PetriNect - A Generic Framework for Executable Modeling of Gestural Interactions

Integrating new input devices and their associated interaction tech-
niques into interactive applications has always been challenging and time-
consuming, due to the learning curve and technical complexity involved. Mod-
eling devices, interactions and applications helps reducing the accidental com-
plexity. Visual modeling languages can hide an important part of the technical
aspects involved in the development process, thus allowing a faster and less er-
ror-prone development process. Even with the help of modeling, a gap remains
to be bridged in order to go from models to the actual implementation of the in-
teractive application. In this paper we use ICO, a visual formalism based on
high-level Petri nets, to develop a generic layered framework for specifying ex-
ecutable models of interaction using gestural input devices. By way of the
CASE tool PETSHOP we demonstrate the framework's feasibility to handle the
Kinect and gesture-based interaction techniques. We validate the approach
through two case studies that illustrate how to use executable, reusable and ex-
tensible ICO models to develop gesture-based gaming applications.