161,335 research outputs found
Revealing the Vicious Circle of Disengaged User Acceptance: A SaaS Provider's Perspective
User acceptance tests (UAT) are an integral part of many different software engineering methodologies. In this paper, we examine the influence of UATs on the relationship between users and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) applications, which are continuously delivered rather than rolled out during a one-off signoff process. Based on an exploratory qualitative field study at a multinational SaaS provider in Denmark, we show that UATs often address the wrong problem in that positive user acceptance may actually indicate a negative user experience. Hence, SaaS providers should be careful not to rest on what we term disengaged user acceptance. Instead, we outline an approach that purposefully queries users for ambivalent emotions that evoke constructive criticism, in order to facilitate a discourse that favors the continuous innovation of a SaaS system. We discuss theoretical and practical implications of our approach for the study of user engagement in testing SaaS applications
Safety-Critical Systems and Agile Development: A Mapping Study
In the last decades, agile methods had a huge impact on how software is
developed. In many cases, this has led to significant benefits, such as quality
and speed of software deliveries to customers. However, safety-critical systems
have widely been dismissed from benefiting from agile methods. Products that
include safety critical aspects are therefore faced with a situation in which
the development of safety-critical parts can significantly limit the potential
speed-up through agile methods, for the full product, but also in the
non-safety critical parts. For such products, the ability to develop
safety-critical software in an agile way will generate a competitive advantage.
In order to enable future research in this important area, we present in this
paper a mapping of the current state of practice based on {a mixed method
approach}. Starting from a workshop with experts from six large Swedish product
development companies we develop a lens for our analysis. We then present a
systematic mapping study on safety-critical systems and agile development
through this lens in order to map potential benefits, challenges, and solution
candidates for guiding future research.Comment: Accepted at Euromicro Conf. on Software Engineering and Advanced
Applications 2018, Prague, Czech Republi
Anomalous compliance and early yielding of nanoporous gold
We present a study of the elastic and plastic behavior of nanoporous gold in
compression, focusing on molecular dynamics simulation and inspecting
experimental data for verification. Both approaches agree on an anomalously
high elastic compliance in the early stages of deformation, along with a quasi
immediate onset of plastic yielding even at the smallest load. Already before
the first loading, the material undergoes spontaneous plastic deformation under
the action of the capillary forces, requiring no external load. Plastic
deformation under compressive load is accompanied by dislocation storage and
dislocation interaction, along with strong strain hardening.
Dislocation-starvation scenarios are not supported by our results. The
stiffness increases during deformation, but never approaches the prediction by
the relevant Gibson-Ashby scaling law. Microstructural disorder affects the
plastic deformation behavior and surface excess elasticity might modify elastic
response, yet we relate the anomalous compliance and the immediate yield onset
to an atomistic origin: the large surface-induced prestress induces elastic
shear that brings some regions in the material close to the shear instability
of the generalized stacking fault energy curve. These regions are elastically
highly compliant and plastically weak
Boundary Objects and their Use in Agile Systems Engineering
Agile methods are increasingly introduced in automotive companies in the
attempt to become more efficient and flexible in the system development. The
adoption of agile practices influences communication between stakeholders, but
also makes companies rethink the management of artifacts and documentation like
requirements, safety compliance documents, and architecture models.
Practitioners aim to reduce irrelevant documentation, but face a lack of
guidance to determine what artifacts are needed and how they should be managed.
This paper presents artifacts, challenges, guidelines, and practices for the
continuous management of systems engineering artifacts in automotive based on a
theoretical and empirical understanding of the topic. In collaboration with 53
practitioners from six automotive companies, we conducted a design-science
study involving interviews, a questionnaire, focus groups, and practical data
analysis of a systems engineering tool. The guidelines suggest the distinction
between artifacts that are shared among different actors in a company (boundary
objects) and those that are used within a team (locally relevant artifacts). We
propose an analysis approach to identify boundary objects and three practices
to manage systems engineering artifacts in industry
Society-in-the-Loop: Programming the Algorithmic Social Contract
Recent rapid advances in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning
have raised many questions about the regulatory and governance mechanisms for
autonomous machines. Many commentators, scholars, and policy-makers now call
for ensuring that algorithms governing our lives are transparent, fair, and
accountable. Here, I propose a conceptual framework for the regulation of AI
and algorithmic systems. I argue that we need tools to program, debug and
maintain an algorithmic social contract, a pact between various human
stakeholders, mediated by machines. To achieve this, we can adapt the concept
of human-in-the-loop (HITL) from the fields of modeling and simulation, and
interactive machine learning. In particular, I propose an agenda I call
society-in-the-loop (SITL), which combines the HITL control paradigm with
mechanisms for negotiating the values of various stakeholders affected by AI
systems, and monitoring compliance with the agreement. In short, `SITL = HITL +
Social Contract.'Comment: (in press), Ethics of Information Technology, 201
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