Michel Beaudouin-Lafon

Pour une version francaise de cette page, cliquer ici

Office location : building 650, office 205, phone +33 1 59 15 69 10, e-mail mbl@lisn.fr

Notes:
As of January 1st, 2020, Université Paris-Sud does not exist anymore and is part of the newly created Université Paris-Saclay.
As of January 1st, 2021, LRI has merged with LIMSI to create the new LISN, Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire des Sciences du Numérique.

Biography

Michel Beaudouin-Lafon is Professor of Computer Science, Classe Exceptionnelle, at Université Paris-Saclay, member of the French Academy of Science, senior fellow of Institut Universitaire de France, recipient of the CNRS Silver Medal and an ACM Fellow. He has worked in human-computer interaction for over 40 years and was elected to the ACM SIGCHI Academy in 2006. His research interests include fundamental aspects of interaction, novel interaction techniques, collaborative computing and engineering of interactive systems. He has published over 220 papers and advised over 35 Ph.D. students. His current research is conducted in the Ex-Situ group, a joint lab between Université Paris-Saclay, CNRS and Inria. He is the laureate of an ERC Advanced Grant and an ERC Proof-of-Concept project, head of the infrastructure projects Digiscope (6.7M€) then CONTINUUM (13.6M€), and co-director of the eNSEMBLE project on the future of digital collaboration (38M€). Michel was director of LRI, the laboratory for computer science joint between Université Paris-Sud and CNRS (280 faculty, staff, and Ph.D. students) from 2002 to 2009, head of the Human-Centered Computing lab at LRI (2013-2020), and chair of the Department of Science and Technology of Information and Communication (STIC) of Université Paris-Saclay (2018-2020). He is currently adjunct director of the newly created lab LISN (380 people). He participates in the evaluation of many research institutions and research proposals at the French, European and international levels, such as the European Research Council panels for starting, advanced and synergy grants. He founded and co-directed two international masters in HCI, and was co-director of the doctoral school in computer science. He founded AFIHM, the Francophone association for human-computer interaction, and was its first president. Michel has also been active in ACM and SIGCHI for over 25 years, including as Technical Program Co-chair for CHI 2013 in Paris (3500 participants, 1000 presentations). He sits on the editorial boards of ACM Books and ACM TOCHI, has served on the ACM Council, ACM Europe Council and ACM Publications Board, and on several award and nominating committees of ACM and SIGCHI. He is currently vice-chair of the ACM Technology Policy Council. He received the ACM SIGCHI Lifetime Service Award in 2015.

Short resume (3 pages, PDF), Full resume and list of publications (82 pages, in French, PDF)

List of publications • Google scholar

News

2025

• [May] An interview (in French) by Serge Abiteboul in the Blog Binaire and in The Conversation.
• [April] A video interview (in French) following my election to the Académie des Sciences.
• [January] I am co-PI with Nicolas Thiéry from the GALaC LISN team of the Synergy Chair ATLAS (AI for Teaching and Learning (AI) at Scale) funded by the DataIA cluster.
• [January] Our article Interaction Substrates: Combining Power and Simplicity in Interactive Systems is accepted at CHI 2025.

