Exploring Intent-driven Multimodal Interface for Geographical Information System

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) offers a large amount of functions for performing spatial analysis and geospatial information retrieval. However, off-the-shelf GIS remains difficult to use for occasional GIS experts. The major problem lies in that its interface organizes spatial analysis tools and functions according to spatial data structures and corresponding algorithms, which is conceptually confusing and cognitively complex. Prior work identified the usability problem of conventional GIS interface and developed alternatives based on speech or gesture to narrow the gap between the high-functionality provided by GIS and its usability. This paper outlined my doctoral research goal in understanding human-GIS interaction activity, especially how interaction modalities assist to capture spatial analysis intention and influence collaborative spatial problem solving. We proposed a framework for enabling multimodal human-GIS interaction driven by intention. We also implemented a prototype GeoEASI (Geo-dialogue Environment for Assisted Spatial Inquiry) to demonstrate the effectiveness of our framework. GeoEASI understands commonly known spatial analysis intentions through multimodal techniques and is able to assist users to perform spatial analysis with proper strategies. Further work will evaluate the effectiveness of our framework, improve the reliability and flexibility of the system, extend the GIS interface for supporting multiple users, and integrate the system into GeoDeliberation. We will concentrate on how multimodality technology can be adopted in these circumstances and explore the potentials of it. The study aims to demonstrate the feasibility of building a GIS to be both useful and usable by introducing an intent-driven multimodal interface, forming the key to building a better theory of spatial thinking for GIS.