To Assist the User: On the Embedding of Adaptive and Agent-Based Mechanisms

In this book, I discuss the embedding of adaptive and agent-based mechanisms in existing software environments with the goal asist the user. The basic interface concept is that of indirect management. The adaptive user interface FLEXCEL (Flekxible EXCEL) is the first effort in implementing this concept in a real application donmain. It shows how to complement adaptability with adaptivity. The features of FLEXCEL -- adaptions tips and usage tips -- are adopted as useful extensions to the spreadsheet program EXCEL. But, from a software technological point of view, FLEXCEL also reveals the frontiers that exist when too many hardware and software constraints make it difflicult to proceed any further. Therefore, the basic ideas of FLEXCEL are extended in the following dimensions: using agent technology to implement the deglegation model, combining user interface with domain-oriented support and complementing implicit usage modeling with explicit components. A global classificaiton scheme for agents helps to identify a software concept for assisting agents. This concept is described along an agent taxonomy built from four basic capabilities of a software agent, namely process, communicator, inference engine, and task performer. The concept ist integrated into a conceptual framework describing how to embed assisting agents and usage profiles in an existing application. A prototype system of the conceptual framework, BASAR (Building Agents Supporting Adaptive Retrieval), is implemented for the domain of distributed information speces taking World-Wide Web (WWW) as the testing substrate. The challenges of the WWW are discussed along the World-Wide Web information lifecycle. For the implementation of BASAR, three types of agents specified and implemented: interface, task, and network agents. To support users in managing their personal information spaces and in dealing with the information overload problem in the WWW, the concept of active views is introduced. It is based on assessments, namely a bookmarks questionnaire. An extension of active views from one user to a group of users is introduced as active group views. The developments of both systems, FLEXCEL ans BASAR, are embedded in a design evaluation redesign process that allows to focus on user-specific needs asking for the usability and the usefulness of the prototypes.