Randall B. Smith 

Randy Smith is a Senior Staff Engineer at Sun Microsystems Laboratories, where he has been principal investigator in several areas, including projects in visualization technologies and radio frequncy ID tags. He previously worked on the Kansas project, a 2D virtual world for creating mutli-user simulations. Kansas was part of the world's largest study of distributed synchronous small group learning, another research project he lead. He was formerly co-leader of the Self project. Before joining Sun, he worked at Xerox PARC for eight years, where he developed a virtual world programming environment called the Alternate Reality Kit, and, with David Ungar, designed the Self language. His Ph.D. is in theoretical physics from the University of California at San Diego.

His hobbies include playing trumpet and jazz piano. He is the trupet player in the jazz octet Octobop, whose recent CD is available online.

Randy recently represented Sun at the  Santa Fe Institute's Complex Systems Summer School where he worked on a model of migrating computational agents. Here are some photos.

He is proud winner of the Bottle Of TESCO Champagne Award for best essay at the 1997 UNESCO Workshop on Learning Environments!

(415) 336-2620 Randall.Smith @ Sun.com

Publications

James "Bo" Begole, John C. Tang, Randall B. Smith and Nicole Yankelovich, "Work rhythms: Analyzing visualizations of awareness histories of distributed groups," Proceedings of the ACM 2002 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW 2002), November 16-20, 2002, New Orleans, Louisiana.

James "Bo" Begole, Craig A. Struble, Clifford A. Shaffer, and Randall B. Smith, "System Resource Sharing for Synchronous Collaboration," IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking, (9)6, Dec 2001, pp. 833-843.

Smith, R.B., Commentary: Awareness in Video-Mediated Communicatio in Cscl 2: Carrying Forward the Conversation, Timothy Koschman, Ed., Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2001, pp 425-432.

Begole, J.B., Struble, C.A., Shaffer, C.A., and Smith, R.B., "Resource Sharing for Synchronous Collaboration," to appear in IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking.

Smith, R.B., Sipusic, M.J., and Pannoni, R.L, "Experiments Comparing Face-to-Face with Virtual Collaborative Learning," Proceedings of Conference on Computer Support for Collaborative Learning 1999, Stanford University, Palo Alto, December 1999. pp 558-566. [ Html  , PDF  ]

Smith, R.B., and Taivalsaari, A., "Generalized and Stationary Scrolling," Proceedings of the 1999 Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST'99), ACM Press, NY, 1999, pp. 1-9.

Sipusic, M.J., Pannoni, R.L., Smith, R.B., Dutra, J., Gibbons, J.F., and Sutherland, W.R., "Virtual Collaborative Learning: A Comparison between Face-to-Face Tutored Video Instruction (TVI) and Distributed Tutored Video instruction (DTVI)," Sun Laboratories Technical Report SMLI-TR-99-72. [Abstract, Postscript, PDF]

Smith, R.B., and Ungar, D. "Programming as an Experience: The Inspiration for Self," in Prototype-Based Programming: Concepts, Languages and Applications, Noble, J., Taivalsaari, A., Moore, I., (eds), Springer (1999) pp. 77-108. Originally in Proc. ECOOP'95, Aarhus, Denmark, Published as Lecture Notes in Computer Science, No. 952, Olthoff, W., (ed.) Springer, Berlin, (1995)pp 303-330.

Smith, R.B., Hixon, R., and Horan, B., "Supporting Flexible Roles in a Shared Space," in Proceedings of the 1998 Conference on Computer Supported Collaborative Work, ACM Press, NY, 1998, pp 197-206. Also to appear in Collaborative Virtual Environments, Churchill, Snowdon, and Munro eds., Springer -Verlag, London.

Begole, J.B., Struble, C.A., Shaffer, C.A., and Smith, R.B., "System Resource Sharing for Synchronous Collaboration," submitted to IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking.

Green, T.R.G., Borning, A., O'Shea, T., Minoughan, M., and Smith, R.B., "The Stripetalk Papers: Understandability as a Language Design Issue in Object-Oriented Programming Systems" in Prototype-Based Programming: Concepts, Languages and Applications, Noble, J., Taivalsaari, A., Moore, I., (eds), Springer (1999) pp. 47-62.

Begole, J.B., Struble, C.A., Shaffer, C.A., and Smith, R.B.,  "Transparent Sharing of Java Applets: A Replicated Approach," Proceedings of the 1997 Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST'97),ACM Press, NY, 1997, pp. 55-64. [PDF version]

 Smith, R.B., Wolczko, M., and Ungar, D., "From Kansas to Oz: Collaborative Debugging when a Shared World Breaks," in Communications of the ACM, April, 1997. pp 72-78 .

Scanlon, E., O'Shea, T., Smith, R. B., and Li, Y. "Supporting the Distributed Synchronous Learning of Probability: learning from an experiment," In Hall, R., Miyake, N. and Enyedy, N. (eds.) Proceedings of CSCL'97, The Second International Conference on Computer Support for Collaborative Learning Toronto, December 10-14, 1997, pp 224-230.

Smith, R.B., Ungar, D., "A Simple and Unifying Approach to Subjective Objects," Theory and Practice of Object Systems, Vol. 2(3), 161-178 1996. Maloney, J., Smith, R.B., "Directness and Liveness in the Morphic User Interface," Proceedings of the 1995 Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST'95), ACM Press, NY, 1995, pp 21-28.

Smith, R.B., Maloney, J., and Ungar, D., "The Self-4.0 User Interface: Manifesting a System-wide Vision of Concreteness, Uniformity, and Flexibility" OOPSLA `95, Austin Texas.

Smith, R.B., "Self: the video," videotape, Nov. 1995.

