The physical user interface profile (PUIP): modelling mobile interactions with the real world

Abstract

So far the field of model based user interface development has focused mostly on the usage of one device, such as a Personal Computer, by one person. New interaction techniques emerge in which the user interacts with the surrounding world while using the mobile phone as a mediator for physical interactions and as communication tool to interact with services and other users. Here several devices or physical elements are used for input and output, and more than one user might be involved. These new settings require description models to support the analysis, design and implementation of systems that take such interaction techniques into account. We present the new UML 2.0 Physical User Interface Profile (PUIP) that is based on the UML 2.0 Profile for Context-Sensitive User Interface (CUP, [24]) to support the modelling of this kind of interactions. We show the feasibility of our approach through the modelling of an existing physical mobile interaction and discuss its suitability.