Domain Specific Language Evaluation: OutSystems’ Business Process Technology

Domain Specific Languages (DSL) are created with the intent of making problem solving easier via abstractions and notations that are closer to the domain users’ way of thinking. However, in order to fulfil this intent the language must be considered usable by its target audience, which requires using a principled approach, contrary to an ad-hoc philosophy. Unfortunately, language engineers are not always concerned by usability. Usability techniques developed by Human Computer Interaction (HCI) experts are generally focused solely on application interfaces that were not designed to be directly applied to languages. However, previous studies have shown that languages are in essence interfaces between users and the computational system, so applying HCI techniques is not incorrect. However, to the best of our knowledge, there is no simple evaluation process that allows developers to validate their languages, both syntactically and semantically. The OutSystems Platform is a development environment composed of several domain specific languages. It is used to quickly build and validate web and mobile applications. The languages allow users to build interfaces and data models, define custom business logic and construct process models. Howbeit, the DSL for process modelling (Business Process Technology (BPT)), does not have the desired adoption rate and is often used for solving problems out of the intended domain it was originally designed for. This is problematic, given that the language has an associated maintenance cost. The purpose of this dissertation is twofold: create a succinct and easy process for evaluating visual programming languages, and apply the proposed process to BPT in order to identify any usability issues that may be present in the BPT language. The process we developed includes adapted HCI evaluation techniques (such as the Systems Usability Score, Task Load Index and others). After identifying the main problems with the BPT language, the language was updated with a new syntax. We performed a comparison analyses between the original and new syntaxes, which showed that the new version is more transparent and has a significantly higher usability rating.Domain Specific Languages (DSL) são criadas com a intenção de tornar mais fácil a resolução de problemas através de abstrações e notações que são mais próximas da maneira de pensar dos utilizadores do domínio. Isso, no entanto, só é verdade se a linguagem for considerada utilizável pelo seu público-alvo, que requer o uso de uma abordagem baseada em princípios, ao contrário de uma filosofia ad-hoc. Infelizmente, a usabilidade não é um dos aspetos técnicos com que os engenheiros de linguagens mais se preocupam. Técnicas de usabilidade desenvolvidas por especialistas em Human Computer Interaction (HCI) são geralmente focadas exclusivamente em interfaces de aplicações e não foram desenvolvidas para serem diretamente aplicadas a linguagens de programação. No entanto, estudos prévios mostraram que as linguagens de programação são, na sua essência, interfaces entre os utilizadores e o sistema computacional, assim sendo a aplicação de técnicas HCI não é considerada incorreta. No entanto, no decorrer da nossa pesquisa, não foi encontrado nenhum processo de avaliação simples que permita aos engenheiros validar as suas linguagens tanto sintatica como semanticamente. A OutSystems Platform é um ambiente de desenvolvimento composto por várias DSL. Este é usado para construir rapidamente aplicações web e móveis. As linguagens permitem aos utilizadores construir interfaces e modelos de dados, definir lógica de negócios personalizada, e construir modelos de processos. Todavia, a DSL para modelar processos (Business Process Technology (BPT)), não tem a taxa de adoção desejada e é utilizada em problemas fora do domínio pretendido. Isto é devido ao custo de manutenção associado. Esta tese tem dois objetivos: criar um processo sucinto e fácil para avaliar linguagens de programação, e usar esse mesmo processo para identificar quaisquer problemas que possam estar presentes na linguagem BPT. Para conseguir isto, foi desenvolvido um processo simples de acompanhar que inclui técnicas HCI. Uma vez identificados os principais problemas com o BPT, foram feitas alterações à linguagem. Finalmente, foi realizada uma comparação entre a sintaxe original e a nova. Estas mostraram que a nova versão é mais transparente e tem uma classificação de usabilidade significativamente maior

Kaleidoscope JEIRP on Learning Patterns for the Design and Deployment of Mathematical Games: Final Report

