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Newman is latest distinguished addition to SI's HCI faculty
(Mar 2008) SI's newest faculty member, Assistant Professor Mark Newman, comes to SI after seven years as a researcher at the legendary Palo Alto Research Center, or PARC, and after earning his doctorate in computer science from UC-Berkeley. Newman joined SI in fall 2007.
His research examines design methods, tools, and frameworks for ubiquitous computing applications.
Helping each other with home computing networks
Newman's current projects include work with Associate Professor Mark Ackerman on how to improve collaborative help-giving in ubiquitous computing environments.
Home media networks serve as one example of such environments. Home networkers who have similar components connected in similar ways should be able to turn to one another with questions when things don't work as expected. Newman's vision is to connect these households automatically so they can help one another troubleshoot.
It's a vision that requires building understanding from the ground up: What services do people need? What information should be collected to help match compatible households? How will this information be collected and shared?
Newman's focus is on the data and information layer that would underlie these services rather than on specific client instances or interfaces. In ubiquitous computing, he says, "you can't get tunnel vision about the devices you're going to use, because they're going to change."
nDash: Public displays at SI
SI boasts several experimental public displays, including the "SI Thank Yous" system dreamed up at the School's Friday afternoon "hacker jams," and the Michiposter system created by research intern Josh Palay (MSI '07).
Newman is collaborating with Palay and with current MSI student Tanuj Shah on another public display project, tentatively titled nDash.
nDash is a system of public displays to promote awareness of SI activities by aggregating many data streams, such as blog posts, research publications, FaceBook pages, Twitter feeds, and more.
Coordinating and displaying this large number of feeds, each with its own sizeable data flow, is a challenge. The sheer volume of information bumps up against limits on two other resources: human attention and screen real estate. In an attempt to make these data streams manageable and meaningful to users, the researchers are studying the tradeoffs people make in allocating their attention.
The researchers also face the challenge of rapidly adapting an information display to the specific interests of the current viewer. Even for a relatively small audience like the SI community, an "averaging" solution won't meet the needs of most users. Newman and his team are now working to categorize users to help individualize displays that meet user needs.
An initial demo of the nDash system is expected in the spring of 2008.
Simulation: Testing systems virtually
Researchers evaluating ubiquitous computing systems or social networks often face the problem of scale. Small-scale versions or demos often can't achieve the "ubiquitous" nature of the intended final system and often don't show the effects that will emerge when usage reaches a critical mass.
Newman and Ackerman tackle this issue through simulation approaches that give them a virtual environment that mimics the large number of users the system will see on rollout.
One of Newman's longer term goals in this area is to give designers simple tools for prototyping and evaluating large-scale systems via such simulation approaches.
Health informatics: Using networks to extend support communities
Newman also works with Assistant Professor Kai Zheng developing an online portal with social networking tools for a chronic kidney disease support community.
The portal grew from a need to scale up a face-to-face mentoring program at the National Kidney Foundation of Michigan. The goal is to extend this program via Web-based approaches initially, with longer term research to examine how this type of social support/behavioral modification work can be effected via mobile and ubiquitous computing devices.
You can find more information on some of Professor Newman's past and current projects on his Web site →.
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Home > About SI > News > Article
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Assistant Professor Mark A. Newman comes to SI with a research career at the legendary PARC, a Ph.D. in computer science from UC-Berkeley, and a passion for making ubiquitous computing, well, ubiquitous.
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