Helping end-user programmers help themselves : the idea garden approach

End-user programmers face many barriers in programming. Research has seen many programming environments that attempted to lower or remove the barriers but despite these efforts, empirical studies continue to report barriers users face. To investigate this issue, we took a theory-informed approach. Using theories from design, creativity, and problem solving as a lens, we examined end-user programmers' programming obstacles to derive design implications. Synthesizing the implications, we proposed an Idea Garden approach for creating problem-solving support in existing end-user programming environments aimed at helping users help themselves. This approach focuses on delivering problem-solving strategies and programming knowledge in the context of users' work to help them overcome barriers. We developed a proof-of-concept prototype of an Idea Garden for the CoScripter environment. Results from empirical studies of the prototype were encouraging: not only was the Idea Garden able to help users overcome barriers, learn relevant programming and strategies, but such learning persisted with users so that they were able to apply it toward problem-solving new tasks without further help from the Idea Garden. We conclude by providing recommendations to researchers who are interested in developing an Idea Garden for their end-user programming environments

Images of Information Systems Development in the Practice of Architecture

This paper explores various architectural images and uses them as analogies with which to explore critically computer-based information systems development. These images include approaches, roles and practices, how they relate to the client, to other professions and trades and the built environment. These images, particularly those relating to participative and adaptive development, will be used to propose parallel emergent forms of computer-based information systems development practices and disciplinary relationships that have the potential to address the inconsistent performance of information systems and a record that includes some notable failures. As well as providing guidance to the IS profession and practice, the paper discusses implications for our teaching and the discipline of information systems in general

How Well Do Service Concepts Apply to Digital Services and Service Digitalization?

This paper explores the extent to which typical service concepts apply to digital service (DS) and service digitalization. It defines service, service systems, digital, digitalization, digital objects, digital agents, digital service, and service digitalization. Application of those definitions to four real world cases explores how well concepts from the service literature describe DS and service digitalization

Economic Fundamentals Of the Knowledge Society

This article provides an introduction to fundamental issues in the development of new knowledge-based economies. After placing their emergence in historical perspective and proposing a theoretical framework that distinguishes knowledge from information, the authors characterize the specific nature of such economies. They go on to deal with some of the major issues concerning the new skills and abilities required for integration into the knowledge-based economy; the new geography that is taking shape (where physical distance ceases to be such an influential constraint); the conditions governing access to both information and knowledge, not least for developing countries; the uneven development of scientific, technological (including organizational) knowledge across different sectors of activity; problems concerning intellectual property rights and the privatization of knowledge; and the issues of trust, memory and the fragmentation of knowledge. This monograph is concerned with the nature of the process of macroeconomic growth that has characterized the U. S. experience, and manifested itself in the changing pace and sources of the continuing rise real output per capita over the course of the past two hundred years. A key observation that emerges from the long-term quantitative economic record is that the proximate sources of increases in real GDP per head in the century between 1889 and 1999 were quite different from those which obtained during the first hundred years of American national experience. Baldly put, the economy's ascent to a position of twentieth century global industrial leadership entailed a transition from growth based upon the interdependent development and extensive exploitation of its natural resources and the substitution of tangible capital for labor, towards a the maintenance of an productivity leadership through rising rates of intangible investment in the formation and exploitation of technological and organizational knowledge.

Novel approaches to promoting end-user programming

End-user programming has become widespread. The increasing size of this population and the prevalence of barriers that they face has sparked the development of approaches that promote end-user programing by helping them overcome barriers and teaching them programming. Despite the fact that these approaches have done well in achieving those goals, there are still limitations. Specifically, these approaches place high expectations on the amount of prior knowledge that they should have and neglect to nurture their problem-solving skills. To fill in these gaps, our collaborators designed the approaches of Idea Garden and debugging-first. The Idea Garden approach attempts to provide problem-solving support by delivering problem-solving strategies and programming knowledge that help end-user programmers help themselves. In the debugging-first approach, which also makes use of the Idea Garden, users debug existing programs before creating their own. In this thesis we study both approaches, finding that they fulfilled their goals in circumventing those limitations. Additionally, our results inform the design of the Idea Garden in a Debugging-first environment, shed lights on enhancing both approaches, and approaches with similar goals

Personal computers and the liberating aspects for human creativity

This narrative inquiry study of selected adults from the UNCG faculty and staff focused on seeking out positive feelings which occur when this group of people use personal computers. A preliminary survey was mailed to identify participants who would be interviewed. The names had been gathered from C-TEP grant recipients, faculty, and staff on campus. Twenty-one adults ranging from 21 to 59 years of age were interviewed. Seven who were from different departments on campus were selected for description, including two females and five males. The interviews were transcribed and analyzed for recurring themes. The major themes which emerged were learning style, rising expectations, playfulness, liberation, and creativity. Each theme with the attained rich data is presented in narrative form