Requirements engineering for business workflow systems: a scenario-based approach

Workflow implementations require a deep understanding of business and human cooperation. Several approaches have been proposed to address this need for understanding, but largely in a descriptive way. Attempts to use them in software development have had mixed results. The work reported here proposes that these approaches can be used in a generative way, as part of the requirement engineering process, by (a) extending requirements engineering modelling techniques with underlying cooperation properties, (b) integrating these techniques through the use of a derivation modelling approach, and (c) providing pragmatic heuristics and guidelines that support the real-world requirements engineering practitioner to ensure a high probability of success for the business workflow system to be developed. This thesis develops and evaluates a derivation modelling approach that is based on scenario modelling. It supports clear and structured views of cooperation properties, and allows the derivation of articulation protocols from business workflow models in a scenario-driven manner. This enables requirements engineering to define how the expectations of the cooperative situation are to be fulfilled by the system to be built - a statement of requirements for business workflow systems that reflects the richness of these systems, but also acts as a feasible starting point for development. The work is evaluated through a real-world case study of business workflow management. The main contribution of this work is a demonstration that the above problems in modelling requirements for business workflow systems can be addressed by scenario-based derivation modelling approach. The method transforms models through a series of properties involving cooperation, which can be addressed by using what are effectively extensions of current requirements engineering methods

Designing for Shareable Interfaces in the Wild

Despite excitement about the potential of interactive tabletops to support collaborative work, there have been few empirical demonstrations of their effectiveness (Marshall et al., 2011). In particular, while lab-based studies have explored the effects of individual design features, there has been a dearth of studies evaluating the success of systems in the wild. For this technology to be of value, designers and systems builders require a better understanding of how to develop and evaluate tabletop applications to be deployed in real world settings. This dissertation reports on two systems designed through a process that incorporated ethnography-style observations, iterative design and in the wild evaluation. The first study focused on collaborative learning in a medical setting. To address the fact that visitors to a hospital emergency ward were leaving with an incomplete understanding of their diagnosis and treatment, a system was prototyped in a working Emergency Room (ER) with doctors and patients. The system was found to be helpful but adoption issues hampered its impact. The second study focused on a planning application for visitors to a tourist information centre. Issues and opportunities for a successful, contextually-fitted system were addressed and it was found to be effective in supporting group planning activities by novice users, in particular, facilitating users’ first experiences, providing effective signage and offering assistance to guide the user through the application. This dissertation contributes to understanding of multi-user systems through literature review of tabletop systems, collaborative tasks, design frameworks and evaluation of prototypes. Some support was found for the claim that tabletops are a useful technology for collaboration, and several issues were discussed. Contributions to understanding in this field are delivered through design guidelines, heuristics, frameworks, and recommendations, in addition to the two case studies to help guide future tabletop system creators

Dramatistic User Experience Design: The Usability Testing of an e-Government System in A Non-Western Setting

This dissertation investigates rhetorical situatedness as a factor that culturally designates users’ motives in adopting a new technology. The application of Kenneth Burke’s dramatism extends the discussion about the situation where an interaction takes place to include acting and meaning-making in Non-Western settings as contextual and situated. This expansion is essential to reinforce the understanding of how cultural contexts impact users’ motives, specifically users from Non-Western settings, to adopt a technology. The traditional Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research stresses mechanical and technical aspects between a user (agent) and a technology device (agency) in order to reduce user errors. This approach isolates the rhetorical situation of interaction in a computer interface, thus eliding the cultural situatedness by regarding the situation as something fixed, such as in a laboratory. Adding a cultural context provides a fuller picture of this interaction. Using a civic records online system called e-Lampid, which is administered by Surabaya City Government in Indonesia as a case study, I discover five elements of situatedness that contribute significantly to weave acting and meaning-making into a culturally informed interaction. User motives are shaped by internal and external situations that are collective, local, and both onsite and off. Dramatism is a tool for analysis and production that prioritizes cultural awareness. Dramatistic User Experience (UX) design offers analytical, comprehensive, and systematic perspectives on the design process. Dramatistic UX integrates three different approaches: usability testing, rhetorical awareness of situations, and needs analysis. The synergy of dramatism, user experience, and design thinking provides a holistic approach to construct a rhetorically grounded and culturally contingent user experience design

An Assessment of Contextual Design and Its Applicability to the Design of Educational Technologies

