VIM : 3 D Co - operative Diagrams as KBS

VIM demonstrates a 3D interactive diagram serving as a radically cooperative user interface to an Underlying Knowledge Base System (UKBS). VIM comprises a Prolog client linked by the In-ternet to a diagram graphics server linked by X/Motif to conventional 2D display hardware. The diagram integrates three concurrent layers of mixed-initiative, direct-manipulation interaction: (i) User-UKBS dialogue controlling beliefs presented in the diagram; (ii) Shared user-UKBS`browsing', controlling selectively emphasised selective viewing of a potentially much larger belief structure; (iii) Novel cooperative force-directed management of diagram layout. VIM's 3D diagrams have a constraining 3D spatial arrangement scheme and a xed principal view. Subjectively this arrangement aids expressiveness, comprehensibility and perceptual toleration of both link crossings and topological change in the 2D display, and inhibits browsing disorientation. We argue that this style of interface ooers fundamental beneets to knowledge engineers and end users.