Design Exploration of Augmented Paper Maps

Paper maps and mobile electronic devices have complementary strengths and shortcomings in outdoor use. In many scenarios like small craft sailing or cross-country trekking a complete replacements of maps is neither useful nor desirable. Paper maps are failsafe, relatively cheap, offer superior resolution and provide large scale overview. In uses like open-water sailing it is therefore mandatory to carry adequate maps/charts. GPS based mobile devices, on the other hand, offer useful features like automatic positioning and plotting, real-time information update and dynamic adaptation to user requirements. While paper maps are now commonly used in combination with mobile GPS devices there is no meaningful integration between the two and the combined use leads to a number of interaction problems and potential safety issues. In this paper we explore the design space of augmented paper maps in which maps are augmented with additional functionality through a mobile device to achieve a meaningful integration between device and map that combines their respective strengths. 1. MOTIVATION AND BACKGROUND Advances in mobile computing, wireless communication and satellite positioning technology have driven the development and proliferation of mobile mapping and navigation applications for a variety of mobile devices ranging from smart phones and PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) to specialized devices like hand-held and wrist-worn GPS receivers. As mobile devices with computing capabilities these have many attractive properties. In contrast to conventional maps they can support explicit (spatial) queries and routing, dynamically provide detail-on-demand, support animation and interaction with the content and allow for easy update of time critical information. However, the development of usable geo-spatial applications for mobile devices is complicated by several factors, including technical ones like the available displays and interaction modalities and conceptual ones, like the lack of guidelines and tools for the creation of adequate user interfaces and visualizations. Many researchers have therefore addressed the development of usable map-based systems for these devices that take the specific constraints into account, often in the context of Location-Based-Services (LBS) and tourism applications (e.g. Paelke et al., 2005). Approaches range from the improvement of the maps used (e.g. Malaka&Zipf, 2000) over the dynamic adaptation of content and presentation to the context of use (e.g. Reichenbacher, 2001) to specific design approaches like task-oriented design (Aoki&Woodruff , 2000). If an electronic devices should replace a map in a practical context of use it is usually not sufficient if the primary task of navigation is well supported, but users also require support in a variety of secondary tasks, as Brown and Chalmers (2003) established for tourism applications. Despite advances in smallscreen cartography the limitations due to size and display technology will remain for the foreseeable future. Interactivity can be a key benefit but a large percentage of user actions is typically concerned with control interaction (e.g. pan and zoom) to address the limitations of the devices used. Reliability and power consumption are usually not critical in inner-city tourism applications, but can be essential in other contexts of use, e.g. sailing or cross-country hiking. In the Augment Paper Map (APM) project the goal is therefore to design a system that exploits the benefits of electronic devices by augmenting paper maps through meaningful integration of additional information and functionality rather than replacing them. The APM should offer fail-safe behaviour for applications where maps are safety critical with graceful degradation so that users can still rely on conventional paper map functionality in the worst-case of complete system failure. In the subsequent sections we first discuss the relative benefits of paper and electronic maps in a mobile use context and review existing work related to augmented paper maps. For the design of the APM we follow a user and task driven approach that is introduced in the following sections presenting the process, techniques and identified requirements. An evaluation of technologies that could potentially be used for practical implementations of APM design follows. The paper ends with a discussion of the current findings and an outlook on future work. 2. PAPER AND ELECTRONIC MEDIA A comparison of paper maps and maps on electronic hand-held mobile devices in an outdoor use context with regards to general features, content presentation as well as use and interaction properties (summarized in table 1) indicates that they have complementary strengths and weaknesses. Paper maps are cheap and very usable for many tasks, but lack the dynamic and interactive properties of electronic maps. Maps on held-held devices, on the other hand, have high potential for the presentation of up-to-date dynamic content, adapted specifically to the user, his current position and the task at hand, but often have critical shortcomings in resolution, ease of control and reliability. A meaningful integration of paper maps and electronic devices that combines the respective benefits seem therefore highly attractive.