Software Engineers' Information Seeking Behavior in Change Impact Analysis - An Interview Study

Software engineers working in large projects must navigate complex information landscapes. Change Impact Analysis (CIA) is a task that relies on engineers' successful information seeking in databases storing, e.g., source code, requirements, design descriptions, and test case specifications. Several previous approaches to support information seeking are task-specific, thus understanding engineers' seeking behavior in specific tasks is fundamental. We present an industrial case study on how engineers seek information in CIA, with a particular focus on traceability and development artifacts that are not source code. We show that engineers have different information seeking behavior, and that some do not consider traceability particularly useful when conducting CIA. Furthermore, we observe a tendency for engineers to prefer less rigid types of support rather than formal approaches, i.e., engineers value support that allows flexibility in how to practically conduct CIA. Finally, due to diverse information seeking behavior, we argue that future CIA support should embrace individual preferences to identify change impact by empowering several seeking alternatives, including searching, browsing, and tracing.Comment: Accepted for publication in the proceedings of the 25th International Conference on Program Comprehensio

The Semantic Grid: A future e-Science infrastructure

e-Science offers a promising vision of how computer and communication technology can support and enhance the scientific process. It does this by enabling scientists to generate, analyse, share and discuss their insights, experiments and results in an effective manner. The underlying computer infrastructure that provides these facilities is commonly referred to as the Grid. At this time, there are a number of grid applications being developed and there is a whole raft of computer technologies that provide fragments of the necessary functionality. However there is currently a major gap between these endeavours and the vision of e-Science in which there is a high degree of easy-to-use and seamless automation and in which there are flexible collaborations and computations on a global scale. To bridge this practice–aspiration divide, this paper presents a research agenda whose aim is to move from the current state of the art in e-Science infrastructure, to the future infrastructure that is needed to support the full richness of the e-Science vision. Here the future e-Science research infrastructure is termed the Semantic Grid (Semantic Grid to Grid is meant to connote a similar relationship to the one that exists between the Semantic Web and the Web). In particular, we present a conceptual architecture for the Semantic Grid. This architecture adopts a service-oriented perspective in which distinct stakeholders in the scientific process, represented as software agents, provide services to one another, under various service level agreements, in various forms of marketplace. We then focus predominantly on the issues concerned with the way that knowledge is acquired and used in such environments since we believe this is the key differentiator between current grid endeavours and those envisioned for the Semantic Grid

Querying a regulatory model for compliant building design audit

The ingredients for an effective automated audit of a building design include a BIM model containing the design information, an electronic regulatory knowledge model, and a practical method of processing these computerised representations. There have been numerous approaches to computer-aided compliance audit in the AEC/FM domain over the last four decades, but none has yet evolved into a practical solution. One reason is that they have all been isolated attempts that lack any form of standardisation. The current research project therefore focuses on using an open standard regulatory knowledge and BIM representations in conjunction with open standard executable compliant design workflows to automate the compliance audit process. This paper provides an overview of different approaches to access information from a regulatory model representation. The paper then describes the use of a purpose-built high-level domain specific query language to extract regulatory information as part of the effort to automate manual design procedures for compliance audit

Exploratory Fieldwork on Balconies as Threshold Spaces on the Juliusz Słowacki housing estate in Lublin

The author reflects upon her experience of exploratory fieldwork conducted by an interdisciplinary group during the Urban Summer School. The research was conducted within an environment built according to the idea of "Open Form", introduced by architect Oskar Hansen. Together with his wife Zofia, he designed a few neighborhoods around Poland, one of which – the Juliusz Słowacki housing estate in Lublin – is used as a case study for this paper. The article follows the process of collaborative development of research design and discusses a number of methods (focused ethnography, interviews, mental mapping, observation, participatory photography) applied to the study of materiality and social functioning of balconies as "threshold spaces" and their domestication. The author also outlines her positions in relation to both the local people with whom she has conducted interviews about their homes and the participants of her group

