Room User Interface (RUI) Design for Laser Based Interaction

This work is part of our pursuit of paradigms and technical solutions that will take advantage of the rapid advances in computing power that inexpensive tools for presentation and collaborative work are bringing to the world of education. We have developed an interaction model for the "smart classroom," (more generally, for rooms in which people interact and learn together). Using our prototype environment we report on preliminary user testing of some novel ways to exploit the common laser pointer, a device most lecturers now possess. In our environment, users report increased usability of complex presentation devices and ability to focus more effectively on delivering a lecture or holding a class. Author