In recent years, tangible user interfaces, which imply interactions performed with one or several objects, gain more and more interest in research in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). The tangible object represents a subject or an action. It acts on the system, as an action in classical user interfaces (e.g,. GUI). Interaction on a table, which is a common furniture in everyday life and used in multiple activities (desktop, coffee table, kitchen table, etc.), opens a new way for research and development in HCI. In this article, we present definitions, models, and key issues elicited from the literature that enable understanding and reasoning about the couple < interactive tabletop, tangible object> within an interactive system. Then, we propose a framework that allows to characterize applications supported by the couple <interactive tabletop, tangible object> in a domain-independent manner.
Keywords: Tangible interaction,Interactive tabletop,State of the art,Framework,Cadre de référence,état de l'art,table interactive,Interaction tangible,ACM: H.: Information Systems/H.5: INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (e.g., HCI)/H.5.2: User Interfaces,ACM: D.: Software/D.2: SOFTWARE ENGINEERING/D.2.10: Design/D.2.10.0: Methodologies,[INFO.INFO-HC]Computer Science [cs]/Human-Computer Interaction [cs.HC],[INFO.INFO-MO]Computer Science [cs]/Modeling and Simulation,[INFO.INFO-SE]Computer Science [cs]/Software Engineering [cs.SE]