A Support Tool for the Design of User Interface Adaptation

Automatic user interface adaptation is considered as a mechanism for supporting universal access to novel interaction technologies in the Information Society, and acquires increased importance in the context of ambient intelligence. However, little attention has been paid so far to supporting user interface designers in effectively designing adaptations. This paper presents a tool providing process-oriented support for the design of user interfaces that are automatically adapted during runtime to individual user and usage-context attributes. The tool, named Mentor, aims at effectively facilitating the conduct of adaptation design, and editing facilities for: (i) the definition of the adaptation design space in terms of userand contextrelated attributes and related values; (ii) the definition of user and context profiles based on the defined attributes; (iii) task decomposition, including adaptation decomposition into alternative task decompositions or interaction styles where needed; and (iv) properties of interactive artifacts, including adaptation-related properties. Based on the above edited models, the tool is capable of automatically extracting the adaptation logic of the designed interface. Additionally, MENTOR offers automatic verification facilities for the adaptation related information in the edited models. This paper discusses the functionality and user interface of MENTOR, as well as its practical use in a design case in the context of Ambient Intelligence.