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Luis Borges Gouveia
A virtual environment to share knowledge February, 2009 ISBN: 978 3 639 12986 1
Book abstract |
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Luis Borges Gouveia
A virtual environment to share knowledge February, 2009 ISBN: 978 3 639 12986 1
Book abstract |
|
|
Luís Borges Gouveia
A virtual environment to share knowledge February, 2009 ISBN: 978 3 639 12986 1
|
Many developments were introduced for presenting information using digital visualisation techniques, including 3D interactive visualisations and virtual environments. Additionally, the way a group of people shares information about the meanings of concepts can be considered as an important issue for knowledge sharing. However, visualisation potential for representing and exploring knowledge has not yet been totally explored. This work proposes a general structure for knowledge sharing to represent knowledge that allows a group of users to share concept meanings and their relations, and to organise information about a specific knowledge context. The development and evaluation of a prototype is presented. An empirical study conducted suggests that users were able to specify structures for knowledge sharing, using the prototype to explore and enhance the structure. The prototype can also be used as tool for collaborative learning. The work offers a structured approach to how 3D visual representations, as virtual environment setting, can be used to support collaboration. It also present how to evaluate them and reports the algorithms used to the prototype visual rendering process.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
A virtual environment to share knowledge
Table of Contents vii List of figures xiv List of tables xvii1 Introduction 11.1 THE CONTEXT FOR THE WORK 3 1.2 APPROACH OF THE WORK 4 1.3 OBJECTIVES OF THE WORK 6 1.4 NOVEL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE WORK 8 1.5 STRUCTURE OF THE WORK 92 Cognitive overhead, information overload and collaborative learning 112.1 INTRODUCTION 11 2.2 MOTIVATION 12 2.3 INTERFACE ISSUES 15 2.3.1 Use graphics as dialogue extenders 15 2.3.2 The human side of technology users 16 2.3.3 Systems to support knowledge sharing 17 2.3.4 The direct manipulation factor 18 2.3.5 The importance of a common language 18 2.3.6 From abstraction to action 20 2.3.7 Information artefacts and information access 22 2.4 LEARNING ISSUES 25 2.4.1 Experiential and reflective learning 25 2.4.2 Collaborative learning 28 2.5 INFORMATION ISSUES 32 2.5.1 Cognitive overhead 32 2.5.2 Information overload 35 2.6 FINAL REMARKS 393 From collaboration technologies to knowledge representation 413.1 INTRODUCTION 41 3.2 RELATED TECHNOLOGIES 43 3.2.1 World Wide Web as a development lab 43 3.2.2 Information retrieval 45 3.2.3 Virtual reality 47 3.3 ENABLING GROUP INTERACTION 50 3.3.1 Computer Supported Cooperative Work 50 3.3.2 Computer Supported Collaborative Learning 52 3.3.3 Collaborative Virtual Environments 54 3.4 USING VISUALS TO CONVEY INFORMATION 59 3.4.1 Visualisation 59 3.4.2 Information Visualisation 62 3.5 KNOWLEDGE SHARING ISSUES 65 3.5.1 Knowledge sharing 65 3.5.2 Graphical knowledge representations for education use 67 3.6 FINAL REMARKS 784 Graphical support for knowledge sharing 804.1 INTRODUCTION 80 4.2 AN ENVIRONMENT TO SUPPORT KNOWLEDGE SHARING 83 4.2.1 The problem 83 4.2.2 How the problem is currently solved 84 4.2.3 Limitations of existing solutions 85 4.2.4 Alternative solutions 86 4.2.5 Additional support needed 87 4.3 THE PROPOSAL 88 4.3.1 The structure for knowledge sharing 88 4.3.2 The visualisation design 93 4.3.3 Putting it all together 98 4.4 SYSTEM FUNCTIONALITY 99 4.4.1 ViDESK facilities 99 4.4.2 ViDESK functions 102 4.5 SUMMARY 1045 A model for a visualisation for knowledge sharing 1065.1 INTRODUCTION 106 5.2 THE STRUCTURE FOR KNOWLEDGE SHARING 109 5.2.1 Definitions 109 5.3 THE VISUALISATION DESIGN 112 5.3.1 Introduction 112 5.3.2 The Concept Space