Dragutin Kermek

Evaluating the perceived and estimated quality in use of Web 2.0 applications

Web 2.0 refers to a new generation of web applications where individuals are able to participate, collaborate, and share created artefacts. Despite the fact that Web 2.0 applications are widely used for both educational and professional purposes, a consolidated methodology for their evaluation is still not available. This paper presents and discusses the results of two empirical studies on the case of mind mapping and diagramming Web 2.0 applications. Both studies employed logging actual use method to measure the estimated quality in use, while the retrospective thinking aloud method and an online questionnaire were applied to assess the perceived quality in use. Achieved analytical results showed that the results of the estimated and the perceived quality in use match partially, which indicates that quality in use should be measured with both subjective and objective instruments. The work presented in this paper is the first step towards a comprehensive methodology for evaluating the quality in use of Web 2.0 applications. Consequently, the usage of the proposed quality in use model for other types of Web 2.0 applications as well as contexts of use needs to be investigated in order to draw generalizable conclusions.

Exploring the quality in use of web 2.0 applications: the case of mind mapping services

Research in Web quality has addressed quality in use as the most important factor affecting a wide acceptance of software applications. It can be conceived as comprising two complementary concepts, that is, usability and user experience, which accounts for the employment of more user-centred evaluations. Nevertheless, in the context of Web 2.0 applications, this topic has still not attracted sufficient attention from the HCI community. This paper addresses the quality in use of Web 2.0 applications on the case of mind mapping services. The evaluation methodology brings together three complementary methods. The estimated quality in use is measured by means of the logging actual use method, while the perceived quality in use is evaluated by means of the retrospective thinking aloud (RTA) method and a questionnaire. The contribution of our work is twofold. Firstly, we provide empirical evidence that the proposed methodology in conjunction with the model, set of attributes, and measuring instruments is appropriate for evaluating quality in use of Web 2.0 applications. Secondly, the analysis of qualitative data reveals that performance and effort based attributes considerably contribute to mind mapping services success.

Novel Approach to BCG Analysis in the Context of ERP System Implementation

Standard ERP systems have been promoted as software solutions that are built on best business practices. According to the promoters, enterprises that buy them should embrace those built in business templates and achieve excellent business results. However, if enterprise has specific needs which are not part of standard ERP functionality, long lasting, expensive and complicated procedure of customization has to be carried out [5, 23, 24]. The link between competitive advantage and information system has been strong motivator for managers to buy ERP systems and force their implementation. However it is intuitively clear, that if something is commercially available to broad customer base, it cannot bring significant competitive advantage [36]. Many authors recognized that, and although there are certain positive indicators of business performance related to standard ERP systems, there is no strong evidence of such relationship [19, 44]. So what an enterprise or a non-profit organization can actually expect from an ERP system, and what benefits does it bring? It seems that certain organizations are better suited for ERP system implementation than the others [1, 30, 31]. Our results show that every serious attempt, which tries to answer this question, has to dig deep into business processes and find out what is their operational and strategic significance. Such comprehensive analysis requires significant time and strict methodology that enables unambiguous comparison between various organizations. This paper presents results of such approach. It is based on several years of research in various organizations that implemented or considered implementation of an ERP system. For that purpose authors developed methodology for strategic planning of information systems (SPIS). It was published in several scientific and professional articles and verified in relatively large number of commercial projects [10, 11, 12]. The methodology consists of a significant number of well known methods, but it combines them into structured and chained holistic process which gives deep insight into the business system and corresponding information system. By combining various methods under a common framework of methodology we obtain detailed and documented picture of an organization.

Examining the Quality in Use of Web 2.0 Applications: A Three-Dimensional Framework

Quality in use plays an essential role in a wide acceptance of software applications. It includes two complementary concepts: usability and user experience. With an aim to assure the quality in use of websites, researchers have proposed various metrics, but without guidelines for their use. Additionally, research on this topic in the context of Web 2.0 applications is fairly modest. In this paper, we introduce a framework composed of three dimensions related to categories of the quality in use, functions of Web 2.0 applications, and agile software development methods. The proposed framework can be used for the classification of metrics as well as for a sound and systematic evaluation of the quality in use of Web 2.0 applications.