2024

• [December] I have been elected to the French Académie des Sciences!!
• [November] I participated in a panel on the history of computing, dedicated to human-computer interaction, at CNAM.
• [October[ Martin Tricaud defended his Ph.D. thesis "Designing Interactions, Interacting with Design : Towards Instrumentality and Materiality in Procedural Computer Graphics and Beyond".
• [October] The ANR-FNR CoMixS project (Collaborative design in MIXed-presence interactive Spaces), in collaboration with LIST (Luxembourg) and coordinated by Anastasia Bezerianos from the ILDA team, has been accepted!
• [October] The PRECOG project (PREdiction for shared COGnition in collaboration with human or artificial agents), funded by PEPR eNSEMBLE and coordinated by Ouriel Grynzspan from the AMI LISN team, has been accepted!
• [September] Matthieu Savary started his Ph.D. thesis in design on tripartite interactions between caregivers, patients and researchers, co-advised with Roland Cahen (ENSCI & ENS Paris-Saclay) and Wendy Mackay.
• [July] Together with Wendy Mackay we organized a Master Class on Generative Theories of Interaction at MIT.
• [July] I am now Chair of the ACM Europe Technology Policy Committee.
• [June] Alexandre Battut defended his Ph.D. thesis Interaction substrates and instruments for interaction histories.
• [April] The article CONTINUUM, the French Research Infrastructure for Collaborative Interaction and Visualisation is published in ERCIM News.
• [March] Camille Gobert defended his Ph.D. thesis "Projecting Computer Languages for a Protean Interaction"
• [March] Our article OneTrace: Improving Event Recall and Coordination With Cross-Application Interaction Histories. is published in International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction.
• [January] Our article VideoClipper: Rapid Prototyping with the ''Editing-in-the-Camera'' Method is accepted at CHI 2024 and received an Honorable Mention!

2023

• I gave an invited talk at Aalto University on "Theory-driven HCI".
• I have been named an ACM Fellow "For contributions to human-computer interaction, instrumental interaction and generative theory, and community leadership!
• I have been awarded a Proof-of-Concept ("POC") project by the ERC called OnePub: Single-Source Collaborative Publishing.
• Our paper "Interaction Knowledge: Understanding the `Mechanics' of Digital Tools" has been accepted at the CHI 2023 conference in Hamburg.
• My paper "Beyond Applications: Interaction Substrates and Instruments" was accepted at the French HCI conference IHM 2023 (in French).

2022

• Our project "eNSEMBLE : the future of collaboration" has been accepted with 38M€ funding. This is a 7-year nation-wide project with 80 research groups funded under the PEPR Exploratoire call of the French government. I am one of the four co-directors of the project.

• I am the recipient of a CNRS Silver Medal! See the bio, the video and profile on the CNRS website, and the profile on the University web site (all in French). CNRS awards silver medals annually in each of its major disciplines. This one is for all of computer science.
• Two of our papers at ACM CHI 2022 have received a Best Paper Honorable Mention: Exploring Technical Reasoning in Digital Tool Use et Passages: Interacting with Text Across Documents.
• I gave two talks at Collège de France in the context of Wendy Mackay's annual chair in computer science (in French): Interaction instrumentale et substrats interactifs (in French) and Information Theory meets Human-Computer Interaction (in English).
• I am deputy director of LISN, the main computer science laboratory of Université Paris-Saclay, since March 1st, 2022.
• My interview about the metaverse has been published in CNRS News : « The metaverse at the crossroads of illusions ».
• Our article in ACM Transactions on Applied Perception: « Motor Variability in Complex Gesture Learning » has been published.

2021

• [November 2021] Our article Generative Theories of Interaction is published in ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI).
• I directed and co-authored a high-school textbook on introduction to computer science.
• Our article SonicHoop: Using Interactive Sonification to Support Aerial Hoop Practices received an Honorable Mention award at CHI 2021.
• Our article Interactive Intermediate Representation for LaTeX code manipulation was awarded best paper and best demo honorable mention at the Francophone HCI conference IHM'20'21.
• I took part in a podcast series about Connected brain: fiction or reality ? as part of the Semaine du Cerveau event, on the theme Connected brain: how to reconcile human and machine (in French).
• I was interviewed in the series Vies de labo of Université Paris-Saclay (in French).

• I am the scientific director of the CONTINUUM "Equipment of Excellence" project, which has been selected for funding by the French government. Following up on the Digiscope project, CONTINUUM will create a national network of 30 interactive platforms for collaboration and visualization.
• As of January 1st, 2021, LRI merges with LIMSI and becomes LISN, Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire en Sciences du Numérique.

2020

• Three of my recent Ph.D. students have been hired in prestigious academic positions : Ignacio Avellino as junior CNRS researcher at ISIR (Paris), Germán Leiva as assistant professort with tenure at Univ. Aarhus (Denmark), and Wanyu (Abby) Liu as junior CNRS researcher at IRCAM (Paris). Congratulations!
• I have created this interactive page to better understand the meaning of COVID-19 test results. I also have a page with plots of COVID19 cases and deaths.