visualisation 112 5.3.3 The criteria space visualisation 119 5.4 VIDESK INTEGRATION WITH DATA SOURCES 125 5.4.1 Introduction 125 5.4.2 The information visualisation design 127 5.4.3 Textual output generation 130 5.5 SHARING ISSUES 131 5.6 SUMMARY 1336 Implementing a knowledge sharing system 1356.1 INTRODUCTION 135 6.2 PROTOTYPE PLATFORM AND ARCHITECTURE 136 6.2.1 Prototype platform 136 6.2.2 Prototype architecture 136 6.2.3 Prototype implementation 138 6.3 USING THE PROTOTYPE 139 6.3.1 The ViDESK visualisation design 139 6.3.2 ViDESK interaction with data sources 153 6.3.3 ViDESK sharing facilities 156 6.4 A USER SCENARIO 162 6.5 SUMMARY 1727 Experiments to evaluate the system in use 1747.1 INTRODUCTION 174 7.2 EXPERIMENTS 176 7.3 USING TASKS TO CONDUCT THE EXPERIMENT 179 7.4 EXPERIMENTAL METHODOLOGY 183 7.5 EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURES 187 7.5.1 Construct a structure and its visualisation 188 7.5.2 Explore a structure by navigating the visualisation 189 7.5.3 Enhance a structure by using the visualisation for shared interaction 191 7.6 SUMMARY 1948 Experimental results 1958.1 INTRODUCTION 195 8.2 ANALYSIS OF EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS 199 8.2.1 Experiment 1 data analysis 199 8.2.2 Experiment 2 data analysis 202 8.2.3 Experiment 3 data analysis 207 8.3 SUMMARY OF EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS 213 8.3.1 Work objectives analysis 213 8.3.2 Experimental conclusions analysis 2189 Conclusions and future work 2229.1 OBJECTIVES OF THE WORK RE-VISITED 223 9.2 SUMMARY OF CONTRIBUTIONS 225 9.3 FUTURE WORK 227 9.4 CONCLUSIONS 230 9.5 RECOMMENDATIONS 234References 236Appendix A Structure for knowledge sharing: issues and examples 257A.1 THE INTERNAL REPRESENTATION OF THE STRUCTURE FOR KNOWLEDGE SHARING 257 A.2 EXAMPLE OF STRUCTURES FOR KNOWLEDGE SHARING 259 A.2.1 The selected knowledge theme 259 A.2.2 Three structure examples 259 A.2.2.1 SMALL SCALE VERSION: 17 CONCEPTS 260 A.2.2.2 MEDIUM SCALE VERSION: 30 CONCEPTS 261 A.2.2.3 LARGE SCALE VERSION: 45 CONCEPTS 262 A.3 VISUALISATION SCALABILITY ISSUES 262 A.4 SMALL SCALE VERSION OF THE INFORMATION MANAGEMENT STRUCTURE FOR KNOWLEDGE SHARING 264 A.5 MEDIUM SCALE VERSION OF THE INFORMATION MANAGEMENT STRUCTURE FOR KNOWLEDGE SHARING 267 A.6 LARGE SCALE VERSION OF THE INFORMATION MANAGEMENT STRUCTURE FOR KNOWLEDGE SHARING 271Appendix B Evaluation materials 275B.1 PRE EXPERIMENT QUESTIONNAIRE 275 B.2 POST-EXPERIMENT QUESTIONNAIRE FOR EXPERIMENT 1 276 B.3 EXPERIMENT 2 TASK 2.1 CHECKLIST 278 B.4 EXPERIMENT 2 TASK 2.2 CHECKLIST 279 B.5 POST-EXPERIMENT QUESTIONNAIRE FOR EXPERIMENT 2 280 B.6 EXPERIMENT 3 FIRST THEME STRUCTURE: HOLIDAYS (IN PORTUGUESE) 281 B.7 EXPERIMENT 3 SECOND THEME STRUCTURE: INFORMATION MANAGEMENT (IN PORTUGUESE) 282 B.8 EXPERIMENT 3 TASK 3.1 CHECKLIST 283 B.9 POST-EXPERIMENT QUESTIONNAIRE FOR EXPERIMENT 3 284Appendix C Experimental data 287C.1 REPORTING DATA FROM EXPERIMENT 1: CONSTRUCT A STRUCTURE AND ITS VISUALISATION 287 C.2 REPORTING DATA FROM EXPERIMENT 2: EXPLORE A STRUCTURE BY NAVIGATING THE VISUALISATION 302 C.3 REPORTING DATA FROM EXPERIMENT 3: ENHANCE A STRUCTURE BY USING THE VISUALISATION FOR SHARED INTERACTION 311Appendix D A ViDESK description with algorithms 322D.1 THE VISUALISATION DESIGN 323 D.2 MODEL DEFINITIONS 325 D.3 THE VISUALISATION DESIGN ALGORITHMS 330
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CV
Luís Borges Gouveia
lmbg@ufp.edu.pt,
http://homepage.ufp.pt/~lmbg
Luis Borges Gouveia, PhD in Computer Science at University of Lancaster and MSc in Computer and Electrotechnical Engineering at University of Porto. Associate Professor at University Fernando Pessoa (PT). Current main research interests are on Information Society, its applications and impact – focus on e-learning and information management issues. He served as editor for the Readings in Information Society (2004), published by the University Fernando Pessoa Press.
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