An Integrated Search Interface with 3D Visualization

There are some problems with the current popular search engines, namely filter bubble and the lack of visual representation. The result of a survey that we conducted shows that users were longing for a higher performing search engine with a holistic view of the search results. This work is aimed to elevate the effectiveness of web searching results by incorporating visual and social representation into the results. We have designed and developed a social and integrated search interface that utilizes three-dimensional image renderer to deal with the above issues. Social search results are incorporated with the basic search engine results, while giving users the capability of navigating and visualize through the search results using the three-dimensional image renderer. We tested the system by administering a survey to measure users’ experience and satisfaction. It can be concluded from the result of the survey that in general the users were happy with how the search interface works, including the social media search results and the three-dimensional visualization. The system was able to enhance the users’ experience when searching for some general topics by having a better visualization.