The Space of Experience in the Architecture of Richard Hamilton

Richard Hamilton realiza tres exposiciones en el Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) en el Londres de los años 50, participando del ambiente interdisciplinar del Independent Group. Estos montajes exploran la transformación de la sala a través de la construcción de estructuras que incentivan la participación activa del espectador. A partir del estudio realizado, para el que se reconstruyen estas propuestas siguiendo su lenguaje técnico original, se analiza cómo los montajes de Hamilton siguen un proceso evolutivo, en el que parte de la exploración de la forma a partir de patrones de crecimiento natural, continúa elevando la técnica a herramienta creativa y concluye con la formulación del espacio de interacción con el espectador. Este último montaje, an Exhibit, sintetiza los hallazgos de los anteriores, dando lugar a una propuesta arquitectónica a modo de tablero de juego que es protagonizada por la experiencia vivida de sus visitantes. Esta arquitectura es una estructura soporte que se genera a partir de un crecimiento orgánico ilimitado de un módulo estandarizado, de combinaciones variables y cambiante a cada momento por sus ocupantes. Los espacios expositivos de Hamilton recogen influencias de las vanguardias y tienden puentes hacia propuestas arquitectónicas contemporáneas entendidas como soporte para la incentivación de la experiencia de sus habitantes.Richard Hamilton held three exhibitions at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London in the 1950s, participating in the interdisciplinary environment of the Independent Group. These exhibitions explored the transformation of the room through the construction of structures that encouraged the active engagement of the viewer. Based on the study carried out, for which these proposals are reconstructed following their original technical language, an analysis is made of how Hamilton’s montages follow an evolutionary process, in which the exploration of form based on patterns of natural growth continues to elevate the technique to a creative tool and concludes with the formulation of the space of interaction with the spectator. This last montage, an Exhibit, summarised the findings of the previous ones, giving rise to an architectural proposal in the form of a game board whose focal element is the experience of its visitors. This architecture acts as a supporting structure that is generated from an unlimited organic development of a standardised module, with varying combinations, and which constantly changes for its occupants. Hamilton’s exhibition spaces draw on influences from the avant–garde and build bridges towards contemporary architectural proposals understood as a support for incentivising the experience of its inhabitants

Using Links to prototype a Database Wiki

Both relational databases and wikis have strengths that make them attractive for use in collaborative applications. In the last decade, database-backed Web applications have been used extensively to develop valuable shared biological references called curated databases. Databases offer many advantages such as scalability, query optimization and concurrency control, but are not easy to use and lack other features needed for collaboration. Wikis have become very popular for early-stage biocuration projects because they are easy to use, encourage sharing and collaboration, and provide built-in support for archiving, history-tracking and annotation. However, curation projects often outgrow the limited capabilities of wikis for structuring and efficiently querying data at scale, necessitating a painful phase transition to a database-backed Web application. We perceive a need for a new class of general-purpose system, which we call a Database Wiki, that combines flexible wiki-like support for collaboration with robust database-like capabilities for structuring and querying data. This paper presents DBWiki, a design prototype for such a system written in the Web programming language Links. We present the architecture, typical use, and wiki markup language design for DBWiki and discuss features of Links that provided unique advantages for rapid Web/database application prototyping

Embedding Spatial Software Visualization in the IDE: an Exploratory Study

Software visualization can be of great use for understanding and exploring a software system in an intuitive manner. Spatial representation of software is a promising approach of increasing interest. However, little is known about how developers interact with spatial visualizations that are embedded in the IDE. In this paper, we present a pilot study that explores the use of Software Cartography for program comprehension of an unknown system. We investigated whether developers establish a spatial memory of the system, whether clustering by topic offers a sound base layout, and how developers interact with maps. We report our results in the form of observations, hypotheses, and implications. Key findings are a) that developers made good use of the map to inspect search results and call graphs, and b) that developers found the base layout surprising and often confusing. We conclude with concrete advice for the design of embedded software maps.Comment: To appear in proceedings of SOFTVIS 2010 conferenc