Conjoint Control paper at HCI International 2025

Sam Nemeth and and Lars Erik Holmquist will present the paper Conjoint Control: A Practical Approach to Implementing Physical Interfaces in Real-World Settings at HCI International 2025 in Gothenburg, Sweden (open access version here). 

The study concerns how to implement physical interfaces, often called tangible user interfaces (TUI), in real-world settings. Such interfaces are in many ways more difficult to implement and maintain than purely software-based graphical interfaces, and this is one of the reasons that they are almost exclusively present in lab settings, despite having documented advantages compared to screen-based interfaces. To support the development of physical interfaces we created a set of guidelines we call Conjoint Control. The approach stresses the use of communities and off-the-shelf hardware and software, as well as an interplay between the designer and the intended users.

The guidelines were applied in a real-world use case where we created and deployed a physical interface in a real-world office setting. We were given the task by the management of a building to design a system to manage a reception desk from a remote location – a “telepresence receptionist”. By following the process of Conjoint Control, we were able to design, implement and deploy a system that was used by the staff for over a year. 

The pictures above show the components of the system from the visitor and remote receptionist side, and the video below shows it in action at the PROTO Emerging Technologies Centre in Gateshead.