Thesis (PhD) - Indiana University, School of Education, 2008Increased use of computing technology in support of learning necessitates the collaboration of instructional designers with technology designers. Yet the instructional designer portrayed in current instructional design textbooks does not participate in technology design but instead designs instructional strategies and materials that are implemented by others. For instructional systems design as a field to move towards the kinds of collaborative work required for the development of effective, innovative educational technologies, there is a need for methods that can integrate the concerns and activities of both instructional and technology designers. This research critically examines a human-computer interaction design method, contextual design (CD), assessing how practitioners employ and characterize it as a method and explores its potential utility in instructional systems design. CD is briefly described and available evaluative studies are summarized. Next, three studies are presented: a case study of CD usage in the design of a digital music library, a case study of CD integrating with another design approach called PRInCiPleS, and a learning-oriented analysis of CD work models. Based on the findings of the literature review and these three studies, a practitioner survey and interview guide were developed. Results from 106 survey respondents and 16 interviews characterized CD as a guiding framework and a collection of useful techniques. However, because of its resource requirements and other limitations, the method is rarely used in full or exclusively. Respondents reported valuing the ability of CD to uncover and communicate user needs but also suggested CD did not provide a means of resolving conflicts between user needs and organizational objectives. Implications of these results are explored for three constituencies: developer-designers of instructional places or interactive materials, educators of instructional designers who will work with software developers, and educational researchers and their graduate students

Mobiiliasiointipalveluiden käyttäjäkeskeinen suunnittelu Namibiassa: Mobiilin henkilökorttihaun ja tunnistautumisen prototypointi

The average e-government implementation level in Africa remains low. While many African governments have created e-government strategies and informational government websites, much attention has not yet been paid to implementing socially inclusive and accessible services. Especially in Namibia, where a digital divide is prevalent and income inequality rates are high, creating equal opportunities to access government services is important in order to combat the divide. Offering services on mobile platforms, gathering an understanding of citizens' needs, and designing intuitive user interfaces have been suggested as courses of action for Namibia. It seems that Namibian e-government initiatives would benefit from user-centred design. The aim of this thesis is to explore the opportunities of mobile platforms for delivering citizen-centric e-government services to Namibian citizens, and how a combination of design science and user-centred design might support the creation of such \textit{m-government} services. The subject is approached through a practical design challenge: creating prototypes for two mobile services related to identification (a service for online ID applications, and for digital authentication of individuals). According to the results, mobile platforms hold a multitude of opportunities related to making existing government services more efficient and approachable, and related to the young, urban Namibians' proficiency in mobile use and overall positive perceptions of offering identification services on mobile platforms. For rural communities, m-government services could help reduce the amount of travel related to interacting with the government, but internet coverage remains an issue. The results also indicate that using prototypes can facilitate cross-cultural co-creation of knowledge by helping to establish a mutual understanding of concepts between parties.Sähköisten asiointipalveluiden keskimääräinen taso Afrikassa on yhä matalalla. Vaikka valtionjohto monissa Afrikan maissa on luonut strategioita sähköisten asiointipalveluiden kehittämiseksi ja verkkosivuja tiedotusta varten, paljoakaan huomiota ei ole vielä kiinnitetty sosiaalisesti inklusiivisten ja saavutettavien palveluiden kehittämiseen. Varsinkin Namibiassa, jossa digitaalinen kuilu eri ryhmien välillä on syvä ja tuloerot suuria, on tärkeää luoda asiointipalveluiden käytölle yhtäläiset mahdollisuudet erojen pienentämiseksi. Menettelytavoiksi Namibiassa on ehdotettu palveluiden tarjoamista mobiilialustoilla, tiedonkeruuta kansalaisten tarpeista sekä käyttöliittymien suunnittelua intuitiivisiksi. Vaikuttaa siltä, että projektit voisivat hyötyä käyttäjäkeskeisestä suunnittelusta. Tämän diplomityön tavoitteena on tutkia mobiilialustojen mahdollisuuksia kansalaiskeskeisten sähköisten asiointipalveluiden tarjoamiseksi Namibian kansalaisille, sekä tietojärjestelmätutkimuksen ja käyttäjäkeskeisen suunnittelun yhdistelmän mahdollisuuksia tukea tällaisten mobiiliasiointipalveluiden suunnittelua. Aihetta lähestytään käytännön suunnitteluhaasteen kautta: työssä kehitetään kaksi prototyyppiä henkilöllisyyteen liittyvistä palveluista (yksi sähköistä henkilökorttihakua varten, toinen sähköistä tunnistautumista varten). Tulosten mukaan mobiilialustat tarjoavat monenlaisia mahdollisuuksia nykyisten asiointipalveluiden tehostamiseksi ja kehittämiseksi lähestyttävämmiksi. Mobiilialustojen käyttö on lupaavaa myös siinä mielessä, että nuoret, kaupungeissa asuvat namibialaiset ovat kyvykkäitä mobiilikäyttäjiä ja heidän suhtautumisensa henkilöllisyyteen liittyvien palveluiden tarjoamiseen mobiilialustoilla oli yleisesti ottaen positiivista. Maaseudulla asuvien yhteisöjen osalta mobiiliasiointipalvelut voisivat vähentää julkisten palveluiden käyttöön liittyvää matkustusta, mutta internet-yhteyden saatavuus seuduilla on yhä heikkoa. Tulokset viittaavat myös siihen, että prototyyppien käyttö voi fasilitoida kulttuurienvälistä tiedon yhteisluomista helpottamalla yhteisen konseptuaalisen ymmärryksen syntymistä eri osapuolten välille

