Design Considerations for Co-located Collaborative Information Visualization

Researchers

Summary

One of the goals of my PhD research was to come up with initial design considerations for co-located collaborative information visualization. The table listed below present a set of considerations from a large literature review, combining CSCW and Information Visualization research and from the results of several studies conducted on collaborative systems during my PhD. More details can be found in the referenced papers below.

Videos

Here is a video of how co-located collaborative data analysis should not take place.

(:media-player (http://petra.isenberg.cc/projects/collabvis/)SingleScreenInfovis2(.flv) width=320 height=260 text="How not to do collaborative data analysis" image="

" align='middle' -link:)

Collection of Considerations

In order to support more sophisticated interaction than shown in the video above, these are things you should consider when setting up a collaborative environment for data analysis.

Consideration	Aspects to Consider
	Collaborative Environment
Display size	Socially appropriate work space size per person, establishment of private, group, and storage spaces
Display configuration	Accommodation of group's current work practices, tasks, and goals
Input Type	Impact of input type on possible interactions
Resolution	Input and display resolution
	Supporting Social Interaction
Communication	Explicit data referencing across different representational and viewing contexts, e.g., annotation; implicit awareness cues of changes to the data across different representational and viewing contexts, support clarification, validation, data and strategy discussions with shared artifacts
Coordination	When using individual data views, location and rotation as a coordination and communication tool, sharing of visualizations and views, multiple synchronous interactions with shared representations, temporal flexibility of analysis processes, analysis processes within different collaboration styles, awareness of analysis activities and histories to encourage joint work
	Designing Information Visualizations
Representation	Personal preferences, multiple representation types, awareness support, appropriateness of representation for work environment and social interaction, integrated reasoning and sensemaking support
Presentation	Arrangement of data items for group access, providing copies of the same data, accommodation of input methods, compensations for display resolution
View	Interpretability of data from multiple viewpoints and orientations
Interaction	Interactive response rates despite simultaneous interaction, collaborative interaction histories, conflict reduction arising from global changes to data or view, fluid interaction, temporal flexibility of analysis processes, support operation, selection, browsing, and parsing as parallel activities

Publications

Most comprehensive summary

Petra Isenberg (2009) Collaborative Information Visualization in Co-located Environments. PhD Thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, AB, Canada, December 2009.

BibTeX entry:



@PHDTHESIS{Isenberg:2009:CIV,
  author      = {Petra Isenberg},
  title       = {C}ollaborative {I}nformation {V}isualization in {C}o-located {E}nvironments,
  type        = {{PhD} Thesis},
  year        = {2009},
  school      = {University of Calgary},
  month       = {December},
  address     = {Calgary, AB, Canada},
  pdf         = {../publications/papers/Isenberg_2009_PhDThesis.pdf},
}

First published set (more general)

Petra Isenberg and Sheelagh Carpendale (2007) Interactive Tree Comparison for Co-located Collaborative Information Visualization. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics (Proceedings Visualization / Information Visualization 2007), 13(6):1232–1239, November/December 2007.

BibTeX entry:



@ARTICLE{Neumann:2007:ITC,
  author      = {Petra Isenberg and Sheelagh Carpendale},
  title       = {I}nteractive {T}ree {C}omparison for {C}o-located {C}ollaborative
	{I}nformation {V}isualization,
  journal     = {IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics (Proceedings
	Visualization / Information Visualization 2007)},
  year        = {2007},
  volume      = {13},
  number      = {6},
  month       = nov # {/} # dec,
  pages       = {1232--1239},
  doi         = {10.1109/TVCG.2007.70568},
  doi_url     = {https://doi.org/10.1109/TVCG.2007.70568},
  pdf         = {../publications/papers/Isenberg_2007_ITC.pdf},
}

A refinement of the first published set

Jeffrey Heer, van Ham,Frank, Sheelagh Carpendale, Chris Weaver, and Petra Isenberg (2008) Creation and Collaboration: Engaging New Audiences for Information Visualization. In Andreas Kerren, John T. Stasko, Jean-Daniel Fekete, and Chris North (ed.): Information Visualization—Human-Centered Issues and Perspectives, pages 92–133. Springer Verlag, 2008.

BibTeX entry:



@INCOLLECTION{Heer:2008:CAC,
  author      = {Jeffrey Heer and van Ham,Frank and Sheelagh Carpendale and Chris Weaver and Petra Isenberg},
  title       = {Creation and Collaboration: Engaging New Audiences for Information
	Visualization},
  booktitle   = {Information Visualization---Human-Centered Issues and Perspectives},
  series      = {LNCS State-of-the-Art Survey},
  editor      = {Andreas Kerren and John T. Stasko and Jean-Daniel Fekete and Chris
	North},
  year        = {2008},
  volume      = {4950},
  pages       = {92--133},
  publisher   = {Springer Verlag},
  doi         = {10.1007/978-3-540-70956-5_5},
  doi_url     = {https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-70956-5_5},
}

Some additional considerations work vs. public settings

Petra Isenberg, Uta Hinrichs, Mark Hancock, Matthew Tobiasz, and Sheelagh Carpendale (2009) Information Visualization on Interactive Tabletops in Work vs. Public Settings. In Proceedings of the Workshop on Collaborative Visualization on Interactive Surfaces (CoVIS). 2009. Appeared in the Technical Reports series of the Department of Media Informatics of the Ludwig-Maximilians-University of Munich, Germany in 2010.

BibTeX entry:



@INPROCEEDINGS{Isenberg:2009:IVO,
  author      = {Petra Isenberg and Uta Hinrichs and Mark Hancock and Matthew Tobiasz and Sheelagh Carpendale},
  title       = {Information {V}isualization on {I}nteractive {T}abletops in {W}ork vs. {P}ublic {S}ettings},
  booktitle   = {Proceedings of the Workshop on Collaborative Visualization on Interactive Surfaces (CoVIS)},
  year        = {2009},
  pdf         = {../publications/papers/Isenberg_2009_IVO.pdf},
}

Petra Isenberg, Uta Hinrichs, Mark Hancock, and Sheelagh Carpendale (2010) Digital Tables for Collaborative Information Exploration. In Christian Mueller-Tomfelde (ed.): Tabletops—Horizontal Interactive Displays, pages 387–406. Springer Verlag, 2010.

BibTeX entry:



@INCOLLECTION{Isenberg:2010:DTF,
  author      = {Petra Isenberg and Uta Hinrichs and Mark Hancock and Sheelagh Carpendale},
  title       = {Digital Tables for Collaborative Information Exploration},
  booktitle   = {Tabletops---Horizontal Interactive Displays},
  series      = {Human-Computer Interaction Series},
  editor      = {Mueller-Tomfelde, Christian},
  year        = {2010},
  pages       = {387--406},
  publisher   = {Springer Verlag},
  doi         = {10.1007/978-1-84996-113-4_16},
  doi_url     = {https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-84996-113-4_16},
}

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