Applying Spatial Computing to Everyday Interactive Designs

In this position paper, we address the applicability of spatial computing in the field of interactive architecture. The process of designing large-scale interactive systems is cumbersome, due in fact to single design cycles (transforming ideas into prototypes) taking a period of time usually measured in months, most of it dedicated to writing the software controlling the system. As most interactive architecture projects pass through several design cycles interleaved with user studies, speeding up the generation of the needed software becomes of crucial importance. The global-to-local programming approach is in fact a perfect tool for this task. Describing complex behaviors with simple rules is rarely seen in the existing installations, the large majority employing a central computer for the control of the system. Building up on our previous experience in this area, we created HiveKit, a proof of concept allowing bridging between the two fields, giving non-specialists easy access to distributed algorithms. HiveKit is a software package which allows designers to specify the desired behavior and automatically generate and deploy the needed code on networks of embedded devices. We introduce several projects where HiveKit is employed and create an argument, based on user studies, favoring the need for large-scale adoption of such tools.