GRAHAM Mann hates computers.

That’s why he has made a career out making them easier to handle.

Dr Mann is Murdoch University’s new Senior Lecturer in Information Technology.

“My research is all about making machines more human,” said Dr Mann.

He’s doing that in two ways - making computers physical by building robots, and improving the cognitive abilities of computers.

“One of the main problems with robots is providing them sufficient power to move,” he said.

Dr Mann is searching for ways to overcome this stumbling block by emulating a human’s bipedal movement in a robot. He has built a small two-legged robot, called TarBaby, which he hopes will help us make first tiny steps, then later great strides, toward mobile robots which can function well in environments built for humans.

“Humans are really efficient at walking, being able to travel all day powered by a stomach full of food,” he said.

“Our limbs are very strong, resilient and agile.

“We can’t build anything as light and powerful as that for robots yet. You don’t realise how sophisticated our bodies are until you try to copy them!”

However, Dr Mann’s main research focus at the moment is finding ways to make ordinary computers behave and respond in a more human-like way.

“At the moment computers are getting more powerful, but more complex as well,” he said.

“Nowhere near enough effort has gone into finding out what happens when humans start interacting with computers.”

Dr Mann believes the key to making computers more useful is to examine human social interactions more closely.

“By studying what happens when human beings converse with each other, we can build machines that mirror this more closely,” he said.

Dr Mann has spent 12 years at the University of New South Wales doing exactly this, studying artificial intelligence and cognitive psychology.

“Humans don’t tend to enjoy filling in menus and check lists. What they are really good at is chatting to each other, learning through exchanging ideas.

“To really get the most out of computer technology, it’s much more important than many think to get computers to adapt to humans’ way of doing things, rather than to force humans to adapt to what’s easy for computers.”

Dr Mann said that one major form of humanising computers is with ‘verbots’ - ‘talking head’ style software agents with a face and a voice that can respond to the computer user in a human-like way. One of his first projects at Murdoch is to develop an Internet shopping assistant which can guide you through the maze of sites and options.

“By building a computer assistant who is patient and polite, with whom you can simply talk (or type), the process of web-shopping will become a lot easier and more pleasurable,” he said.

Dr Mann believes that sociable interaction of this kind has widespread uses for toys and games, e-commerce, information systems and computer-controlled appliances.