Creating highly-interactive and graphical user interfaces by demonstration

Abstract

It is very time-consuming and expensive to create the graphical, highly-interactive styles of user interfaces that are increasingly common. User Interface Management Systems (UIMSs) attempt to make the creation of user interfaces easier, but most existing UIMSs cannot create the low-level interaction techniques (pop-up pull-down and fixed menus, on-screen "light buttons", scroll-bars, elaborate feedback mechanisms and animations, etc.) that are frequently used. This paper describes Peridot, a system that automatically creates the code for these user interfaces while the designer demonstrates to the system how the interface should look and work. Peridot uses rule-based inferencing so no programming by the designer is required, and Direct Manipulation techniques are used to create Direct Manipulation interfaces, which can make full use of a mouse and other input devices. This allows extremely rapid prototyping of user interfaces.