CSCW-Based Software Engineering : AWARENESS

1. CSCW-Based Software Engineering: AWARENESS Awareness and Coordination in Shared Workspaces Gökhan ÖZER

2. Outline Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion • Introduction • Definition of ‘awareness’ • Some related concepts • Collaborative Writing Systems • Quilt • PREP • GROVE • Two General Mechanisms for Awareness Information • Description of the mechanisms • Problems with the mechanisms • A new approach: Shared Feedbac • Related Work • Integration of computer science with social science to get a comprehensive and nevertheless detailed concept of awareness • Comparing existing collaborative writing systems with the Vertegaal framework • Summary/Discussion/Conclusion

3. Definition of ‘awareness’ • Awareness is defined as • “understanding of the activities of others, which provides a context for your own activity” / by Dourish and Belloti • “awareness is part of the glue that allows groups to be more effective than individuals” • Advantage of improved awareness • provides spontaneous, informative communication • Group members know about actual group activity and can decide own activity with minimum mistake Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

4. Awareness in shared workspaces • Awareness plays a number of key roles • High-level awareness of the character of other’s actions allows participants to structure their activities and avoid duplication of work • Lower-level awareness of the content of others’ actions allows fine-grained shared working and synergistic group behaviour which needs to be supported by collaborative applications Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

5. Definition of ‘awareness’Some Concepts Awareness • close collaboration • Group members have an shared focus • loose collaboration • Group members haven’t any shared focus synchronous asynchronous To know about new occurred events To know about old occurrences • semi synchronous • incorporate synchronous and asynchronous working Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

6. Collaborative Writing Systems • Essential factors for collaborative writing • Information sharing • Knowledge of group and individual activity • Coordination • Activities of others  Context • content of individual contributions • their character Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

7. Collaborative Writing Systems: Quilt • Quilt: a collaborative tool for cooperative writing • asynchronous • Forms a superstructure which manages the specifically collaborative aspects of group authoring • uses roles • By developers identified primary problems: • Coordination • Information sharing • Primary mechanisms available to Quilt • Hypermedia system • Audit trail • Electronic mail and conferencing Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

8. Collaborative Writing Systems: PREP • PREP • Asynchronous • Concentrates in particular on the early stages of the writing process • uses roles • By developers identified primary problems • Role assignments should be re-negotiate • PREP tries to support • A model of “communication about comments” Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

9. Collaborative Writing Systems: GROVE • GROVE • is synchronous • is a multi-user editor for the creation and editing of textual outline documents • has no explicit notion of role • has an audio communication to support informal awareness between participants • provides dOPT synchronization algorithm • Constrains some task elements in an effort to prevent editing conflicts Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

10. Two General Mechanisms for Awareness Information • The three collaborative editing systems use mechanisms to support sharing awareness information between participants • Two Mechanisms • Informational • Each collaborator inform each other of their activities • Role restrictive • Supports for roles in collaborative systems Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

11. Problems with Mechanisms • Information provider does not directly benefit • In role restrictive systems • Heightened awareness for the group is restriction in the potential activities of individuals • Roles are negotiated and reassigned dynamically • In informational systems • Adds an extra work load • Information consumer does not benefit • The way in which the information is made Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

12. A new approach: Shared Feedback • An alternative mechanism to increasing awareness • automates collection and distribution of information • Presents it as background information within a shared space • Shared feedback • Makes information about individual activities • A case study which embodies some aspects of shared feedback  ShrEdit Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

13. Case Study: ShrEdit • Features of ShrEdit • allows multiple users to edit a set of documents • Each user can have a number of shared(public) and private windows and a control window • Locks shared windows at the level of text selections • ShrEdit • is synchronous • multi-user text editor • is developed as a tool to support design meetings • Description of Study • Tested by groups of three designers • Separate locations, linked via video and audio • Unstaffed automatic post office should be designed Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

14. Case Study: Some Observations • Talk dominated the activity • Participants moved opportunistically and unpredictably between independent work • Activities of the members also varied continuously • Participant chose to ask instead using facilities such find or track • Participants volunteered information to the group Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

15. Shared Feedback, used by ShrEdit • ShrEdit automatically represents activity within the shared space without any informational and role restrictive mechanisms • It still lacks some features of shared feedback • Collaborators could not see their edit cursors whilst they could see other’s input • Awareness was provided without increasing the workload of the individual Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

16. Common view on Shared Feedback • Monitor other’s actions, tailor indirect informative productions • are useful ways of coordinating shared activities like collaborative writing, drawing or programming • are mechanisms used to coordinate natural collaboration in other settings • in control rooms of urban transportation systems • in Cognoter, a group brainstorming support tool Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

17. Advantages of Shared feedback • It reduces the costs to individuals of information production • It allows participants to look for and extract the awareness information • It presents awareness information through the shared workspace and users can • find relevant information • browse awareness information concurrently Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

18. Related Work • To evaluate the efficiency of Collaborative Systems: Functional Versus Conscious Awareness in CSCW Systems • Awareness in CSCW Systems • Understanding of Awareness in Social Sciences • Evaluate existing groupware systems according to human behaviour perspective • To compare the collaborative Systems: Group Awareness in Collaborative Systems • Group awareness frameworks • Interpretation of elements for collaborative writing • Comparing collaborative writing systems Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