Usability Metrics for Gamified E-learning Course: A Multilevel Approach

This paper discusses the effect of a gamified learning system for students of the master course on Web Design and Programming performed at the Faculty of Organization and Informatics. A new set of usability metrics was derived from web-based learning usability, user experience and instructional design literature and incorporated into the questionnaire which consists of three main categories: Usability, Educational Usability and User Experience. The main contribution of this paper is the development and validation of a questionnaire for measuring the usability of a gamified e-learning course from students’ perspective. Usability practitioners can use the developed metrics with confidence when evaluating the design of a gamified e-learning course in order to improve students’ engagement and motivation.

Preparation of a hybrid e-learning course for gamification

Usage of game mechanics, dynamics, aesthetics and game thinking in a non-game systems is called gamification and recently becomes very popular in academia. In e-learning systems gamification is mainly used to increase users motivation, experience and engagement. When using gamified design elements in e-learning, we must consider various types of learners and learning objectives that have to be set for a course. For a successful implementation, the cooperation of experts in fields of education, technology, psychology, pedagogy and design is required. The paper presents our first attempt to convert an e-learning course and its grading systems into gamified version using various gamification design elements (e.g. points, badges, leader boards, levels, progress tracking, feedback, and social engagement). Some of them are supported by popular LMSs, usually through some plugin that must be installed. One of the issues many teachers encounter is the limitation of gamified elements in official LMS that they use and how to get the most out of it.

An Overview on the use of Ontologies in Software Engineering

One of the main goals of the Software Engineering (SE) discipline is to find higher abstraction levels and ways to reuse software in order to increase its productivity and quality. Ontologies, which are typically considered as a technique or an artifact used in one or more software lifecycle phases, may be used to help achieve that goal. This paper provides a literature review, discussion and analysis of the existing solutions for implementing ontologies in SE. We selected several software development paradigms (including Software Product Lines, Component-Based Development, Generative Programming and Model-Driven Engineering) for our classification and discussion of different approaches proposed in the literature. It was established that ontologies are suitable for providing a common vocabulary to avoid misunderstanding between different parties in SE, requirements specification, features specification, variability management, components specification, components matching, model transformations and code generation. Based on the conducted review, guidelines for further research are given.

Using Fourier coefficients in time series analysis for student performance prediction in blended learning environments

In this work, it is shown that student access time series generated from Moodle log files contain information sufficient for successful prediction of student final results in blended learning courses. It is also shown that if time series is transformed into frequency domain, using discrete Fourier transforms DFT, the information contained in it will be preserved. Hence, resulting periodogram and its DFT coefficients can be used for generating student performance models with the algorithms commonly used for that purposes. The amount of data extracted from log files, especially for lengthy courses, can be huge. Nevertheless, by using DFT, drastic compression of data is possible. It is experimentally shown, by means of several commonly used modelling algorithms, that if in average all but 5-10% of most intensive and most frequently used DFT coefficients are removed from datasets, the modelling with the remained data will result with the increase of the model accuracy. Resulting accuracy of the calculated models is in accordance with results for student performance models calculated for different dataset types reported in literature. The advantage of this approach is its applicability because the data are automatically collected in Moodle logs.

The application of formative e-assessment data in final exam results modeling using neural networks

After introducing e-assessment into laboratory and seminar teaching of physics in a biomedical university study program the improved final practical exam passing rate was observed. The final practical exam passing rate increased from approximately 60% to more than 80%. Encouraged by these results, in this paper we will try to show a correlation between the results of e-assessments collected during continuous monitoring of student performance and their success in final tests using neural networks as modeling method. The models will be built using various sets of data collected during three academic years. Aside from the impact on the final practical exam passing rate, the models should help us in dealing with the missing data problems. Some data are missing due to technical problems and some due to errors in student handling of e-application. In this paper we have observed data collected by two types of e-assessment. The first type of e-assessment is carried out during laboratory exercises and it influences the formation of the final grade. The second type of e-assessment is performed during seminars and has no impact on the final grade.

Analysis and Evaluation of Web Application Performance Enhancement Techniques

Performance is one of the key factors of web application success. Nowadays, users expect constant availability and immediate response following their actions. To meet those expectations, many new performance enhancement techniques have been created. We have identified almost twenty such techniques with various levels of implementation complexity. Each technique enhances one or more tiers of the application. Our goal was to measure the efficiency and effectiveness of such techniques when applied to finished products (we used three popular open source applications). We argue that it is possible to significantly enhance the performance of web applications by using even a small set of performance enhancement techniques. In this paper we analyse these techniques, describe our approach to testing and measuring their performance and present our results. Finally, we calculate the overall efficiency of each technique using weights given to each of the measured performance indicators, including the technique implementation time.