Project deliverable (D40.05.01-F)Over the last few years have witnessed a growing recognition of the educational potential of computer games. However, it is generally agreed that the process of designing and deploying TEL resources generally and games for mathematical learning specifically is a difficult task. The Kaleidoscope project, "Learning patterns for the design and deployment of mathematical games", aims to investigate this problem. We work from the premise that designing and deploying games for mathematical learning requires the assimilation and integration of deep knowledge from diverse domains of expertise including mathematics, games development, software engineering, learning and teaching. We promote the use of a design patterns approach to address this problem. This deliverable reports on the project by presenting both a connected account of the prior deliverables and also a detailed description of the methodology involved in producing those deliverables. In terms of conducting the future work which this report envisages, the setting out of our methodology is seen by us as very significant. The central deliverable includes reference to a large set of learning patterns for use by educators, researchers, practitioners, designers and software developers when designing and deploying TEL-based mathematical games. Our pattern language is suggested as an enabling tool for good practice, by facilitating pattern-specific communication and knowledge sharing between participants. We provide a set of trails as a "way-in" to using the learning pattern language. We report in this methodology how the project has enabled the synergistic collaboration of what started out as two distinct strands: design and deployment, even to the extent that it is now difficult to identify those strands within the processes and deliverables of the project. The tools and outcomes from the project can be found at: http://lp.noe-kaleidoscope.org

Usability and open source software.

Open source communities have successfully developed many pieces of software although most computer users only use proprietary applications. The usability of open source software is often regarded as one reason for this limited distribution. In this paper we review the existing evidence of the usability of open source software and discuss how the characteristics of open-source development influence usability. We describe how existing human-computer interaction techniques can be used to leverage distributed networked communities, of developers and users, to address issues of usability

A social and technical sustainability requirements catalogue

Isabel Sofia Brito is a Coordinator Professor at Polytechnic Institute of Beja, Portugal, and a member of the Centre of Technology and Systems (CTS-UNINOVA). Her main research interests are Requirements Engineering and Sustainability Requirements, Model and Data-Driven Development, Multi-Criteria Decision Making and, Big Data. She has published several papers on these topics. She has been involved in several national and international research projects (e.g., COMPETISOF, Petri-Rig, U-Bike Project). Currently, she is involved in the international applied research project HIBA—Hub Iberia Agrotech, an initiative funded by Digital Innovation Hub (DIH) and “Portugal INCoDe.2030”. She is or was involved as organiser, conference chair and program committee member in several international conferences (e.g., IEEE RE, ACM SAC, CISTI, QUATIC, CIbSE, ICT4S) and in several smaller and regional ones. Publisher Copyright: © 2022 The Author(s)Climate change calls for action from all sectors of our global economy, including ICT. Therefore, it is important to change the way we develop software to address the challenges posed by sustainability. Our goal is to contribute with a reusable sustainability requirements catalogue that helps developers be aware of sustainability-related properties worth considering during software development. The information for this catalogue was gathered via a systematic mapping study, whose results were synthesised in feature models and then modelled using iStar for a more expressive and configurable representation. A qualitative evaluation of the catalogue's readability, interest, utility, and usefulness by 50 participants from the domain, showed that around 79% of the respondents found the catalogue “Good” or “Very Good”. However, more than 5% of the expert participants found weaknesses regarding most of the evaluated questions and around 25% are neutral in their overall evaluation. This led us to evolve the initial version of the catalogue for the social and technical dimensions of sustainability to improve its completeness and usefulness. This is achieved by aligning the information gathered in the systematic mapping study with the well-established quality model of the ISO/IEC 25010:2011, as we expect most of the experts are familiar with those qualities and respective hierarchies. During this process, we found information that led us to propose two additional qualities that were not covered by the ISO standard: fairness and legislation. We applied this evolved version of the catalogue to the U-Bike project comparing the requirements elicited without the catalogue with those identified using the catalogue. The result suggests that new sustainability requirements were worth considering from a sustainability point of view, supporting the usefulness of the catalogue.publishersversionpublishe

Wikidatians are Born: Paths to Full Participation in a Collaborative Structured Knowledge Base

We investigated how participation evolves in Wikidata as its editors become established members of the community. Originally conceived to support Wikipedia, Wikidata is a collaborative structured knowledge base, created and maintained by a large number of volunteers, whose data can be freely reused in other contexts. Just like in any other online social environment, understanding its contributors\u27 pathways to full participation helps Wikidata improve user experience and retention. \ \ We analysed how participation changes in time under the frameworks of legitimate peripheral participation and activity theory. We found out that as they engage more with the project, ``Wikidatians\u27\u27 acquire a higher sense of responsibility for their work, interact more with the community, take on more advanced tasks, and use a wider range of tools. Previous activity in Wikipedia has varied effects. As Wikidata is a young community, future work should focus on volunteers with little or no experience in similar projects and specify means to improve critical aspects such as engagement and data quality

