Orit Shaer

oshaer (at) wellesley.edu
SCI E108
Wellesley College
Wellesley, MA

Orit Shaer is the Clare Boothe Luce Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Wellesley College. Her research in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), focuses on developing interaction techniques and software tools for next generation user interfaces. Orit received her PhD and MSc in Computer Science from Tufts University, where she worked with Professor Robert Jacob. She has been a visiting researcher in the Design Machine Group at the University of Washington and in the University College London Interaction Center. Previously, she served as a system engineer at Orbotech Ltd, where she led an interdisciplinary development team.

Orit is a member of ACM, IEEE Computer Society and ACM SIGCHI. She serves as a Program Co-Chair of TEI 2010, the international conference on Tangible and Embedded Interaction. She is a guest editor of a special issue of TOCHI on User Interface Description Languages for Next Generation User Interfaces. She was also a co-organizer of the CHI 2008 workshop on User Interface Description Language for Next Generation User Interfaces.

Full CV

July 2009, Our paper on a Specification Paradigm for the Design and Implementation of Tangible User Interfaces was accepted for publication in the ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI).

March 2009, Honda R&D sponsors a User Interface Design Competetion for Wellesley Students enrolled in CS249: Human-Computer Interaction.

January 2009, I serve as a Program Co-Chair for TEI 2010,the international conference on Tangible and Embedded Interaction.

August 2008, I am co-editting an ACM TOCHI special issue on User Interface Description Languages for Next Generation User Interfaces, with Rob Jacob, Mark Green, and Kris Luyten. Submissions are due November 7th 2008.

July 2008, Our paper on Teaching Tangible Interaction in Practice will appear in AIEDAM Special Issue on Tangible Interaction for Design , Spring 2009.

CS220: Human-Computer Interaction (HCI)(Spring 2010)

CS349: Tangible User Interfaces (Fall 2009)

CS 111: Computer Programming and Problem Solving (Fall 2009, Spring 2010)

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Emerging interaction styles such as tangible computing, gesture-based interfaces and virtual reality, extend beyond the desktop paradigm and offer a more natural, intuitive and accessible form of interaction. With a broad range of application-domains, including scientific visualization, energy management and education, these interfaces show a potential to significantly enhance the way people interact and leverage digital information.

Through my research I seek to contribute to these next generation interfaces by developing frameworks, software tools and specification techniques that aid their design, implementation and evaluation. In addition I am exploring the benefits of next generation interfaces by building interactive systems that utilize emerging interaction styles.

Check out the Wellesley College HCI Lab to learn about my current research projects.

A Specification Paradigm for the Design and Implementation of Tangible User Interfaes

Shaer, O. Jacob, R.J.K., ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, Vol. 16, No. 4, November 2009.

Tangible User Interface Laboratory: Teaching Tangible Interaction Design in Practice

Shaer, O., Horn, M.S., Jacob, R.J.K., AIEDAM Special Issue on Tangible Interaction for Design , Spring 2009, Vol. 23, No. 2.

Reality Based Interaction: A Framework for Post-WIMP Interfaces

Jacob, R.J.K., Girouard, A., Hirshfield, L.M., Horn, M.S. Shaer, O., Solovey, E.T., and Zigelbaum J., ACM CHI 2008.

The Tangible Video Editor: Collaborative Video Editting with Active Tokens

Zigelbaum, J., Horn, M.S., Shaer, O., Jacob, R.J.K., TEI 2007.

Marble Track Audio Manipulator: A Tangible User Interface for Music Composition

Bean, A., Siddiqi, S., ChowdhuryA., Whited, B., Shaer, O., and Jacob, R.J.K, TEI 2008.

Full Publication List

Last updated on November 9, 2009.