Scalability is an issue in visualization and visual analytics. The dataset sizes we can handle are lagging behind by several levels of magnitude compared to domains such as database, artificial intelligence, and simulation. The standard method for addressing scalability consists of adding more resources: more processors, more GPUs, more memory, and faster networks. Unfortunately, this method will not solve the visualization scalability problem alone. It does not solve the crucial issues of maintaining latency under critical limits to allow exploration and taming human attention during long-lasting computations. Progressive Data Analysis (PDA) emerged about a decade ago to address this scalability problem, showing promising but challenging solutions. I will show a few examples of applications. However, PDA is still lagging behind, mainly because of domain boundaries coming from academic research. I will summarize the roadmap with published with colleagues to progress towards a unified solution, crossing the domain boundaries, to achieve visualization at scale.

Jean-Daniel Fekete is a Senior Research Scientist at Inria, France, head of the Research Lab Aviz at Université Paris-Saclay and Inria. He received his PhD in Computer Science in 1996 from Université Paris-Sud (now Université Paris-Saclay). His main research areas are Visual Analytics, Information Visualization, and Human-Computer Interaction. He published more than 180 articles in international conferences and journals, including the most prestigious in visualization (TVCG, InfoVis, EuroVis, PacificVis) and Human-Computer Interaction (CHI, UIST).

He has been granted the IEEE VGTC Visualization Career Award 2020 and is a member of the IEEE VGTC Visualization Academy, and ACM SIGCHI Academy.He is a member of the Eurographics publication board.

Jean-Daniel Fekete was Associate Editor in Chief of IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics 2019-2023, Chair of the EuroVis Best PhD Award Committee 2017-2021, General Chair of the IEEE VIS Conference in 2014, the first time it was held outside of the USA in Paris, and the President of the French-Speaking HCI Association (AFIHM) 2009-2013.

Decades ago, the natural interaction design paradigm brought a revolutionary shift in how interactions with computers should take place. By promoting intuition, familiarity, and context matching, natural interactions would leverage users' best capabilities to engage in effective dialogue with computers, usually implemented through familiar gestures, expressive voice conversations, or discrete yet meaningful eye gaze input. However, recent contexts of use represented by extended reality, augmenting the human body and, in some cases, creative designs of assistive technology have lead to interactions that cannot be characterized any longer as "natural." In this context, I will talk about "non-natural interaction design," a transformative and creative process that leads to highly usable and effective interactive systems by deliberately deviating from users' expectations and experience of engaging with the physical world. Non-natural interactions are surprising, unexpected, and thought-provoking and, by design, non natural. Yet, they foster usability, accessibility, and efficiency. In this talk, I will present the new paradigm of non-natural interaction design with examples spanning from wearables to buildings to computer-supported worlds.

Radu-Daniel Vatavu is a Professor of Computer Science at the University of Suceava, where he directs the Machine Intelligence and Information Visualization Research Laboratory. His research spans topics from Human-Computer Interaction, Ambient Intelligence, Augmented/Mixed Reality, Accessible Computing, and Interactive Media. In this landscape, he has focused prioritarily on enabling efficient interactions with computer systems, from large displays to personal mobile and wearable devices to mixed reality environments, that exploit natural interaction modalities. He is also interested in making computing more accessible to users of various abilities, and his work has often addressed interaction design for people with visual or motor impairments. His contributions have been recognized with numerous paper awards at CHI, ICMI, and IMX.

We are currently witnessing the rapid evolution of Generative Artificial Intelligence (Gen-AI), marking the beginning of a transformative era. Gen-AI is not only revolutionizing what we can achieve with computing but also redefining how we engage with this new medium. Much like the printing press, which unlocked immense potential as a tool, its true value was fully realized when paired with human creativity. Similarly, the true magic of AI lies in the experiences it will empower when combined with human ingenuity. This talk will explore new research directions in Human-Computer Interaction that enable us to leverage the power of Gen-AI, shaping the experiences we create to empower individuals in the future.

Nathalie Henry Riche is a principal researcher at Microsoft Research, leading the Blended Intelligence research effort. Her mission is to reinvent the way people work with information in this new era of AI. Nathalie envisions a future in which digital experiences enable humans to create, think and communicate at the best of their abilities. Her research spans technical and fundamental contributions to Human-AI Experiences, Digital Inking, Information Visualization and Data Storytelling. 

Due to personal issues, Kori Inkpen will not be able to give her talk

Kori Inkpen is a Senior Principal Research Manager at Microsoft Research, leading the Human-Centered AI Experiences (HCAIX) team. Kori's personal research is focused on leveraging generative AI to transcend place, time and modalities to support innovative collaborative experiences.  Over the years her research has made significant contributions in the areas of Human-AI Collaboration, Computer-Supported Collaboration, and Human-Computer Interaction. Prior to joining Microsoft, she was a professor of Computer Science at Dalhousie University (2001-2007) and Simon Fraser University (1998-2001).