User Interface Services: Wearable User Interface Toolkit
The Wearable User Interface Toolkit (WUI-Toolkit) is the Java implementation of the user interface service of the Open Wearable Computing Framework (OWCF).
The WUI-Toolkit provides the user interface development service to application developers. Based on a model-driven approach, application developers can build an application's user interface with reusable components provided by the toolkit. To generate a user interface for a wearable application, an abstract model of the envisioned/required user interface is needed; such model specifies its general semantics as well as temporal relations between interface components. Due to the abstract model approach, even developers that are unfamiliar with the details of the wearable computing paradigm can generate reasonable interfaces for their applications. The toolkits overall design is particularly tailored to support step-by-step driven procedures as easy as possible.
To provide its service the toolkit abstracts from low level I/O devices by using a separated “core” layer that offers things like driver services, event queuing, etc. in form of a hardware abstraction layer (HAL).
All components of the toolkit are configurable through a set of XML files; configuration of components is achieved through the dependency-injection capabilities of the core OWCF and the Spring framework.
The basic idea of the toolkit is to support the user interface development process of wearable applications by facilitating the design and implementation of the actual user interface needed. Independent of the particular interests of the user group, the toolkit's intended usage is organized in a process chain. The following figure shows the separation of concerns approach taken by the toolkit.
To generate a user interface, the toolkit requires an abstract model specification of the envisioned interface that models its capabilities. For this, application developers do not pay attention to specific interaction devices used or graphical representations of interface components. To generate a user interface that reflects the properties of the abstract model, the model is evaluated at runtime of the applications. Thus, the generation of interfaces is not static but dynamic. Because the evaluation of the abstract model is done at runtime, the system state, including different information sources, such as available I/O capabilities, can be taken into account during that process. Through this, a wide range of possibilities in reconfiguring the system are given that enable the adaptation of the user interfaces to the actual context of use. However, this comes at the price of taking away the full control of the final interface from the application developer and leaving the burden of ensuring flexibility and runtime configuration to the framework developers.
System requirements
The WUI-Toolkit has the following requirements:
- Java JDK 1.4
- Java Bluetooth API (JSR82) (In case Bluetooth devices should be usable for interaction.)
Maturity Level (?)
| Component Name | Responsible Partner | Initial Maturity Level | Current Maturity Level |
| User Interface Services: Wearable User Interface Toolkit | TZI | 0 | 6 |
