Pros & Cons of an Industrial Ph.D. Program

From 2013 till 2016 I've done an industrial Ph.D. at Unister GmbH in Leipzig in cooperation with Chemnitz University of Technology. This means that I worked in Unister's R&D department, which at that time developed a novel semantic search engine, and wrote my thesis about the part I contributed to the project. A few days… Continue reading Pros & Cons of an Industrial Ph.D. Program

The Search Interaction Optimization Toolkit – The Essence of my PhD Thesis

My PhD thesis introduces a novel methodology that is named Search Interaction Optimization (SIO) and is used for designing, evaluating and optimizing search engine results pages (so-called SERPs). As a proof-of-concept of this new methodology, I've developed a corresponding SIO toolkit, which comprises a total of seven components1 (most of which have already been introduced in previous… Continue reading The Search Interaction Optimization Toolkit – The Essence of my PhD Thesis

INUIT: The Interface Usability Instrument

As one of the building blocks of my PhD thesis, I have developed a novel instrument for measuring the usability of web interfaces, which is simply called Inuit—the Interface Usability Instrument1. This was necessary because a usability instrument that is suited for the automatic methods for Search Interaction Optimization I have developed in my PhD… Continue reading INUIT: The Interface Usability Instrument

S.O.S. Receives Best Paper Honarable Mention Award at CHI ’15

Our paper "S.O.S.: Does Your Search Engine Results Page (SERP) Need Help?"—co-authors are Dr. Andreas Both (Unister) and Prof. Martin Gaedke (TU Chemnitz)—has been awarded a Best Paper Honarable Mention Award by ACM SIGCHI, the Special Interest Group on Computer–Human Interaction of the Association for Computing Machinery. According to Wikipedia, ACM SIGCHI is "the world's leading organization in… Continue reading S.O.S. Receives Best Paper Honarable Mention Award at CHI ’15

Survey: Search Engines – Perception, Usage & Expectations

In the context of my PhD thesis in Human–Computer Interaction, I currently conduct a survey concerning the use of search engines. With the help of this survey I hope to better understand how you perceive and use search engines and which expectations you have towards them. In particular, I focus on the use of search… Continue reading Survey: Search Engines – Perception, Usage & Expectations

Umfrage: Suchmaschinen – Wahrnehmung, Nutzung & Erwartungen

Für meine Doktorarbeit in Human-Computer Interaction führe ich momentan eine Umfrage zur Nutzung von Suchmaschinen durch. Es geht mir in dieser Umfrage vor allem darum, herauszufinden, wie ihr Suchmaschinen wahrnehmt und welche Erwartungen ihr an sie habt. Besonderer Fokus liegt auch auf der Nutzung mit Smartphones, Tablets und anderen Geräten, wie z. B. einer Nintendo Wii… Continue reading Umfrage: Suchmaschinen – Wahrnehmung, Nutzung & Erwartungen

[offene Masterarbeit] Was that Page Pleasant to Use? Usability-Metriken in einer echten Suchmaschine

Es gibt viel zu viele schlechte Webseiten! Schon mal versucht, auf http://www.finanzen.sachsen.de die Tagessätze für Auslandsreisekosten zu finden? Falls nicht, einfach mal ausprobieren und viel Spaß dabei! Oder schon mal auf der Seite der Uni Würzburg versucht, herauszufinden, wie genau eine Bewerbung für den Bachelor in Wirtschaftswissenschaften abläuft? Nein? Ist auch eigentlich besser so, weil… Continue reading [offene Masterarbeit] Was that Page Pleasant to Use? Usability-Metriken in einer echten Suchmaschine

motherfuckingwebsite.com Redesigned. My Other Poster Presented at #ICWE2014

(Disclaimer: motherfuckingwebsite.com was not made by me!) From my original post about redesigning motherfuckingwebsite.com (see here), I have created a poster along with a corresponding short paper, which have been presented at the 2014 International Conference on Web Engineering (ICWE). The short paper will be included in the conference proceedings published by Springer: Maximilian Speicher… Continue reading motherfuckingwebsite.com Redesigned. My Other Poster Presented at #ICWE2014

How to Infer Usability from User Interactions. My Poster Presented at #ICWE2014

The corresponding publications are: Maximilian Speicher, Andreas Both and Martin Gaedke (2014). “Ensuring Web Interface Quality through Usability-based Split Testing”. In Proc. ICWE. Maximilian Speicher, Andreas Both and Martin Gaedke (2014). “WaPPU: Usability-based A/B Testing”. In Proc. ICWE (Demos). For more information about WaPPU, please see this previous post. Special thanks go to Fred Funke,… Continue reading How to Infer Usability from User Interactions. My Poster Presented at #ICWE2014