listeners. To counteract the use of Blob listeners, we propose good coding practices regarding the development of GUI listeners.

In contrast to a traditional setting where users express queries against the database schema, we assert that the semantics of data can often be understood by viewing the data in the context of the user interface (UI) of the software tool used to enter the data. That is, we believe that users will understand the data in a database by seeing the labels, dropdown menus, tool tips, help text, control contents, and juxtaposition or arrangement of controls that are built in to the user interface. Our goal is to allow domain experts with little technical skill to understand and query data. In this dissertation, we present our GUi As View (Guava) framework and describe how we use forms-based UIs to generate a conceptual model that represents the information in the user interface. We then describe how we generate a query interface from the conceptual model. We characterize the resulting query language using a subset of relational algebra. Since most application developers want to craft a physical database to meet desired performance needs independent of the schema used by the user interface, we subsequently present a general-purpose schema mapping tool called a channel that can be configured by instantiating a sequence of discrete transformations. Each transformation is an encapsulation of a physical design decision or business logic process. The channel, once configured, automatically transforms queries from our query interface into queries that address the underlying physical database, similar to a view. The channel also transforms data updates, schema updates, and constraint definitions posed against the channel’s input schema into equivalent forms against the physical schema. We present formal definitions of each transformation and properties that must be true of transformations, and prove that our definitions respect the properties.

The presented research summarizes (1) the development of a rapid prototyping framework, (2) the application of advance meshing algorithms, data structures, programming languages and libraries toward the field of numerical surface-water modeling (NSWM), (3) the application of (2) in (1), and (4) a real world application. The result of the research was the development of a prototype grid generator tool, the Mesh Generation and Refinement Tool (MGRT). MGRT supports a customizable interface and plug-and-play functionality through the use of plug-ins and incorporates a plug-in based topology/geometry system. A detailed explanation of the data structures, algorithms, and tools used to construct the MGRT are presented. Additionally, the construction of a mesh of Mobile Bay is presented. This represents a real world application of the MGRT. This tool provides many benefits over current tools in NSWM, which include faster meshing and the ability the use any grid generator that can be plugged-in.

Different possible interactions with computers is an ever-evolving topic and the usage of computers are more ubiquitous than ever. To design with the user in mind is not an easy task with regular use cases and interactions at hand. Designing for users in a military context can be even more difficult as the working environment of said users is demanding. This thesis sets out to investigate how a redesign of an existing GUI can reduce the impact of the contextual challenging environment of operating a software in terrain vehicles and in outdoor weather. For the redesign of the GUI a user-centered design process was performed. The process was initiated by using the method of contextual interviews and affinity diagram for data gathering and analysis, which gave a deeper understanding of the user’s issues and needs. After defining the different key elements for the redesign, a prototype was developed. The first prototype was evaluated by experienced users of the software out of military context. With the feedback from the users another developed version of the software was created and evaluated by current users of the software with an interview in military context. The evaluation showed that the users believed that the redesign of the GUI would help mitigate problems caused by the challenging context the software is used in, as well as improve quality of work. / Olika möjligheter för interaktion med datorer är ett område i ständig utveckling och användandet av datorer idag är mer omfattande än någonsin. Även för vanliga användningsområden och interaktioner så är det svårt att designa något där användarens behov står i centrum. Att designa något för en militär kontext kan göra processen ännu svårare då arbetsmiljön för användarna är mycket påfrestande. Denna studie undersöker hur en ny design av ett grafiskt användargränssnitt kan reducera de negativa effekterna som uppstår i den kontextuella miljön. Den miljö som datorprogrammet används i är i terrängfordon i rörelse och i alla väderförhållanden utomhus i fält. För att skapa en ny design av gränssnittet utfördes en användarcentrerad designprocess. Processen initierades med att utföra kontextuella intervjuer och skapa ett affinitetsdiagram för att sammanställa och analysera data, med detta erhölls en djupare insikt av användarbehoven och krav för designen. Efter att de mest betydande huvuddragen för designen var fastställda utvecklades en prototyp av designen. Första prototypen utvärderades av användare med erfarenhet av mjukvaran utanför den militära kontexten. Av responsen från dessa användare utvecklades en ny version av designen som sedan utvärderades under en intervju med nuvarande användare av mjukvaran i militär kontext. Utvärderingen visade att användarna trodde att den nya designen av användargränssnittet skulle hjälpa att minska problemen som uppstod i deras arbetsmiljö och kontext samt förbättra deras arbetskvalitet.