Mobile computers are increasingly used as a link between the physical and the digital world. This innovation demands a more sophisticated multidisciplinary approach to the modeling of spatial interaction, than have yet been developed. Our aim in this article is to ‘open up the black box’ of Mobile Spatial Interaction (MSI) and discuss some of issues and possible approaches that could be taken.

Ground breaking concepts of how to combine virtual information with the user’s direct surroundings were proposed as early as the 1990’s, for example by Egenhofer [5]. Two early examples included ‘Smart Compasses’, pointing and directing people to places of interest, and ‘GeoWands’, virtual geographic pointers for the selection of surrounding objects and attached services…