Earlier

• I was interviewed by ACM for the People of ACM newsletter.
• Our paper "Textlets: Supporting Constraints and Consistency in Text Documents" received a Honorable Mention award at CHI 2020
• The video of my Sanders Series Invited Lecture "Towards Unified Principles of Interaction" at the Toronto User Experience group (TUX) is available on YouTube. Watch the video
• I gave a "Visions" talk at the ACM UIST conference in New Orleans in October 2019: "A World Without Apps". Watch the video
• Our paper "Touchstone2: An Interactive Environment for Exploring Trade-offs in HCI Experiment Design" received a Best Paper award at CHI 2019
• Our paper "BIGFile: Bayesian Information Gain for Fast File Retrieval" received an Honorable Mention at CHI 2018
• As of June, 2018, I am chair of the Department of Computer Science at the newly created Université Paris-Saclay, with 1200 faculty and permanent researchers
• Our group had 11 accepted papers at the ACM CHI 2017 conference. I am a co-author on 5 of them, including a Best of CHI Paper award
• The video (in French) of my Colloquium at UPMC (Université Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris) on 28 February 2017 is available online. Title : Human-Computer Intefaces - Unifying Principles for Diversifying Interaction

• I have been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant titled ONE: Unified Principles of Interaction. The 5-year project will start in October, 2016 and I am looking for excellent PhD students and post-docs!
• Read my article in CNRS Le Journal (in French): Mieux penser les interfaces informatiques and my article (in French) in Interstices: 50 ans d’Interaction Homme-Machine : retour vers le futur
• I have collaborated with Didier Goupy, photographer, for an installation showing the portraits of 188 French Academy members at the festival Bains Numériques in Enghien-les-Bains, June 1-5, 2016 (inauguration on June 1st).
• I am featured on Ben Shneiderman's web site "Encounters with HCI Pioneers: A Personal Photo Journal"
• The article Webstrates: Shareable Dynamic Media received a best paper award at the UIST 2015 conference (HAL)
• Our TOCHI paper "Mid-air Pointing on Ultra-Walls" (64 pages!) is now online (PDF on HAL).
• I received the ACM SIGCHI Lifetime Service Award at the CHI 15 conference. "The SIGCHI Lifetime Service Award goes to individuals who have contributed to the growth and success of SIGCHI in a variety of capacities".
• I am now an ACM Distinguished Speaker. If you invite me to give a seminar, expenses are covered by ACM (see conditions).
• Best of CHI award at ACM CHI'14 : Best of CHI for Effects of Display Size and Navigation Type on a Classification Task (article, video).
• Technical Program co-chair of the CHI 2013 Conference in Paris, April 27 - May 2, 2013. The conference broke all attendence records, with 3500 participants, 1000 presentations in 16 parallel sessions over 4 days.
• Two articles received an award at the ACM CHI'12 conference: Best of CHI for Using Rhythmic Patterns as an Input Method (article, video) and Honorable Mention pour Evaluating the Benefits of Real-time Feedback in Mobile Augmented Reality with Hand-held Devices (article, video)

• An article and a video in the special issue of IEEE Computer on Interaction Beyond the Keyboard : Multi-surface Interaction in the WILD Room (also available here)
• Senior member of the Institut Universitaire de France. Here is my research project
• The paper Cracking the Cocoa Nut : User Interface Programming at Runtime received a Notable Mention at UIST 2011

• The DIGISCOPE project was accepted to the French government Equipment of Excellence call (budget: 22M€ including 6.7M€ from ANR EQUIPEX)
• I spent two years (2010-2012) as Visiting Professor at Stanford University (HCI Group). I have taught a course with Wendy Mackay on Reinventing Interactive Systems.
• Viewpoint article in CACM on Open Access Publishing: [HTML], [PDF]
• WILD project : the largest high-resolution wall display in the world. (See also the project web site)
• Chair of the new Interaction specialty of the Master in Computer Science at Université Paris-Sud

