Parallel Processing Interfaces

This thesis deals with the problem of presenting and managing multiple live audiovisual data streams for television viewing. Prior work has dealt with content presentation and navigation in a large information space and typically has not concerned itself with the time critical aspect of the data. This thesis extends and modifies these concepts and applies them to entertainment. A general purpose super computer is programmed to be the digital television prototype. The massive computing capability and the connectivity of the prototype provides the backbone for testing new user interface designs. We took advantage of the computer's internal connectivity to provide multiple perspectives for the most complete and up to date pictorial presentation. User interface experiments are conducted to explore screen layouts for television viewing. We eliminated image motion and used peripheral vision to watch multiple television channels. An array of one full motion main and three relatively static side channels is a reasonable configuration for watching television. Command input using an externally attached proximity sensor has shown promise as means of controlling the television. Thesis Supervisor: Andrew B. Lippman Associate Director, MIT Media Laboratory The work reported herein is supported by the Television of Tomorrow consortium Parallel Processing Interfaces to Television