A rapid simulation modelling process for novice software process simulation modellers

In recent years, simulation modelling of software processes have has promoted as a tool to understand, study, control, and manage software development processes. Claims have been made that simulation models are useful and effective at gaining insight into software development processes. However, little has been said about the process of developing simulation models for software engineering problems. Simulation modelling is a young discipline in software engineering. Consequently, many number software process simulation modellers are thought to be novices. The simulation modelling process is believed to have had an effect on the quality of a simulation study. Although there is a body of knowledge available in the general simulation literature to guide and educate novices, the software process simulation modelling literature lacks information for novice software process simulation modellers to understand and adopt a simulation modelling process. This thesis aims to develop a simulation modelling process for novice software process simulation modellers. This thesis reports how the development and evaluation of a simulation modelling process for novice software process simulation modellers. The rapid simulation modelling process (RSMP) is based on an empirical study of the contexts and practices of expert simulation modellers in SPSM and Operational Research (OR). The RSMP is intended to be independent of a particular simulation technique (i. e. system dynamics or discrete event simulation) and guides novice software process simulation modellers through a set of steps that should be undertaken during a simulation study; the RSMP emphasises heavy client contact and provides guidelines for model documentation. The RSMP has been evaluated through controlled experiments with novice software process simulation modellers using system dynamics (SD) modelling. In the future, it will be further evaluated with software process simulation modellers using discrete event simulation. The RSMP has also been evaluated with a panel of expert software process simulation modellers. The main contribution of this study lies in providing novice software process simulation modellers with a simulation modelling process, which embodies real world simulation practice and is intended to be independent of a particular simulation technique

Crafting a rich and personal blending learning environment: an institutional case study from a STEM perspective

Institutional pressures to make optimal use of lecture halls and classrooms can be powerful motivators to identify resources to develop technology enhanced learning approaches to traditional curricula. From the academic’s perspective, engaging students in active learning and reducing the academic workload are important and complementary drivers. This paper presents a case study of a curriculum development exercise undertaken in a STEM subject area at a research-intensive UK university. A multi-skilled team of academics and learning designers have worked collaboratively to build this module which will be realised as a mix of online and face to face activities. Since the module addresses professional issues, a strong emphasis is being placed on establishing authentic learning activities and realistic use of prominent social tools.The learning designers are working for a cross-institutional initiative to support educational innovations; therefore it is important to carefully document the development process and to identify reusable design patterns which can be easily explained to other academics.<br/

weSPOT: A personal and social approach to inquiry-based learning

weSPOT is a new European initiative proposing a novel approach for personal and social inquiry-based learning in secondary and higher education. weSPOT aims at enabling students to create their mash-ups out of cloud based tools and services in order to perform scientific investigations. Students will also be able to share their inquiry accomplishments in social networks and receive feedback from the learning environment and their peers. This paper presents the research framework of the weSPOT project, as well as the initial inquiry-based learning scenarios that will be piloted by the project in real-life educational settings

Enhancing the decision-making process of project managers in the built environment: An integrated approach

A study of the project manager’s (PM) function must be to examine: what their role is, their skills, and training needed. The project manager needs wide perspective regarding the classic management functions of control, coordination, communication, and the settling of performance standards. If the PM is a professional, their performance must be of the highest standard, and must be accountable for a high level of productivity. This is the project manager’s Achilles heel. Another problem is the absence of feedback during the early stages through to completion of the project. During the project’s life the relative importance of their responsibilities may change several times, including the constant changing of the dynamic environment. The PM will aim for a balanced emphasis; they will try to be flexible so they can adapt to new circumstances as they occur. The PM needs tried and tested methods to aid his decision making. This paper posits an integrated development and use of methods such as; scenario planning, effectuation, and reflective thinking to enhance decision making. The paper concludes with potential benefits that this method brings to the PM when fully understood and tested in the application domain