Database Reference
In-Depth Information
Coordination:
In group settings, collaborators have to coordinate their actions
with each other. Here, we describe several guidelines for how to support the
coordination of activities in collaborative information visualization applications.
Workspace Organization:
Typical single-user information visualization systems
impose a fixed layout of windows and controls in the workspace. Previous re-
search has shown that, on shared workspaces, collaborators tend to divide their
work areas into personal, group, and storage territories [81]. This finding im-
plies that a group interaction and viewing space is needed for collaborative data
analysis where the group works on a shared representation of the data or in
which they can share tools and representations. Also, the possibility of explor-
ing the data separately from others, in a personal space, is necessary. Flexible
workspace organization can offer the benefit of easy sharing, gathering, and pass-
ing of representations to other collaborators. By sharing data in the workspace,
representations will be viewed by team members with possibly different skill
sets and experiences and, therefore, subjected to different interpretations. Also,
by being able to move and rotate representations in the workspace, an individ-
ual can gain a new view of the data and maybe discover previously overlooked
aspects of the data display.
Collaborative information visualization systems should allow for social in-
teraction around data displays [46]. If visualizations can be easily shared, team
members with different skill sets can share their opinions about data views, sug-
gest different interpretations, or show different venues for discovery. By offering
mechanisms to easily rotate and move objects, comprehension, communication,
and coordination can be further supported [54]. Rotation can support compre-
hension of a visualization by providing alternative perspectives that can ease
reading and task completion, coordination by establishing ownership and cat-
egorizations, and communication by signaling a request for a closer collabora-
tion [53]. By allowing free repositioning, re-orientation we can also make use of
humans' spatial cognition and spatial memory and possibly better support in-
formation selection, extraction, and retrieval tasks [68]. Mechanisms for transfer
and access to information visualization in the workspace should be designed in
a way that they respect common social work protocols [53,81].
Changing Collaboration Styles:
Tang et al. [90] describe how collaborators
tend to frequently switch between different types of loosely and closely coupled
work styles when working over a single, large, spatially-fixed information display
(e. g., maps or network graphs). A study by Park et al. [72] in distributed CAVE
environments discovered that, if the visualization system supports an individual
work style, users preferred to work individually on at least parts of the problem.
For information visualization systems, an individual work style can be supported
by providing access to several copies of one representation. The availability of
unlimited copies of one type of representation of data allows group members
to work in parallel. More closely coupled or joint work on a single view of the
data can be supported by implementing the possibility of concurrent access and
interaction with the parameters of an information visualization. Free arrange-
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