Liquidtext: A Flexible, Multitouch Environment To Support Active Reading

Active reading, involving acts such as highlighting, writing notes, etc., is an important part of knowledge workers' activities. Most computer-based active reading support seeks to replicate the affordances of paper, but paper has limitations, being in many ways inflexible. In this paper we introduce LiquidText, a computer-based active reading system that takes a fundamentally different approach, offering a flexible, fluid document representation built on multitouch input, with a range of interaction techniques designed to facilitate the activities of active reading. We report here on our design for LiquidText, its interactions and gesture vocabulary, and our design process, including formative user evaluations which helped shape the final system.