Christiane Floyd

Choices about choices

In this contribution to the Festschrift devoted to Heinz von Foerster, choices are shown to be constitutive in processes of human self-organization. This is pursued along three dimensions that are seen as inherently connected: the epistemological dimension of reality construction, the communal dimension of dialogical closure, and the ethical dimension of autonomy and dialogical responsibility. In order to exemplify his style of working as a mentor, Heinz von Foerster is portrayed in interaction, drawing largely on the authors experience. As one concrete case of a far-reaching general approach, the paper brings out the implications of his way of thinking for cooperative software design. This leads to an epistemological view of the design process, to guidelines for communal work focussing on dialogue and self-organization, and to the ethics of systems design, which means taking responsibility for the choices made in design and the choice scopes associated with computer based systems.

Being critical in, on or around computing?

When I was invited as a opening speaker for this conference, I was nto asked to embed it in what some call the Aarhus tradition that is now giving rise to the fourth decennial international and interdisciplinary scientific event. However, I found that I could not do otherwise. Partly, because I am full of admiration for what has been achieved, and partly because I wonder where the movement is now going.

STEPS — ein softwaretechnischer Projektansatz und seine arbeitswissenschaftliche Begründung

Vorgehensmodelle zur Softwareentwicklung gibt es mittlerweile so viele, wie es Ansichten daruber gibt, was angemessenes softwaretechnisches Vorgehen ist. Die meisten Modelle entstanden ohne explizite Berucksichtigung arbeitswissenschaftlicher Grundlagen.

Den Softwareentwicklungsprozeß in der Lehre erfahrbar machen

Der Ausgangspunkt dieses Beitrags ist meine Uberzeugung: Softwaretechnik bleibt hohl, es sei denn, sie wird an der Praxis der Softwareentwicklung gemessen. Der Schlussel zum Verstandnis, zur Beurteilung und zur Umsetzung softwaretechnischer Konzepte ist das eigene Erleben der Softwareentwicklung.