764
arewithinthefocusofthedevelopment.Thisincludes
both, the providing of information to nautical
personal as well as new control concepts. The
portable structure of the system allows a
straightforward demonstration and evaluation of
theseconceptsin arealsystem environment,e.g. on
realshipbridgesasthe
systemcanbeconnectedtoa
NaviBox[6]togetnecessaryinformationandrunin
parallel with the real systems. An additional vision
systemsupportsthedesign,development,evaluation,
and demonstration of these interaction concepts
withinavirtualenvironment.
2 RELATEDWORK
In the beginning, maritime simulators have been
mainly
developed to allow mariners training under
realistic circumstances without the potential risk of
harm to a real environment or themselves. Its
developmentevolvedfromrudimentarygraphicsand
text‐based simulation (e.g. port simulator from
Hayuthetal.[8])tocomplex3Dvirtualenvironments
that assist in learning specific tasks (e.g. offloading
maneuvers [16]). A detailed overview of first
maritimetraineesimulatorscanbefoundinthepaper
fromHayuthetal.[8].Thedevelopmenttowards3D
virtual environments was foreseeable since several
papers proposed to use virtual reality for more
immersive simulations already at the end of the
nineties[18],[11].
Butnotonlythevisualpossibilitiesincreasedalso
the purpose of maritime simulatorsextended fastto
cover additional topics like research and
development. Since the motivation of just having a
virtualshipcrashandnotarealshipstaysthesame
forthesetopics.Additionally,asimulationisableto
simulate
aspecificpartofrealityandforthatreasonis
moreadaptivetonewtechniques.
Especiallyfor thedevelopment ofuser interfaces,
different concepts have been proposed based on
maritime simulation. All these concepts focus on
taking the human factor into account for the
developmentprocessofnewinterfaces.Since
accident
investigationshowedthatthehumanerroristhemost
frequentreasonforaccidents[15].Although,thereisa
connectionbetweenthedesignofuserinterfacesand
thecapabilityofnauticalofficerstounderstandtheir
currentsituationandtodecidecorrectly[5].Asafirst
step, research focused on creating simulator
environments to develop new user interfaces.
Therefore, training simulators were adapted and
combined with tools and techniques to set up an
environmentforuserinterfacedevelopment(e.g.the
design simulator for offshore ship bridges from
KristiansenandNordby[10]).With respecttoaspects
of easy access and low price a
simulator is a better
choiceoverarealshipbridge,butcannotcompensate
it(e.g.theimportantfieldwork).Butthegeneralidea
of using a simulator as a valid strategy to conduct
user studies got strengthened by the findings of
HareideandOstnes [7:201].They did acomparative
studybetweena
realshipbridgeandasimulatorfor
navigation training and found no differences in
comparing the eye‐tracking data of both
environments. To use simulators for a redesign to
create more user‐centered solutionsisonlyone goal
ofresearch.Anothergoalisthedevelopmentofmore
unified interfaces that are consistent over different
systems on one or more vessels. Therefore, Nordby
andKomandurpresentedalaboratoryforthedesign
ofadvancedshipbridges[12].
But more than new environments for developing
maritime user interfaces are also new design
principles necessary since the given environment
differsinmanypointsfromothers.
Anapproachfor
radicalconceptdesignispresentedbyWahlströmand
Kaasinen[17].
Forresearchnotonlythesimulatorenvironmentis
relevant also the operator is of high interest. For
example the effect of the spatially distributed space
onashipbridgeoninformationdemandandsupply
[3:2].Inthe
paperfromHontvedtandArnseth,aship
bridge simulator has been used to investigate the
social organization of nautical instructions [9].
Therefore, they looked into training sessions with
nautical students and experienced mariners and
observed their behavior. Such investigations can be
usedtocreateamodelofthecrewmembersbehavior
and simulate it. These virtual nautical officers were
forexample createdinthepaperfromBrüggemannet
al.[1].
TheConceptforourmobileshipbridge wasfirst
introducedbyHahnetal.aspartoftheeMIRTestbed
[4].TheideaoftheeMIRTestbedistosetup
atesting
environment for simulation and physical real‐world
demonstrations.Thefocusisonhowtovalidateand
verify e‐Navigation technologies.Therelatedproject
HAGGIS [13] provides modeling and simulation
tools.Thephysicaltestbed embedded inHAGGISis
called LABSKAUS [14]. It is also mentioned that
testbeds alreadyexistin
the automotive domain but
aremissinginthemaritimedomain.
3 DESIGNOFMOBILEBRIDGE
Inourapproach,wedesigneda mobilebridgetofully
support the development cycle of new software
components. Key to our approach are flexible boxes
calledʺBridgeElementsʺ.
Ourmobilebridgesystem,consistsofthree
equal
segments that can be combined and connected with
eachother.Eachofthesesegmentsisbuildupofone
information and one control element. Whereas the
information element is realized as a multi‐touch
monitor.Thecontrolelementcouldbeeitheramulti‐
touchmonitororasetofbridge
controlelementslike
thrust levers or a steeringʹʹwheelʹʹ. The multi‐touch
control element enables the testing of new concepts
for virtual handles and controls. Every segment can
beoperatedindependently.Thisallowsusingmoreor
less than three segments. The system is highly
configurable, e.g. distance and position
of displays
and components can mimic a broad variety of real
shipbridgeconfigurations.