Virtual Reality Techniques for 3D Data-Warehouse Exploration

Abstract : This paper focuses on the evaluation of virtual reality (VR) interaction techniques for exploration of data warehouse (DW). The experimental DW involves hierarchical levels and contains information about customers profiles and related purchase items. A user study has been carried out to compare two navigation and selection techniques. Sixteen volunteers were instructed to explore the DW and look for information using the interaction techniques, involving either a single WiimoteTM (monomanual) or both WiimoteTM and NunchuckTM (bimanual). Results indicated that the bimanual interaction technique is more efficient in terms of speed and error rate. Moreover, most of the participants preferred the bimanual interaction technique and found it more appropriate for the exploration task. We also observed that males were faster and made less errors than females for both interaction techniques.