Elastic Windows: A Hierarchical Multi-Window World-Wide Web Browser

Abstract

The World-Wide Web (WWW) is becoming an invaluable source for the information needs of many users. However, current browsers are still primitive, in that they do no support many of the navigation needs of users, as indicated by user studies. They do not provide an overview and a sense of location in the information structure being browsed. Also they do not facilitate the organization and filtering of information nor aid users in accessing already visited pages without much cognitive demands. In this paper, a new browsing interface is proposed with multiple hierarchical windows and efficient multiple windows operations. It provides a flexible organization where users can quickly organize, filter, and restructure the information on the screen as they reformulate their goals. Overviews can give the user a sense of location in the browsing history as well as provide fast access to a hierarchy of pages.