Human-Centred Web Adaptation and Personalization: From Theory to Practice

358 Pages·2016·8.18 MB·English

by  Panagiotis Germanakos, Marios Belk (auth.)

Human–Computer Interaction Series
Panagiotis Germanakos
Marios Belk
Human-
Centred Web
Adaptation and
Personalization
From Theory to Practice
H uman–Computer Interaction Series
E ditors-in-chief
D esney T an, M icrosoft Research, U SA
J ean V anderdonckt, U niversité catholique de Louvain, B elgium
H CI is a multidisciplinary field focused on human aspects of the development
of computer technology. As computer-based technology becomes increasingly
pervasive – not just in developed countries, but worldwide – the need to take a
human-centred approach in the design and development of this technology
becomes ever more important. For roughly 30 years now, researchers and practitio-
ners in computational and behavioral sciences have worked to identify theory and
practice that infl uences the direction of these technologies, and this diverse work
makes up the fi eld of human-computer interaction. Broadly speaking it includes the
study of what technology might be able to do for people and how people might
interact with the technology. The HCI series publishes books that advance the
science and technology of developing systems which are both effective and
satisfying for people in a wide variety of contexts. Titles focus on theoretical
perspectives (such as formal approaches drawn from a variety of behavioral
sciences), practical approaches (such as the techniques for effectively integrating
user needs in system development), and social issues (such as the determinants of
utility, usability and acceptability).
T itles published within the Human– Computer Interaction Series are included in
Thomson Reuters’ Book Citation Index, The DBLP Computer Science Bibliography and
The HCI Bibliography.
M ore information about this series at h ttp://www.springer.com/series/6033
P anagiotis G ermanakos • M arios B elk
H uman-Centred Web
Adaptation and
Personalization
F rom Theory to Practice
P anagiotis G ermanakos M arios B elk
S uite Engineering UX, D epartment of Computer Science
Products & Innovation U niversity of Cyprus
S AP SE, W alldorf, G ermany N icosia, C yprus
D epartment of Computer Science
U niversity of Cyprus
N icosia, C yprus
I SSN 1571-5035
H uman–Computer Interaction Series
I SBN 978-3-319-28048-6 ISBN 978-3-319-28050-9 (eBook)
D OI 10.1007/978-3-319-28050-9
L ibrary of Congress Control Number: 2016931418
© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2 016
T his work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of
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The registered company is Springer International Publishing AG Switzerland.
F oreword
M any of the roots of today’s personal and collective computing can be traced to
some of the seminal work of the Stanford Research Institute and Xerox’s Palo Alto
Research Lab from the 1960s and 1970s. Since this time, amazing progress, as pre-
dicted by Moore’s law, has relentlessly driven inventions into the hands of billions
of people worldwide. Businesses have been able to leverage technology solutions to
drive dramatic effi ciencies and new capabilities at scale. Beyond technical capabili-
ties, early visionaries like Doug Engelbart and Alan Kay envisioned an even higher
purpose – one in which computing could be a personal and shared medium to aug-
ment human capability and to amplify human creativity. From the beginning, the
early vision of personal computing was human-centred.
I n 1972, Hasso Plattner and the cofounders of SAP brought together a deep
expertise in technology and quickly uncovered some unmet needs of businesses.
With this expertise and understanding, SAP created a real-time data processing
application for fi nancial accounting known as RF and later known as R/1. Many
years later, I would learn from Hasso that one of the keys to SAP’s early success was
a third dimension that the cofounders added to their technology and business under-
standing. This was an approach that the cofounders took to better understand and
defi ne the problem at hand before jumping into the solution. They worked on-site
with potential customers trying to deeply understand work of the end users for
whom they were building their solutions. They observed, asked many questions,
and even helped perform the tasks of their end users. They coded on-site and often
sought feedback about the applications that they were building directly from the end
users who would be using their software. From SAP’s beginning, the early key to
success was human-centred.
Back then; there was no terminology for this methodology. Now, terms such as
human factors, human computer interaction, user experience design, and design
thinking describe the theory, vocabulary, application, and values in the software
industry. In fact, when Hasso Plattner fi rst read about design thinking in 2004, he
quickly saw the potential to bring an SAP which had grown signifi cantly from its
v
vi Foreword
humble beginnings back to its human-centred roots. Today, a growing number of
organizations are trying to learn and scale creativity through the application of
design thinking and human-centred methodologies. This is especially true in the
information technology industry. I have called it the “humanization of IT.” Whether
in academia or in business or from theory to practice, if we commit to continue the
quest of the visionaries that came before us, to augmenting human capabilities
through technology innovations, the keys to success will be human-centred.
C hief Design Offi cer, SAP SE S am Yen, Ph.D.
C onsulting Associate Professor,
Hasso Plattner Institute for Design at Stanford
( a.k.a. the “d.school”)
P alo Alto, 2015
P refa ce
T he rapid evolution of heterogeneous and ubiquitous technologies in recent years,
along with the growing demand for automation of services and content delivery,
generated a number of new communication opportunities, interaction concepts, and
information structures. Nowadays, the role of the computer and the Internet has
been upgraded to an indispensable auxiliary tool for the harmonious and orderly
everyday human action. However, in this era of wireless communication, pervasive
computing, and Internet of Things, there is an increased likelihood that technology
will drive developments into directions with no clear reasoning and strong grounds
at its basis. There is the risk that the pure technological-driven developments will
not contribute to the solution of real problems and concerns that could be proven
benefi cial for the end users. Today, this is already, at some extent, visible through
the “war of apps,” in which various organizations release updates of applications
with the latest technological, visual, or interaction design enhancements driven by
their strategic objectives, such as their strong presence in the market, rather than
systematically investigating and analyzing methods for comprehensively capturing
the real needs and requirements of users that could bring real innovation and quality
to them.
I n this respect, the need for research and development of adapted and personal-
ized multi-contextual interfaces and systems becomes today even more evident.
Researchers and practitioners alike can take advantage of the philosophy, benefi ts,
