Kimura: Providing Support for Software Engineering Tasks

The goal of this mini-project was to explore the literature on computer-assisted whiteboards as Augmented Reality (AR) devices and to investigate the possible use of Kimura to assist in Software Engineering tasks. Kimura is “an augmented office environment to support common multitasking practices. Previous systems, such as Rooms, limit users by constraining the interaction to the desktop monitor. Kimura leverages interactive projected peripheral displays to support the perusal, manipulation and awareness of background activities. Furthermore, each activity is represented by a montage comprised of images from current and past interaction on the desktop. These montages help remind the user of past actions, and serve as a springboard for ambient context-aware reminders and notifications [13]. Due to logistical complications, I was unable to install a working copy of Kimura with which to experiment. Thus the work on the bibliography became the major task. The annotated bibliography is included as the References section of this paper. The exploration of Kimura for Software Engineering is limited to presenting and discussing possible scenarios.