Information scraps: how and why information eludes our personal information management tools

In this paper we describe information scraps -- a class of personal information whose content is scribbled on Post-it notes, scrawled on corners of random sheets of paper, buried inside the bodies of e-mail messages sent to ourselves, or typed haphazardly into text files. Information scraps hold our great ideas, sketches, notes, reminders, driving directions, and even our poetry. We define information scraps to be the body of personal information that is held outside of its natural or We have much still to learn about these loose forms of information capture. Why are they so often held outside of our traditional PIM locations and instead on Post-its or in text files? Why must we sometimes go around our traditional PIM applications to hold on to our scraps, such as by e-mailing ourselves? What are information scraps' role in the larger space of personal information management, and what do they uniquely offer that we find so appealing? If these unorganized bits truly indicate the failure of our PIM tools, how might we begin to build better tools? We have pursued these questions by undertaking a study of 27 knowledge workers. In our findings we describe information scraps from several angles: their content, their location, and the factors that lead to their use, which we identify as ease of capture, flexibility of content and organization, and avilability at the time of need. We also consider the personal emotive responses around scrap management. We present a set of design considerations that we have derived from the analysis of our study results. We present our work on an application platform, jourknow, to test some of these design and usability findings

Exploring Memory Cues to Aid Information Retrieval from Personal LifeLog Archives

The expansion of personal information archives and the emerging field of Personal Lifelogs (PLs) are creating new challenges for information retrieval (IR). While studies have demonstrated the difficulties of IR for these massive data collection [1], we should also think about how we can opportunities and benefits from integrating these data sources as a component of “digital memories” , considering their rich connections with the users‟ memory. We observed that most existing approaches to personal archive IR are mostly technology-driven. Although in recent years studies in Personal Information management (PIM) have claimed to make use of the human memory features, and many works have been reported as investigating well-remembered features of computer files (documents, email, photos). Yet, these explorations are usually confined to the attributes or feature that current computer file systems or technology have provided. I believe that there are important and potentially useful data attributes that these studies have ignored. In addition, current personal search interfaces provide searching options based on what is available in the system, e.g. require users to fill in the calendar date, regardless of the fact that people actually don‟t often encode „time‟ in such a way. My PhD project aims to explore what users actually tend to recall in different personal achieve information seeking tasks, how to present searching options to cater for the right type or format of information that users can recall, and how to exploit this information in an IR system for personal lifelog archives. In this paper, I discuss the limits and advantages of some related work, and present my current and proposed study, with an outlook of an interface that I plan to develop to explore my proposals

Knowledge Management for Foundations: Planning Study

Outlines objectives, methodologies, and issues for components of a study on knowledge management among foundations and solutions to challenges: existing practice, a market study, copyright issues, technical standards, taxonomies, and a pilot repository

Organization and Usage of Learning Objects within Personal Computers

Research report of the ProLearn Network of Excellence (IST 507310), Deliverable 7.6To promote the integration of Desktop related Knowledge Management and Technology Enhanced Learning this deliverable aims at increasing the awareness of Desktop research within the Professional Learning community and at familiarizing the e-Learning researchers with the state-of-the-art in the relevant areas of Personal Information Management (PIM), as well as with the currently on-going activities and some of the regular PIM publication venues

JISC Final Report: IncReASe (Increasing Repository Content through Automation and Services)

