From desktop to phonetop: a UI for web interaction on very small devices

ABSTRACT

While it is generally accepted that new Internet terminals should leverage the installed base of Web content and services, the differences between desktop computers and very small devices makes this challenging. Indeed, the browser interaction model has evolved on desktop computers having a unique combination of user interface (large display, keyboard, pointing device), hardware, and networking capabilities. In contrast, Internet enabled cell phones, typically with 3-10 lines of text, sacrifice usability as Web terminals in favor of portability and other functions. Based on our earlier experiences building and using a Web browser for small devices we propose a new UI that splits apart the integrated activities of link following and reading into separate modes: navigating to; and acting on web content. This interaction technique for very small devices is both simpler for navigating and allows users to do more than just read. The M-Links system incorporates modal browsing interaction and addresses a number of associated problems. We have built our system with an emphasis on simplicity and user extensibility and describe the design, implementation and evolution of the user interface.

REFERENCES

• 1: Mobile Google, search engine for WAP and Palm devices, http://mobile.google.com/.
• 2: Fox, A. Goldberg, I., Gribble, S., Lee, D., Polito, A., Brewer, E. Experience With Top Gun Wingman, A Proxy-Based Graphical Web Browser for the USR PalmPilot. Proc. IFIP International Conference on Distributed Systems Platforms and Open Distributed Processing (Middleware '98), Lake District, UK, 1998
• 3: AvantGo, web browsing and caching for wireless devices, http://www.avantgo.com/.
• 4: Timothy W. Bickmore , Bill N. Schilit, Digestor: device-independent access to the World Wide Web, Selected papers from the sixth international conference on World Wide Web, p.1075-1082, September 1997, Santa Clara, California, United States
• 5: Orkut Buyukkokten , Hector Garcia-Molina , Andreas Paepcke , Terry Winograd, Power browser: efficient Web browsing for PDAs, Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems, p.430-437, April 01-06, 2000, The Hague, The Netherlands [doi>10.1145/332040.332470]
• 6: Neopointl000 phone details http://www.neopoint.com/
• 7: Mik Lamming , Marge Eldridge , Mike Flynn , Chris Jones , David Pendlebury, Satchel: providing access to any document, any time, anywhere, ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI), v.7 n.3, p.322-352, Sept. 2000 [doi>10.1145/355324.355326]
• 8: Bonnie A. Nardi , James R. Miller , David J. Wright, Collaborative, programmable intelligent agents, Communications of the ACM, v.41 n.3, p.96-104, March 1998 [doi>10.1145/272287.272331]
• 9: Milind S. Pandit , Sameer Kalbag, The selection recognition agent: instant access to relevant information and operations, Proceedings of the 2nd international conference on Intelligent user interfaces, p.47-52, January 06-09, 1997, Orlando, Florida, United States [doi>10.1145/238218.238285]
• 10: R. Bentley , W. Appelt , U. Busbach , E. Hinrichs , D. Kerr , K. Sikkel , J. Trevor , G. Woetzel, Basic support for cooperative work on the World Wide Web, International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, v.46 n.6, p.827-846, June 1997 [doi>10.1006/ijhc.1996.0108 ]
• 11: The Voice eXtensible Markup Language (VXML) Forum, http://www.vxml.org/
• 12: Staffan Björk , Lars Erik Holmquist , Johan Redström , Ivan Bretan , Rolf Danielsson , Jussi Karlgren , Kristofer Franzén, WEST: a Web browser for small terminals, Proceedings of the 12th annual ACM symposium on User interface software and technology, p.187-196, November 07-10, 1999, Asheville, North Carolina, United States [doi>10.1145/320719.322601]
• 13: Steven E. Czerwinski , Ben Y. Zhao , Todd D. Hodes , Anthony D. Joseph , Randy H. Katz, An architecture for a secure service discovery service, Proceedings of the 5th annual ACM/IEEE international conference on Mobile computing and networking, p.24-35, August 15-19, 1999, Seattle, Washington, United States [doi>10.1145/313451.313462]

INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)
      H.5.2 User Interfaces (D.2.2, H.1.2, I.3.6)
          Subjects: Interaction styles (e.g., commands, menus, forms, direct manipulation)

Additional Classification:
  C. Computer Systems Organization
  C.5 COMPUTER SYSTEM IMPLEMENTATION
      C.5.3 Microcomputers
          Subjects: Portable devices (e.g., laptops, personal digital assistants)

  I. Computing Methodologies
  I.7 DOCUMENT AND TEXT PROCESSING
      I.7.2 Document Preparation
          Subjects: Markup languages

General Terms:
Design, Languages

Keywords:
PDA, Web browsing, transcoding, transducing, web phone, wireless web