Chang, B., Ungar, D., and Smith, R.B., "Getting Close to Objects," in Visual Object-Oriented Programming: Concepts and Environments, Burnett, M.M., Goldberg, A., Lewis, T.G., (eds.) Manning Publications Co., Greenwich, CT, (1995) pp 185-198.

Smith, R.B., Ungar, D., "A Simple and Unifying Approach to Subjective Objects," Self group technical report SDS# 94-0416|09, 1994.

Harrison, W., Osher, H., Smith, R.B., and Ungar, D.,"Subjectivity in Object-Oriented Systems: Workshop Summary" in Addendum to the Proceedings, OOPSLA `94. also published as OOPS Messenger 5(4). pp 131-136.

Smith, R.B., Taivalsaari, A., Lenctzner, W., Smith, W.R., and Ungar, D., "Prototype-Based Languages: Object Lessons from Class Free Programming," proc. OOPSLA `94, pp 102-112. Also also published as OOPS Messenger 5(4). pp 48-53.

Chang, B., Ungar, D., Smith, R.B., Maloney, J.M., "Directly Experiencing Objects: Employing Object-Based Visual Environments for Textual Object-Oriented Languages," Proc. OOPSLA `93 Workshop on Visual Object-Oriented Programming, 1993, pp 13-16.

Scanlon, E., Smith, R.B., O'Shea, T., O'Malley, C. & Taylor, J. "Running in the Rain -- Can a Shared Simulation Help To Decide?" Physics Education, Vol 28, March 1993, pp 107-113.

Smith, R.B., "What You See is What I Think You See," Proc. Conf. Computer Supported Collaborative Learning, published as SIGCUE Outlook, Vol 21(3), ACM Press, New York, 1992, pp 18-23.

Guzdial, M., Reppy, J., Smith, R.B., "Report of the `User/Programmer Distinction' Working Group" in Languages for Developing User Interfaces, Myers, B.A., (ed.) Jones and Bartlett, Boston (1991) pp 367-384.

Smith, R.B., Ungar, D., and Chang, B., "The use-mention perspective on programming for the interface." CHI `90 Workshop on computer languages for programming user interface software, April 1990, New Orleans. Also appears in Languages for Developing User Interfaces, Myers, B.A., (ed.) Jones and Bartlett, Boston (1991) pp 79-90.

Gaver, W.W., Smith, R.B., O'Shea, T., "Effective sounds in complex systems: the ARKola simulation." Proc. CHI `91 conference, pp 85-90. Taylor, J., O'Shea, T., Scanlon, E., O'Malley, C., and Smith, R. "Discourse and Harmony: Preliminary findings in a case-study of multi-media collaborative problem-solving" in Interactive Interfaces and Human Networks, R. Glanville & G. de Zeeuw (eds.) (1993) Amsterdam: Thesis Publishers, ISBN 90-5170-199-3 This paper was the winner of the OOC International Award (1991)

Gaver, W., Smith, R.B., "Auditory icons in large-scale collaborative environments," Human-computer Interaction: Interact `90, D.Diaper et.al, eds, North Holland, Amsterdam, 1990, pp 735-740.

Smith, R.B., O'Shea, T., O'Malley, E., Scanlon, E., and Taylor, J., "Preliminary experiments with a distributed, multimedia problem solving environment," in Proceedings of EC-CSCW `90, Gatwick, England, pp 19-34. Also appears in J. Bowers, S. Benford, eds., Studies in Computer Supported Cooperative Work: theory, practice and design, Elsevier, Amsterdam, (1991) pp 31-48.

Smith, R.B., "Helping Hands: adding guided discovery to the Alternate Reality Kit," in proc. NATO Advanced Research Institute on Guided Discovery Learning, Tuscany, Italy 1989.

Ungar, D., Smith, R.B. "Self: the power of simplicity," Proceedings of the 1987 conference on Object-Oriented Programming Languages and Applications, Orlando, October 1987, pp 247-241.

Smith, R.B., "A Prototype Futuristic Technology for Distance Education," in New Directions in Educational Technology, Scanlon, E., and O'Shea, T., (eds.) Springer, Berlin, (1991) pp 131-138.

Smith, R.B., "Experiences with the Alternate Reality Kit: an example of the tension between literalism and magic," proceedings of the CHI+GI `87 conference on Human Factors in computing Systems (April 5-9, Toronto), New York, ACM. pp 61-67. Selected for reprint in Computer Graphics and Applications, vol. 7 no 9, September 1987, pp 42-50. Also selected for reprint in Visual Programming Environments: Paradigms and Systems, Glinert, E.P., IEEE Computer Society Press, Los Alamitos, CA, (1990) pp 388-396. Also an invited talk at MIMI'88, Sant Feliu, Spain, and appears in Mini and Microcomputers and their Applications, Luque, E. (ed.) International Society for Mini and Microcomputers, Barcelona, (1988) pp 1-8.

Smith, R.B., An Overview of the Alternate Reality Kit (videotape, copies available from Xerox PARC).

Smith, R.B., Scanlon, E., "A rational reconstruction of a bubble chamber simulation using the Alternate Reality Kit," in Computers and Education, Pergamon Press, London, 1988.

Smith, R.B., "The Alternate Reality Kit: an animated environment for creating interactive simulations," Proc. 1986 IEEE comp. soc. workshop on visual languages, Dallas, June 1986, CS-IEEE, Los Alamitos, Calf. pp 99-106. Also reprinted in Computers and Learning, Boyd-Barret, E. Scanlon, (eds.), Addison Wesley Publishers, ltd., London.

Smith, R.B., "Building and using alternate realities for physics education," Third International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Education Pittsburgh, PA. (1987)