19. Functional Versus Conscious Awareness in CSCW Systems • An increasing number of groupware systems aim at providing users with awareness information • Problem: These are designed from a functional rather than a human-oriented point of view • There was a need for the development of a comprehensive concept of awareness • Integration of • Concept of awareness in social sciences • Concept of awareness in computer science • Objectives of this section • To evaluate existing groupware systems • To identify deficiencies of existing groupware systems Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

20. CSCW Systems focusing on Awareness • Some Definitions( A little Different as we saw): • Asynchronous groupware systems • Support cooperation at different times • Synchronous groupware systems • Support cooperation at the same time • Semi-synchronous groupware systems • Apply the notion of place rather than of a session Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

21. Classification of CSCW systems • There are 10 classified CSCW systems • Asynchronous groupware systems • Synchronous collaborative editors with awareness about actors • Synchronous collaborative text and graphic editors • … • There is a table for classified CSCW systems Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

22. Structure of table1 Awareness information Classes of group-ware systems Provided features • Table1, Table1b for detailed description Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

23. Awareness in Social Sciences • Human-centered design focuses • On group awareness • On awareness stemming social sciences • Human behaviours are assigned to the identified categories of awareness • All the forms of awareness significantly influences the performance of work tasks • Forms of human behaviour as awareness presented in Table2 … Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

24. Structure of table2 Type of awareness Definition • Table2 for detailed description Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

25. Evaluation Groupware Systems • A scheme is specified for comparing technology-driven approaches to behaviour-oriented understanding of awareness • The instances of groupware systems ( Table1 ) and human behaviours ( Table2 ) are put in Table3 • The capability of a system is marked with X if it supports a particular form of awareness Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

26. Groupware Systems in the Context of Human Behaviour-Oriented

27. Group Awareness Support in Collaborative Writing Systems • This section presents a comparative analysis of group awareness in collaborative writing systems • Vertegaal’s framework is used • Vertegaal’s framework considers • workspace awareness • conversational awareness • What is Vertegal’s framework? Will be explained on the following slides  Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

28. Group awareness in collaborative systems • Group awareness is made of several classes • Informal awareness • Group-structural awareness • Social awareness • Workspace awareness • New definition of group awareness for our recent purpose • Group awareness is mental state of the users generated by • their mutual interactions • their interactions within the workspace Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

29. Group Awareness Framework • Gutwin and Greenberg developed a framework • grants • Necessary vocabulary • Starting point to design a workspace awareness model • considers • elements • mechanisms Vertegaal complemented this framework • includes conversational awareness; adds the element “people • This work aims at adapting Vertegaal’s framework to make a comparative analysis of collaborative writing systems

30. Vertegaal’s framework: elements We see the questions that group members might ask Questions are formulated in present and past tense, why? These are workspace elements Explanation in following slides Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

31. Workspace/Conversational Elements • Some Workspace Elements • Location • Presence • Activity level • … • Some Conversational Elements • Location • People • Intention • …

32. Comparing Collaborative Writing System • For study these writing systems are chosen: • Synchronous • GROVE, SASSE, Calliope • Asynchronous • Quilt, PREP, Alliance • Evaluation procedure • Identification of group awareness mechanisms • Observation how group awareness mechanisms work in order to find a clear answer for all questions • Charts are elaborated

33. Workspace awareness

34. Last Step of Evaluation • In the similar way conversational awareness is evaluated with an other table • Using information from tables of workspace and conversational awareness we obtained this graph: • Regarding workspace awareness • first place  SASSE and Calliope • last place  PREP • Regarding conversational awareness • first place  SASSE and Calliope • last place  Alliance

35. Summary • Main Paper: • Three Collaborative writing systems • Two used approaches are described • Informational • Role restrictive • To improve awareness: as third approach  shared feedback • Test it with the study case • Related Works: • Integration of computer science with social science to get a comprehensive and nevertheless detailed concept of awareness • Test existing CSCW Systems to evaluate their success according to human centered approach • Comparing existing collaborative writing systems with the Vertegaal framework

36. MHO on the main paper • Pros • Interesting topic • Good description of case study • Cons • Bad structure • Some concepts are explained after using it • Definitions are not clear • Unnecessary repeats make text boring • Poor explanations about some important issues Introduction Collaborative Writ. Two General Mech. Related Work Conclusion

37. The only picture in the paper

38. Questions? THANK YOU FOR LISTENING

39. References • P. Dourish and V. Belotti “Awareness and Coordination in Shared Workspaces” Cambridge Xerox EuroPARC November 1992 • A. Totter and T. Gross and C. Stary “Functional Versus Conscious Awareness in CSCW-Systems” University of Linz • S. Mendoza-Chapa and M. Romero-Salcedo “Group Awareness Support in Collaborative Writing Systems” Ciudad University, Mexico • K. Schmidt “The Problem with ‘Awareness’” IT University of Copenhagen 2002