Use Cases for Design Personas : A Systematic Review and New Frontiers

Personas represent the needs of users in diverse populations and impact design by endearing empathy and improving communication. While personas have been lauded for their benefits, we could locate no prior review of persona use cases in design, prompting the question: how are personas actually used to achieve these benefits? To address this question, we review 95 articles containing persona application across multiple domains, and identify software development, healthcare, and higher education as the top domains that employ personas. We then present a three-stage design hierarchy of persona usage to describe how personas are used in design tasks. Finally, we assess the increasing trend of persona initiatives aimed towards social good rather than solely commercial interests. Our findings establish a roadmap of best practices for how practitioners can innovatively employ personas to increase the value of designs and highlight avenues of using personas for socially impactful purposes.© 2022 Copyright held by the owner/author(s). Publication rights licensed to ACM. ACM ISBN 978-1-4503-9157-3/22/04. https://doi.org/10.1145/3491102.3517589fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

USE OF PERSONAS FOR USER INTERFACE DESIGN: RESULTS OF FIELD AND EXPERIMENTAL STUDIES

Persona is a fictitious user serving as a role model for designers, helping them make difficult decisions from the users\u27 perspective during the interface design process. This concept, which was introduced by Alan Cooper in 1999, has been found to be a powerful tool for engaging the designers with the users. Although personas do not replace the rich data acquired through user testing, they enhance the interface development process by focusing the designers\u27 attention on the target user until the interface qualifies for testing. Recognizing the benefits of persona, many companies, including the Fortune 500 have embraced this concept as a way to enhance their customer experience with computer interfaces. As this new technique originated in the practitioner\u27s world, no experimental validation has been conducted on the impact of implementing this technique in the interface design process. Although Pruitt and Adlin investigated methods for developing personas and using them in the design of interface, publishing their results in March 2006, the benefits of personas have yet to be experimentally validated. To address this need, the current research presents two studies focusing on the use of personas. The first details a case study developing an intranet application intended to be used by various user categories for analyzing data from aviation maintenance processes. The second experimentally validates the effect of persona-based user interface design on the performance of the respective user types. The SUMI data and performance specifications gathered through the field studies indicated that the web applications developed to cater to various user categories from the aircraft maintenance industry were highly satisfactory to the end users. The empirical study conducted to validate use of personas showed that the users performed significantly better when they used persona interfaces than while using non-persona interfaces. The results also indicated that the secondary user categories liked the interfaces which were primarily targeted to the primary user category better than those which did not distinguish between the two user categories

Let’s augment the future together!:Augmented reality troubleshooting support for IT/OT rolling stock failures

The railway industry is moving to a socio-technological system that relies on computer-controlled and human-machine interfaces. Opportunities arise for creating new services and commercial business cases by using technological innovations and traffic management systems. The convergence of Information Technology (IT) with Operational Technology (OT) is critical for cost-effective and reliable railway operations. However, this convergence introduces complexities, leading to more intricate rolling stock system failures. Hence, operators necessitate assistance in their troubleshooting and maintenance strategy to simplify the decision-making and action-taking processes. Augmented Reality (AR) emerges as a pivotal tool for troubleshooting within this context. AR enhances the operator’s ability to visualize, contextualize, and understand complex data by overlaying real-time and virtual information onto physical objects. AR supports the identification of IT/OT rolling stock system failures, offers troubleshooting directions, and streamlines maintenance procedures, ultimately enhancing decision-making and action-taking processes. This thesis investigates how AR can support operators in navigating troubleshooting and maintenance challenges posed by IT/OT rolling stock system failures in the railway industry