Exploring awareness related messaging through two situated-display-based systems.

This article focuses on our exploration of awareness issues through the design and long-term deployment of two systems: the Hermes office door display system (which enabled staff in a university department to post awareness messages to their door displays) and SPAM (a messaging system for supporting coordination between staff at two associated residential community care facilities). In the case of both systems, a significant number of the messages sent could be classified as relating to awareness. Furthermore, with both systems, the situatedness of displays (outside office doors in the case of Hermes and in staff offices in the case of SPAM) had a significant impact on the design and subsequent use of the deployed systems. In particular, the placement of displays provided significant context for awareness messages, including, for example, the identity of the sender of the message and the intended audience of the message. Both systems highlight the need for interaction methods that fit in with both normal working practices (and unplanned events) and that enable the user to manage communication channels. The need for appropriate levels of expressiveness and user control is also apparent: We present numerous examples of users controlling the precision of awareness information and sending awareness messages that have as much to do with playfulness as supporting coordination through activity awareness

Beyond handover: supporting awareness for continuous coverage

Abstract Hospitals are required to operate as a continuous system because patient care cannot be temporarily suspended and handover is seen as a key method for enabling this. This paper reports a study of handover in a medical admissions unit. We draw on the notion of awareness as conceptualised within the Computer Supported Cooperative Work literature to explore the role played by a variety of cognitive artifacts in supporting continuous coverage. While such awareness is typically characterised as being ‘effortless’, our study reveals that maintaining awareness in a context such as the medical admissions unit is effortful due to invisible work. We suggest that the notion of awareness is beneficial for exploring the practices of continuous coverage because it moves attention away from the moment of handover, instead encouraging consideration of the variety of practices through which clinicians display their work to, and monitor the work of, colleagues on different shifts. We argue that efforts to support continuous coverage should focus on improving awareness by increasing the visibility of information

Rede social na UM : um estudo de caso : análise e estratégias de utilização de portais situados na dinamização da rede social – Flickr

Dissertação de mestrado em Tecnologias e Sistemas de InformaçãoDiversos estudos enfatizaram a importância que a estrutura social tem no desempenho organizacional. A taxa da propagação de convenções sociais em uma sociedade é afectada pela estrutura complexa da rede entre os membros (Delgado, 2002). As Redes Sociais on-line constituem relações e estabelecem ligações entre os membros de um grupo buscando conectar pessoas e proporcionar sua comunicação. A interacção de uma comunidade promove a partilha da informação e do conhecimento incentivando o desenvolvimento de inovações, uma vez que os membros de uma comunidade buscam por objectivos comuns na grande maioria das vezes. A partilha pública da informação se dá através da interacção social mútua entre participantes em uma Rede Social on-line (Primo, 1998), e é composta por laços relacionais (Breiger, 1974), sendo responsáveis por estabelecer a ligação entre pares de actores em uma Rede Social, capital social diversificado (Bertolini & Bravo, 2004) e trocas comunicacionais, que constituem os interesses que os indivíduos têm em comum. No presente trabalho foi utilizado um espaço público para projectar e analisar a Rede Social FlickrUMINHO que foi criada a partir do Flicrk, no qual há partilha imagens fotográficas dos utilizadores e permite que os usuários entrem em contacto com fotógrafos variados e de diferentes locais do mundo. Para dar suporte a essa rede foi usado um Portal Situado que é definido por várias aplicações associadas em um ambiente público, sendo suportado por um ecrã. O Ecrã Público foi utilizado para dar suporte tecnológico e permitir aos utilizadores ver a exibição de suas fotos em um espaço público, podendo assim, interagirem de uma maneira diferente da habitual, ou seja, de estar sozinho em frente a um computador. Os resultados deste trabalho mostram ter havido alguma dinâmica na comunidade Flickr UMINHO e pôde-se perceber que a utilização de Portais Situados são importantes na dinamização de Redes Sociais.Several studies had emphasized the importance that the social structure has in the organizational performance. The tax of the propagation of social conventions in a society is affected by the complex structure of the net between the members (Delgado, 2002). The online Social Networks constitute relations and establish linking’s between the members of a group searching to connect people and to provide its communication. The interaction of a community promotes the allotment of the information and the knowledge stimulating the development of innovations, a time that the members of a community search for common objectives in the great majority of the times. The public allotment of the information if gives through the mutual social interaction between participants in a on-line Social Network (Primo, 1998), and is composed for relationary bows (Breiger, 1974), being responsible for establishing the linking between pairs of actors in a Social Net, capital stock diversified (Bertoline & Bravo, 2004) and communication exchanges, that constitute the interests that the individuals have in common. In the present work, a public space was used to project and to analyze the Social Network FlickrUMINHO that was created from the Flicrk, in which photographic images of the users can be shared and allows that the users enter in contact with many others photographers of different places of the world. To give support to the online Social Network, the Situated Portal is defined by several software applications used in a public environment and available from a Public Display. The Public Display was used to give technological support and to allow the users to see the exhibition of its photos in a public space, thus being able, to interact in a different way of the habitual one, or either, to be alone in front of a computer. The results of this work show that the FlickrUMINHO displayed some community dynamics and that the use of Situated Portal is relevant in motivating the emergence of a Social Network