Workshop Human Interaction for Symbolic Computation

[jmi@columbo.inria.fr (Janet Bertot)]

The following was passed along to me by Norbert Kajler, it includes the
announcement of a Workshop on Human Interaction for Symbolic Computation which
will take place in Amsterdam at RIACA on March 10th and 11th.  So if any 
Centaur users have been doing related work, this may be of interest to you.

            
              THE HUMAN INTERACTION SEMESTER AND WORKSHOP IN RIACA
              ----------------------------------------------------
 
       Research Institute for Applications of Computer Algebra, Amsterdam
 
   Among the three main themes scheduled at RIACA in 1994, one is to be 
 devoted to human interaction, towards interactive books.  This project will 
 take place at RIACA during one full semester, from January to June 1994.
 
   An important aim of the Human Interaction semester is to investigate 
 new paradigms in this area.  Clearly, user interfaces for computer algebra 
 systems have already improved a lot as the most advanced front-ends allow, 
 for instance, mixing text, graphics, and formulas, shrinking paragraphs, 
 browsing the on-line manual using hypertext mechanisms, etc.
 Taking advantage of previous work, we will focus on highlighting new
 research directions to simplify the use of symbolic computation tools.
 Many problems are poorly or not at all addressed by present user interfaces.
 These include the use of alternative input technologies -- such as voice or 
 pen; direct manipulation of subexpressions involving both syntactic and 
 semantic aspects; representation and interactive manipulation of exotic 
 mathematical objects; intelligent session management providing support to 
 users solving non-trivial problems, interaction with theorem provers/checkers 
 such as COQ, LEGO, etc.
 
   Another characteristic of this semester is its close connection with the 
 ACELA project.  ACELA is a long term project of both RIACA and CWI.
 It aims to develop, within the next four years, a software environment to 
 help in writing interactive mathematical books.  In collaboration with the 
 expertise of CAN/RIACA, an interactive book on Lie algebras should be 
 released using this technology.  Such a book will offer full hypertext 
 facilities, such as jumping from subjects to definitions or browsing through 
 an on-line mathematical encyclopedia, or other interactive books.
 Moreover, it will embed some comprehension of the syntactical and semantical
 structure of the formulas, allowing interaction with Computer Algebra systems
 and interactive examples or exercises.  In cooperation with the hypertext 
 facilities, this will enable authors to give help when a reader gets stuck 
 in an exercise by jumping to a related example which could be recomputed
 using the context of the exercise.  Finally, it will be able to produce high 
 quality graphical outputs while the appearance can still be modified to the
 reader preferences.
 
   The research involved will be pursued by a number of researchers in the 
 field of document editing, user interfaces, and computer algebra, who will 
 be invited to participate in the ACELA project and/or Human Interaction 
 semester.  To this end, contacts have already been established with the
 following institutes: ETHZ Zurich, University of Bordeaux I, INRIA Sophia-
 Antipolis, University of Paderborn, and Brown University.
 
   In relation with the special semester, a two days workshop on Human 
 Interaction for Symbolic Computation (HISC) will take place in Amsterdam 
 on March 10-11 1994. 
 
   For all further information or submission to the workshop, please contact 
 the coordinator of the Human Interaction semester:
 
    Norbert Kajler
    CAN/RIACA
    Kruislaan 419, 1098 VA Amsterdam, The Netherlands
    E-mail: kajler@can.nl    Tel.: +31-20-560 84 65    Fax.: +31-20-668 54 86