The use of design activity for research into Computer Supported Co-operative Working (CSCW)

This paper describes current research at Loughborough University in the field of Computer Supported Co-operative Working (CSCW). The project, which is funded by the Information Engineering Directorate (IED) within the Science and Engineering Research Council (SERC), is titled 'Establishing the Communicational Requirements of Information Technology (IT) Systems that Support Humans Co-operating Remotely'. The research group have adopted a less cumbersome acronym for the project - ROCOCO which is derived from REmote COoperation and COmmunication. Design activity has been proposed as offering a suitable context for a study of co-operation and at the time of writing the first phase of the experiments - involving face to face or proximal co-operation - has been undertaken and the analysis begun. The ROCOCO project is about to embark on phase two involving remote co-operation. This paper presents, in some detail, the construction and operation of a pilot study that allowed project members to assess and adjust the experimental design prior to the start of Phase One. A selection of initial findings illustrate the nature of the investigation to be undertaken. The paper also seeks to highlight the importance of CSCW research for the design community. The substance of the paper is concerned with a presentation of issues involved in an analysis of co-operation, involving as it does, verbal and non-verbal communication

A Conceptual Model for User-system Collaboration: Enhancing Usability of Complex Information Systems

A variety of organizations around the world use complex information systems (e.g., enterprise resource planning and supply chain management systems). However, poor usability caused by system complexity continues to frustrate users and damage the reputation of these systems. In this study, we address usability issues with complex information systems from the human-computer collaboration perspective by modeling user-system interaction as a joint activity between the system and its users. We propose a conceptual model for user-system collaboration, elaborate on the components in the model and the relationships between the components, derive the required capabilities for collaborative information systems, and establish conceptual relationships between system collaborative behaviors and usability. We use empirical evidence gathered from a qualitative field study on ERP systems to illustrate the model and the possible impact of system collaborativeness (i.e., the presence or absence of collaborative capabilities) on usability. We do so to provide a strong conceptual foundation for modeling user-system collaboration and to encourage designers to employ the collaboration metaphor during system design and, thus, help them develop future complex information systems with better usability

The use of evaluation in the design and development of interactive medical record systems

An explorative study was done to develop an evaluation methodology. This method can be applied during the development of interactive medical record systems in order to provide information which can be used to improve user interaction with the system. Th e evaluation methodology consists of a number of interactive sessions with potential users of the interactive medical record system. During the first two sessions the subjects are trained to use the system. During the third and last session the subjects are videotaped while they are doing a set of benchmark tasks on the system under evaluation. The video recordings are analysed to obtain performance data. This performance data consists of task timings and a list of problems experienced (errors made) by the subjects. The systems evaluated during the study were a problem-oriented manual medical record and an interactive computerized medical record. The computerized record system was specifically developed for this study. The design and subsequent improvements to this system are documented in the study

Construction of a support tool for the design of the activity structures based computer system architectures

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and was awarded by Brunel University.This thesis is a reapproachment of diverse design concepts, brought to bear upon the computer system engineering problem of identification and control of highly constrained multiprocessing (HCM) computer machines. It contributes to the area of meta/general systems methodology, and brings a new insight into the design formalisms, and results afforded by bringing together various design concepts that can be used for the construction of highly constrained computer system architectures. A unique point of view is taken by assuming the process of identification and control of HCM computer systems to be the process generated by the Activity Structures Methodology (ASM). The research in ASM has emerged from the Neuroscience research, aiming at providing the techniques for combining the diverse knowledge sources that capture the 'deep knowledge' of this application field in an effective formal and computer representable form. To apply the ASM design guidelines in the realm of the distributed computer system design, we provide new design definitions for the identification and control of such machines in terms of realisations. These realisation definitions characterise the various classes of the identification and control problem. The classes covered consist of: 1. the identification of the designer activities, 2. the identification and control of the machine's distributed structures of behaviour, 3. the identification and control of the conversational environment activities (i.e. the randomised/ adaptive activities and interactions of both the user and the machine environments), 4. the identification and control of the substrata needed for the realisation of the machine, and 5. the identification of the admissible design data, both user-oriented and machineoriented, that can force the conversational environment to act in a self-regulating manner. All extent results are considered in this context, allowing the development of both necessary conditions for machine identification in terms of their distributed behaviours as well as the substrata structures of the unknown machine and sufficient conditions in terms of experiments on the unknown machine to achieve the self-regulation behaviour. We provide a detailed description of the design and implementation of the support software tool which can be used for aiding the process of constructing effective, HCM computer systems, based on various classes of identification and control. The design data of a highly constrained system, the NUKE, are used to verify the tool logic as well as the various identification and control procedures. Possible extensions as well as future work implied by the results are considered.Government of Ira

Innovations for Requirements Analysis, From Stakeholders' Needs to Formal Designs

14th MontereyWorkshop 2007 Monterey, CA, USA, September 10-13, 2007 Revised Selected PapersWe are pleased to present the proceedings of the 14thMontereyWorkshop, which took place September 10–13, 2007 in Monterey, CA, USA. In this preface, we give the reader an overview of what took place at the workshop and introduce the contributions in this Lecture Notes in Computer Science volume. A complete introduction to the theme of the workshop, as well as to the history of the Monterey Workshop series, can be found in Luqi and Kordon’s “Advances in Requirements Engineering: Bridging the Gap between Stakeholders’ Needs and Formal Designs” in this volume. This paper also contains the case study that many participants used as a problem to frame their analyses, and a summary of the workshop’s results