As tools for designing and manufacturing hardware become more accessible, smaller producers can develop and distribute novel hardware. However, there aren't established tools to support end-user hardware troubleshooting or routine maintenance. As a result, technical support for hardware remains ad-hoc and challenging to scale. Inspired by software troubleshooting workflows like StackOverflow, we propose a workflow for asynchronous hardware troubleshooting: SplatOverflow. SplatOverflow creates a novel boundary object, the SplatOverflow scene, that users reference to communicate about hardware. The scene comprises a 3D Gaussian Splat of the user's hardware registered onto the hardware's CAD model. The splat captures the current state of the hardware, and the registered CAD model acts as a referential anchor for troubleshooting instructions. With SplatOverflow, maintainers can directly address issues and author instructions in the user's workspace. The instructions define workflows that can easily be shared between users and recontextualized in new environments. In this paper, we describe the design of SplatOverflow, detail the workflows it enables, and illustrate its utility to different kinds of users. We also validate that non-experts can use SplatOverflow to troubleshoot common problems with a 3D printer in a user study.

翻译：随着硬件设计与制造工具日益普及，小型生产商得以开发并分发新型硬件。然而，目前尚缺乏成熟的工具来支持终端用户的硬件故障排除或日常维护。因此，硬件技术支持仍处于临时性状态且难以规模化发展。受StackOverflow等软件故障排除工作流程的启发，我们提出了一种异步硬件故障排除工作流程：SplatOverflow。SplatOverflow创建了一种新颖的边界对象——SplatOverflow场景，用户可借助该场景进行硬件相关沟通。该场景由用户硬件的三维高斯点云与硬件CAD模型配准而成，其中点云捕捉硬件的当前状态，配准后的CAD模型则作为故障排除指令的参照基准。通过SplatOverflow，维护人员可直接在用户工作空间中定位问题并编写指导说明。这些说明定义了可轻松在用户间共享、并能适应新环境的工作流程。本文阐述了SplatOverflow的设计方案，详述了其支持的工作流程，并通过案例说明了其对各类用户的实用价值。此外，我们通过用户研究验证了非专业人员能够使用SplatOverflow对3D打印机的常见故障进行有效排查。