fl exible models, and techniques of these research areas and create hybrid solutions
that could adequately support the generated specialized use cases to the benefi t of
the unique user. Each user has unique traits, abilities, perceptual preferences, expe-
riences, etc., that directly affect every interaction process. It is therefore of para-
mount importance to increase the quality of the information delivery and navigation
support in order to increase users’ comprehension, usability, and decision-making
during task execution. This could be achieved by defi ning more accurate user-
centred models and by developing intelligent personalization and adaptation algo-
rithms and interfaces that can ensure effective information management,
communication, and presentation.
vii
viii Preface
A t a broader extent, the vast amount of dynamic data produced by systems and
services should not be driven only by pure data and task models, but rather should
be processed in a user-centred manner. In turn, user-centred approaches must not
consider only traditional profi le elements of the user (i.e., age, experience, profes-
sion, tasks, interests, time, location) or technology characteristics (i.e., displays,
connectivity, processing power, interface, and data entry) but also other intrinsic
human factors such as visual, cognitive, and/or emotional values that can constitute
inclusive user models based on which these data can be interpreted to the benefi t of
the unique user. Furthermore, adaptation and personalization should not focus only
at a design level for enhancing users’ interaction and usability, but at the same time
at a level where intelligent techniques will be able to decide for the volume and kind
of information that need to be delivered given the particular multi-contextual objec-
tives and needs of various users (i.e., deciding on the why, what, when, and how).
I t is true that one-to-one Web-based content provision probably is a functionality
of the distant future. However, the existing underlined challenges of comprehension
and orientation diffi culties suggest the direct adoption of guidelines and practices
that will enhance the design and development of interactive hypermedia applica-
tions and systems. This could provide more usable and qualitative content and ser-
vices adjusted not only to the respective execution environments but also to the
heterogeneous needs, requirements, skills, and perceptions of users.
H enceforth, the main objective of this book is to study all the important theoreti-
cal dimensions and technologies that govern the relationship between human and
computer communication, from the adaptation and personalization viewpoint, sug-
gesting methods and techniques that can promote the robust interaction among the
two entities in various application domains.
M ore specifi cally, it focuses on state of the art that covers a large number of top-
ics in the area of adaptation and personalization of the content and navigation, pro-
cessing and communication, and human factors, providing pragmatic references,
analyses, new methodologies, architectures, and evaluation methods that tend to
approach the subject more thoroughly. It further provides latest suggestions and
solutions placing emphasis on step-by-step practical guidelines of developing adap-
tation and personalization algorithms and interfaces of hypermedia applications and
services taking advantage of users’ intrinsic individual characteristics, preferences,
behaviors, and needs.
O ur Standpoint: From Theory to Practice
M any books in the areas of adaptation and personalization, user modeling, HCI, or
user-centred design primarily focus upon the presentation of a good amount of cur-
rent research works in their respective sub-domains of investigation; they deal with
latest technologies and systems for content adaptation, and they report sound tech-
niques, algorithms, practical examples, and evaluation methodologies. They also
propose a diversity of aspects helping someone to generate new ideas in their fi elds
Preface ix
as well as interaction designs which are, however, mostly driven by a technological
viewpoint, subjective beliefs, or qualitative assessments. All these angles are of
great value and importance that defi nitely set the grounds for more optimized prac-
tices toward adaptation and personalization.
Nevertheless, traditionally, the main efforts in academia and business were
focused on how to tackle the well-known gap between research results and practical
designs. Consequently, most of the works, white reports, and/or materials are pre-
senting either solid theoretical backgrounds and models or technological frame-
works and routines, making it diffi cult for someone, most of the time, to fi nd any
tangible connection between the two “ends” in a single unit of reference.
In this respect, our main concern in H uman-Centred Web Adaptation and
Personalization: From Theory to Practice is to present a consistent end-to-end
standpoint toward the interdisciplinary fi elds of adaptation and personalization, dis-
cussing the convergence of the pertinent human-centred theoretical dimensions,
challenges, and constraints, with the models, methods, and technologies that
researchers and practitioners can use as a practical guide for the development of
their systems and applications. We discuss how they can handle the arising com-
plexity, and we suggest guidelines not only at an architectural level but also at a user
interface design level. As a success factor we consider the broader perspective we
have tried to adopt toward the subject matter, avoiding where possible, to emphasize
on stand-alone nonreusable approaches (e.g., present communication interactions
and multi-applicable components that align their functionality depending on the
application area and the distinct contextual elements that might be composed of,
like, e-learning, e-commerce, usable security, intelligent interfaces, etc., but having
always the user in the centre). We elaborate on the adaptation and personalization
process in dynamic environments from the user perspective, employing psychomet-
ric tools and algorithms, and we describe an open framework that has the ability to
adapt the content presentation, navigation, and resources to various contexts based
on human-centred design guidelines and adaptation effects.
This holistic and interdisciplinary approach is expressed through the overarching
fl ow of the book that is intentionally structured from theory and p rinciples to p rac-
tice. These three phases approach the subject rigorously giving the reader an under-
standing of how the fuzzy humanistic nature (user) can coexist with the deterministic
technological presence (system) revealing the links and subsequent interaction pro-
cesses to the benefi t of the former.
F or Academia and Business
This book could also be used as a textbook since it cites numerous scientifi c works
and sources for an additional variety of insights and guidance in each discussion
topic or as a reference (handbook) redirecting to a selection of our most infl uential
publications till today for more comprehensive and focused descriptions. We believe
that its scope is suitable for both the academic and business sectors and aims to