Unmanned aerial systems (UAS) carry no pilot on board, yet they still require live operators to handle critical functions such as mission planning and execution. Humans also interpret the sensor information provided by these platforms. This applies to all classes of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV's), including the smaller portable systems used for gathering real-time reconnaissance during military operations in urban terrain. The need to quickly and reliably train soldiers to control small UAS operations demands that the human-system interface be intuitive and easy to master. In this study, participants completed a series of tests of spatial ability and were then trained (in simulation) to teleoperate a micro-unmanned aerial vehicle equipped with forward and downward fixed cameras. Three aspects of the human-system interface were manipulated to assess the effects on manual control mastery and target detection. One factor was the input device. Participants used either a mouse or a specially programmed game controller (similar to that used with the Sony Playstation 2 video game console). A second factor was the nature of the flight control displays as either continuous or discrete (analog v. digital). The third factor involved the presentation of sensor imagery. The display could either provide streaming video from one camera at a time, or present the imagery from both cameras simultaneously in separate windows. The primary dependent variables included: 1) time to complete assigned missions, 2) number of collisions, 3) number of targets detected, and 4) operator workload. In general, operator performance was better with the game controller than with the mouse, but significant improvement in time to complete occurred over repeated trials regardless of the device used. Time to complete missions was significantly faster with the game controller, and operators also detected more targets without any significant differences in workload compared to mouse users. Workload on repeated trials decreased with practice, and spatial ability was a significant covariate of workload. Lower spatial ability associated with higher workload scores. In addition, demographic data including computer usage and video gaming experience were collected and analyzed, and correlated with performance. Higher video gaming experience was also associated with lower workload.

De nombreux travaux ont montré que, à l’origine des limitations de l’interaction bureautique, il y a un manque à la fois d’espace moteur et d’espace visuel.Cette thèse explore des moyens pour optimiser l’usage de ces espaces.D’une part, à partir du constat que l’on contrôle la position et l’orientation d’un objet par un geste naturel, cette thèse étudie les bénéfices que peut offrir une souris dotée d’un capteur de rotation. Cette < souris rotative > permet à l’utilisateur de maîtriser avec aisance trois variables continues d’une tâche informatique. Un état de l’art présente des aspects perceptifs et moteurs des actions en question et les particularités ergonomiques et techniques d’un tel dispositif. Deux techniques d’interaction - visant à faciliter des tâches métier récurrentes - sont proposées :le réglage < quasi-intégral > et la < palette satellitaire >. Par ailleurs, une évaluation expérimentale compare la performance d’une souris rotative avec celle d’une souris traditionnelle.D’autre part, ce travail se penche sur les questions de la visualisation de documents dans le contexte des bibliothèques numériques. D’abord, il examine l’apport et la faisabilité technique de l’utilisation d’un dispositif d’affichage immersif pour la navigation dans un catalogue de titres virtuel. Puis, afin de faciliter l’inspection massive d’un lot de pages numérisées, il avance des techniques de visualisation zoomables et multi-focales. Ces dernières permettent, dans une recherche d’anomalies, de saisir vite les caractéristiques visuelles de quelques centaines de pages. Et cela grâce à un va-et-vient entre la vue d’ensemble et la navigation panoramique des détails. / Past research has suggested that among the reasons for the limitations of present desktop interaction style is the lack of both motor and visual space. The goal ofthis thesis is to optimize the use of such spaces. Based on the fact that one can control an object’s position and orientation through a natural movement, the first main contributioin of this thesis is to explorethe advantages of enhancing the sensing of the standard mouse througha rotation sensor. This < rotary mouse > allows one to easily control three continuous variables of a computer task. A survey presents the perceptual and motorissues of some rotary manipulations and also the technical and ergonomic requirements of such device. Two interaction techniques, aimed to simplify repetitive tasks, are proposed : the < nearly-integral selection > and the < satellite palette >.Furthermore, an experimental evaluation compares the performance of the rotarymouse with that of a standard one. The other main contribution of this work is to investigate document visualization issues in the context of digital libraries. First, it analyses the advantages and the technical feasibility of integrating an immersive display to an interface aimed to support navigation in a virtual catalog. Second, in order to inspect the quality of a batch of digitized pages, it explores some zoomable and multi-focal visualization techniques. The overview and the panoramic detail browsing enabled by such techniques try to help users, which have to identify the flaws resulted from the digitization process, to quickly grasp the visual characteristics of a large set of pages.

