Modeling of Synaesthesia Metaphor and Its Application to User Interface for Distributed Systems

本研究的目的是构建一个提供联觉隐喻的用户界面（一种具有情感表达的隐喻，能够吸引人类的多模型感性）。我们研究了以下三点；(1)构建分布式系统联觉UI隐喻的基本模型；(2)基于该模型进行系统开发；(3)对系统进行评价。以下两点变得可行。用户界面的实现，构建用户心理模型在1997财政年度，我们建立了联觉用户界面隐喻模型，并在此模型的基础上设计并实现了用户界面描述语言。为了处理联觉隐喻，我们扩展了传统的UI隐喻模型。为此，我们通过考虑必要的联觉，将感觉归因引入隐喻映射，并在UI中对其进行表征。在计算机网络系统上设计了描述语言并实现了执行环境。1998财年，我们考察了联觉用户界面隐喻的构成方法，设计了联觉用户界面原型。针对网络环境下提供虚拟活动空间的多智能体系统，从改进人-智能体通信协议的角度，获得了联觉UI隐喻的构建方法。通过对联觉用户界面架构的研究，运用联觉用户界面隐喻的构建方法，设计了联觉用户界面原型。在1999财年，我们实现并评估了联觉UI原型。我们将多智能体系统定位为支持网络环境下的办公活动，以新手用户为中心。我们展示了联觉隐喻的有效性。

The purpose of this research is to construct an UI that offers the synaesthesia metaphor (a metaphor with the feeling expression that appeals to human's multi-model sensuousness). We study the following three points ;(1) Construction of the basic model of synaesthesia UI metaphor for distributed systems, (2) System development based on the model, and, (3) Evaluation of the system.The following two points become feasible.1. Realization of UI to construct the user's mental model2. Assistance of the handicapped person and the novice users by utilizing multi modalityIn 1997 fiscal year, we modeled synaesthesia UI metaphor and, designed and implemented the UI description language based on this model. We extended our conventional model of UI metaphor in order to deal with synaesthesia metaphor. To do this, we introduced sense attributions to metaphor mapping by considering the necessary synaesthesia and characterized them in UI. We designed description language and implemented the execution environment on the computer network system.In 1998 fiscal year, we examined the constitution method of synaesthesia UI metaphor and designed the prototype of synaesthesia UI. We obtained the construction method of synaesthesia UI metaphor from the improvement point of view of human-agent communication protocol to target the multi-agent system which provides virtual activity space on networked environment. We designed the synaesthesia UI prototype by examining architecture of synaesthesia UI and applying the construction method of synaesthesia UI metaphor.In 1999 fiscal year, we implemented and evaluated the synaesthesia UI prototype. We targeted the multi-agent system to support the office activities on network environment by focusing the novice users. We showed the efficiency of synaesthesia metaphor.