Teaching:TUW - UE InfoVis WS 2006/07 - Gruppe 02 - Aufgabe 1 - AlphaSlider

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Definitions[edit]

The Alphaslider is used to rapidly scan through and select from lists of alphanumeric data. The essential components of an Alphaslider are a slide area, a slider thumb, a text output and an index to the elements that the slider operates over. Whereas a traditional slide area lets users page through the content of a scrolling list, the Alphaslider slide area lets users move directly to a certain part of the slider range by clicking in it.
[Ahlberg, Shneiderman, 1993]


A Compact and Rapid Selector
[Ahlberg, Shneiderman, 1993]


Usage[edit]

Alphaslider

The AlphaSlider interface was originally devised in 1993 and promoted by Ahlberg and Shneiderman. The essential components of the AlphaSlider are the same as that of the drop-down listbox. There is a slider area, a slider thumb (the square in the middle that a user can directly drag on), and left / right arrow. To find the result, just drag the slider thumb left or right, or use the left / right arrows. For a big amount of output or a small slider area, the thumb isn't very exact, so the arrows are good for "fine tuning" the result.

The small size of the Alphaslider allows it to be placed on mobile devices, on a credit card, on a control panel for a VCR, or as a widget in direct manipulation based database interface. [Osada et al., 1993]

Conclusion[edit]

Research and user experience came to following conclusion:

Pros[edit]

The advantages of this AlphaSlider approach are:

  • there are no typing errors
  • performance increases as the number of words per entry increases
  • keyboards are not necessary

[Osada et al., 1993]

  • due the small size of Alphasliders, they can be placed on small displays, like those of mobile devices.
  • quick and easy usage, even for unexperienced users
  • the alphanumerical distribution of the output can be seen with ease, because of the proportional output of pixels representing them on the alphaslider.

Cons[edit]

The disadvantages of the current implementation are that:

  • the number of entries is limited by the number of pixels
  • Alphasliders also does not allow users to input words freely

[Osada et al., 1993]

Future Direction[edit]

Important items to examine are:

  • slider design when the number of entries exceeds the number of horizontal pixels
  • performance when sliders and buttons are made of hardware devices
  • combination of AlphaSliders and other information visualization techniquges

[Osada et al., 1993]

  • With good use of feedback techniques, the Alphaslider is a powerful, compact, and rapid way of selecting items from lists.

[Ahlberg, Shneiderman, 1993]

Related Links[edit]

References[edit]

[Osada et al., 1993] Osada M.,Liao H., Shneiderman B., AlphaSlider: Searching Textual Lists with Sliders, Department of Computer Science, Human-Computer Interaction Laboratory and Institute for Systems Research, University of Maryland, April 1993, http://hcil.cs.umd.edu/trs/93-08/93-08.html
[Ahlberg, Shneiderman, 1993] Ahlberg C.,Shneiderman B., The Alphaslider: A Compact and Rapid Selector, Department of Computer Science, Human-Computer Interaction Laboratory and Institute for Systems Research, University of Maryland, 1993, http://hcil.cs.umd.edu/trs/93-15/93-15.html