De nombreux travaux ont montré que, à l’origine des limitations de l’interaction bureautique, il y a un manque à la fois d’espace moteur et d’espace visuel.Cette thèse explore des moyens pour optimiser l’usage de ces espaces.D’une part, à partir du constat que l’on contrôle la position et l’orientation d’un objet par un geste naturel, cette thèse étudie les bénéfices que peut offrir une souris dotée d’un capteur de rotation. Cette < souris rotative > permet à l’utilisateur de maîtriser avec aisance trois variables continues d’une tâche informatique. Un état de l’art présente des aspects perceptifs et moteurs des actions en question et les particularités ergonomiques et techniques d’un tel dispositif. Deux techniques d’interaction - visant à faciliter des tâches métier récurrentes - sont proposées :le réglage < quasi-intégral > et la < palette satellitaire >. Par ailleurs, une évaluation expérimentale compare la performance d’une souris rotative avec celle d’une souris traditionnelle.D’autre part, ce travail se penche sur les questions de la visualisation de documents dans le contexte des bibliothèques numériques. D’abord, il examine l’apport et la faisabilité technique de l’utilisation d’un dispositif d’affichage immersif pour la navigation dans un catalogue de titres virtuel. Puis, afin de faciliter l’inspection massive d’un lot de pages numérisées, il avance des techniques de visualisation zoomables et multi-focales. Ces dernières permettent, dans une recherche d’anomalies, de saisir vite les caractéristiques visuelles de quelques centaines de pages. Et cela grâce à un va-et-vient entre la vue d’ensemble et la navigation panoramique des détails. / Past research has suggested that among the reasons for the limitations of present desktop interaction style is the lack of both motor and visual space. The goal ofthis thesis is to optimize the use of such spaces. Based on the fact that one can control an object’s position and orientation through a natural movement, the first main contributioin of this thesis is to explorethe advantages of enhancing the sensing of the standard mouse througha rotation sensor. This < rotary mouse > allows one to easily control three continuous variables of a computer task. A survey presents the perceptual and motorissues of some rotary manipulations and also the technical and ergonomic requirements of such device. Two interaction techniques, aimed to simplify repetitive tasks, are proposed : the < nearly-integral selection > and the < satellite palette >.Furthermore, an experimental evaluation compares the performance of the rotarymouse with that of a standard one. The other main contribution of this work is to investigate document visualization issues in the context of digital libraries. First, it analyses the advantages and the technical feasibility of integrating an immersive display to an interface aimed to support navigation in a virtual catalog. Second, in order to inspect the quality of a batch of digitized pages, it explores some zoomable and multi-focal visualization techniques. The overview and the panoramic detail browsing enabled by such techniques try to help users, which have to identify the flaws resulted from the digitization process, to quickly grasp the visual characteristics of a large set of pages.

Traditional methods of input on mobile devices are cumbersome and difficult to use. Devices have become smaller, while their operating systems have become more complex, to the extent that they are approaching the level of functionality found on desktop computer operating systems. The buttons and toggle-sticks currently employed by mobile devices are a relatively poor replacement for the keyboard and mouse style user interfaces used on their desktop computer counterparts. For example, when looking at a screen image on a device, we should be able to move the device to the left to indicate we wish the image to be panned in the same direction. This research investigates a new input model based on the natural hand motions and reactions of users. The model developed by this work uses the generic embedded video cameras available on almost all current-generation mobile devices to determine how the device is being moved and maps this movement to an appropriate action. Surveys using mobile devices were undertaken to determine both the appropriateness and efficacy of such a model as well as to collect the foundational data with which to build the model. Direct mappings between motions and inputs were achieved by analysing users' motions and reactions in response to different tasks. Upon the framework being completed, a proof of concept was created upon the Windows Mobile Platform. This proof of concept leverages both DirectShow and Direct3D to track objects in the video stream, maps these objects to a three-dimensional plane, and determines device movements from this data. This input model holds the promise of being a simpler and more intuitive method for users to interact with their mobile devices, and has the added advantage that no hardware additions or modifications are required the existing mobile devices.