An interactive surface solution to support collaborative work onboard ships

Abstract

Industrial environments are notoriously known as difficult places to gain access to conduct any type of contextual inquiry work, and marine vessels are no exception. But once this initial hurdle is overcome, these environments reveal interesting research directions. Challenges faced onboard ships range from issues with communication links, to the lack of support for current work practices. Based on findings from an earlier field study, the work presented in this paper focuses on several challenges involving collaboration, communication, information sharing such as video and images, and tracking task completion of crew members. This paper therefore presents a prototype which consists of a Microsoft surface, mobile phones, and PCs to enable crew members onboard ships to effectively communicate and collaborate with their colleagues.

Usage of Interactive Event Timelines in Collaborative Digital Tabletops Involving Automation

“…Significant work has also been done on information visualization, coordination and collaboration styles, and control widgets for collaborative tabletop systems [20,25,43]. As more sophisticated tabletop applications are developed to support complex task domains [1,5,6], application tools that allow maintenance of awareness of dynamic changes will become essential. To date, no such tools have been tested in collaborative tabletop environments, and existing tabletop applications involving dynamic data focus on supporting current, real-time view of the system state in collaborative work [1,4].…”

“…There is a growing interest in using digital tabletops for co-located group activities that involve complex, often dynamically changing data. Given their ability to provide digital functionality for collaborative work while allowing for face-to-face communication, tabletop interfaces have been proposed for many domains, such as crisis and disaster management [6] and commercial maritime operations [5]. In such domains, decision-makers' awareness of the system state is crucial to the decision making quality [11].…”

Supporting Situation Awareness in Collaborative Tabletop Systems with Automation

“…In the collaborative tabletop space, significant work has been done on information visualization, coordination and collaboration styles, and the use of control widgets (e.g., [20,21,27]). As more sophisticated tabletop applications are developed for complex domains [2,6,7], situation awareness for automation becomes increasingly important. Yet, little previous work has studied dynamically changing data with historic events.…”

“…Tabletop interfaces have been proposed for crisis and disaster management [7,29], military simulation [2], and military and commercial maritime operations [6,36]. In these complex domains, decisionmakers need to maintain a high level of awareness of changing system data to respond quickly, with appropriate strategies.…”