The IncReASe (Increasing Repository Content through Automation and Services) was an eighteen month project (subsequently extended to twenty months) to enhance White Rose Research Online (WRRO)1. WRRO is a shared repository of research outputs (primarily publications) from the Universities of Leeds, Sheffield and York; it runs on the EPrints open source repository platform. The repository was created in 2004 and had steady growth but, in common with many other similar repositories, had difficulty in achieving a “critical mass” of content and in becoming truly embedded within researchers’ workflows. The main aim of the IncReASe project was to assess ingestion routes into WRRO with a view to lowering barriers to deposit. We reviewed the feasibility of bulk import of pre-existing metadata and/or full-text research outputs, hoping this activity would have a positive knock-on effect on repository growth and embedding. Prior to the project, we had identified researchers’ reluctance to duplicate effort in metadata creation as a significant barrier to WRRO uptake; we investigated how WRRO might share data with internal and external IT systems. This work included a review of how WRRO, as an institutional based repository, might interact with the subject repository of the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). The project addressed four main areas: (i) researcher behaviour: we investigated researcher awareness, motivation and workflow through a survey of archiving activity on the university web sites, a questionnaire and discussions with researchers (ii) bulk import: we imported data from local systems, including York’s submission data for the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise (RAE), and developed an import plug-in for use with the arXiv2 repository (iii) interoperability: we looked at how WRRO might interact with university and departmental publication databases and ESRC’s repository. (iv) metadata: we assessed metadata issues raised by importing publication data from a variety of sources. A number of outputs from the project have been made available from the IncReASe project web site http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/increase/. The project highlighted the low levels of researcher awareness of WRRO - and of broader open access issues, including research funders’ deposit requirements. We designed some new publicity materials to start to address this. Departmental publication databases provided a useful jumping off point for advocacy and liaison; this activity was helpful in promoting awareness of WRRO. Bulk import proved time consuming – both in terms of adjusting EPrints plug-ins to incorporate different datasets and in the staff time required to improve publication metadata. A number of deposit scenarios were developed in the context of our work with ESRC; we concentrated on investigating how a local deposit of a research paper and attendant metadata in WRRO might be used to populate ESRC’s repository. This work improved our understanding of researcher workflows and of the SWORD protocol as a potential (if partial) solution to the single deposit, multiple destination model we wish to develop; we think the prospect of institutional repository / ESRC data sharing is now a step closer. IncReASe experienced some staff recruitment difficulties. It was also necessary to adapt the project to the changing IT landscape at the three partner institutions – in particular, the introduction of a centralised publication management system at the University of Leeds. Although these factors had some impact on deliverables, the aims and objectives of the project were largely achieved

Family memories in the home: contrasting physical and digital mementos

We carried out fieldwork to characterise and compare physical and digital mementos in the home. Physical mementos are highly valued, heterogeneous and support different types of recollection. Contrary to expectations, we found physical mementos are not purely representational, and can involve appropriating common objects and more idiosyncratic forms. In contrast, digital mementos were initially perceived as less valuable, although participants later reconsidered this. Digital mementos were somewhat limited in function and expression, largely involving representational photos and videos, and infrequently accessed. We explain these digital limitations and conclude with design guidelines for digital mementos, including better techniques for accessing and integrating these into everyday life, allowing them to acquire the symbolic associations and lasting value that characterise their physical counterparts

"Stuff goes into the computer and doesn't come out": a cross-tool study of personal information management

This paper reports a study of Personal Information Management (PIM), which advances research in two ways: (1) rather than focusing on one tool, we collected cross-tool data relating to file, email and web bookmark usage for each participant, and (2) we collected longitudinal data for a subset of the participants. We found that individuals employ a rich variety of strategies both within and across PIM tools, and we present new strategy classifications that reflect this behaviour. We discuss synergies and differences between tools that may be useful in guiding the design of tool integration. Our longitudinal data provides insight into how PIM behaviour evolves over time, and suggests how the supporting nature of PIM discourages reflection by users on their strategies. We discuss how the promotion of some reflection by tools and organizations may benefit users

The future of social is personal: the potential of the personal data store

This chapter argues that technical architectures that facilitate the longitudinal, decentralised and individual-centric personal collection and curation of data will be an important, but partial, response to the pressing problem of the autonomy of the data subject, and the asymmetry of power between the subject and large scale service providers/data consumers. Towards framing the scope and role of such Personal Data Stores (PDSes), the legalistic notion of personal data is examined, and it is argued that a more inclusive, intuitive notion expresses more accurately what individuals require in order to preserve their autonomy in a data-driven world of large aggregators. Six challenges towards realising the PDS vision are set out: the requirement to store data for long periods; the difficulties of managing data for individuals; the need to reconsider the regulatory basis for third-party access to data; the need to comply with international data handling standards; the need to integrate privacy-enhancing technologies; and the need to future-proof data gathering against the evolution of social norms. The open experimental PDS platform INDX is introduced and described, as a means of beginning to address at least some of these six challenges

Wicked Problems and Gnarly Results: Reflecting on Design and Evaluation Methods for Idiosyncratic Personal Information Management Tasks

This paper is a case study of an artifact design and evaluation process; it is a reflection on how right thinking about design methods may at times result in sub-optimal results. Our goal has been to assess our decision making process throughout the design and evaluation stages for a software prototype in order to consider where design methodology may need to be tuned to be more sensitive to the domain of practice, in this case software evaluation in personal information management. In particular, we reflect on design methods around (1) scale of prototype, (2) prototyping and design process, (3) study design, and (4) study population