Activities (current)

• Professor in Computer Science, Université Paris-Saclay;
• Member of ex)situ (formerly In Situ), a joint project between LISN/Université Paris-Saclay-CNRS and Inria;
• Scientific Director of the CONTINUUM Equipex+ project;
• Chair of the ACM Europe Technology Policy Committee;
• Deputy director of LISN (Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire des Sciences du Numérique), the main computer science laboratory of Université Paris-Saclay (400+ members) joint between Université Paris-Saclay, CNRS and Inria.

Activities (recent and less recent)

• Vice-chair of the ACM Technology Policy Council and member of the ACM Europe Technology Policy Committee;
• Head of HCC (Human-Centered Computing) group at LRI ;
  
• Scientific Director of the DIGISCOPE project;
• Founder and former head of EIT Digital Masters in Human-Computer Interaction and Design at Univ. Paris-Sud;
• Chair of the Information Science and Technology department at Université Paris-Saclay ;
• Vice-president for research of the Computer Science department at Université Paris-Sud ;
• Founder and former head of Interaction Specialty of the Masters in Computer Science at Univ. Paris-Sud.
• Former director of LRI, the Laboratory of Computer Science at Université Paris-Sud and CNRS (2001-2009)
  (Here is the ergonomic chair that was offered to me by the lab members when I finished my second term.)

• Visiting Professor, HCI Group, Computer Science Department, Stanford University, September 2010 - August 2012;
• Guest Professor, Computer Science Department, University of Aarhus (Denmark) September 1998 - August 2000;
• Former Vice-Chair for teaching, Department of Computer Science, Université Paris-Sud;

• Technical Program Co-Chair for CHI 2013, ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems;
• Program Chair for UIST 2008, ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology;
• Conference co-chair for ECSCW 2005, European Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work;
• Conference chair for UIST 2002, ACM Symposium on User Interfaces Software and Technology;
• Papers co-chair for CHI 2001, ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems;

• Member of the ACM Europe Council ;
• Former member of the ACM Europe Council, former member-at-large of the ACM Council and former member of the ACM Publications Board.
• Founder and first President of AFIHM, Association Francophone d'Interaction Homme-Machine (French HCI Association);
• Former member of the executive committee of ASTI, Association des Sciences et Technologies de l'Information;

Teaching

• "Fundamentals of Human-Computer Interaction", Master level, Université Paris-Saclay;
• "Fundamentals of Situated Interaction", Master level, Université Paris-Saclay (with Wendy Mackay);
• "Groupware and Collaborative Interaction", Master level, Université Paris-Saclay (with Cédric Fleury);
• CS477 "Reinventing interactive systems", taught at Stanford with Wendy Mackay in 2010.

• Older courses (in French):
  • Human-Computer Interaction (various levels);
  • Advanced Computer Graphics, Master (4th year level);
  • Imperative programming, DEUG MIAS (2nd year level);
  • Introduction to Computer Graphics, Licence (3rd year level);

• 
  Author of "Les Langages à Objets : principe de base, techniques de programmation" (Armand Colin, 1992)
  • English version published by Chapman & Hall.
  • French version available on-line!

Research

• Publications
  • Google scholar
  • The article "Designing Interaction, not Interfaces" presented as opening keynote at AVI 2004 (Advanced Visual Interfaces), was ranked 6th in the December 2004 Top 10 Downloads of the ACM Digital Library!

• Novel interaction techniques, including the use of sound, gesture and two-handed input
  • Multisurface interaction and the WILD project (see my Google Talk from May 2011);
  • Instrumental interaction, and the CPN2000 project;
  • DIVA, a system for visualizing and computing with multimedia streams;
  • The ENO audio server (see also the ongoing work by Stéphane Conversy).

• 
  Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW), including shared editors and mediaspaces
• Editor of a book on Computer Supported Co-operative Work, Trends in Software Series, Wiley.
• Full-text is available on-line!

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