Jarmo Palviainen

Knowledge transfer in collaborative teams: experiences from a two-week code camp

Software engineering has both technological and social dimensions. As development teams spanning across the globe are increasingly the norm and while the web enables massive online collaboration, there is a growing need for effective collaboration tools. In this paper, we describe experiences on collaborative programming as a tool for learning software development. To investigate the nature of collaboration in software engineering education, we arranged a two-week-long course experiment where students used a collaborative online integrated development environment to create different kinds of web services. We present lessons learned from the experiment and discuss how collaboration can act as a tool for knowledge transfer among learners.

Designing for presence in social television interaction

In the past years, people have started to use social media to interact actively about TV content. However, despite of over a decade of active research and product development, Social TV has not been adopted by large populations. This paper aims to support designing interaction for Social TV services and, more specifically, designing for the presence and togetherness between viewers. Our constructive research consisted of a series of user studies and iterative prototyping. We conducted user studies with altogether 51 participants both in laboratory and in real-life contexts. To support the presence, the final prototype includes three different modalities of communication -- voice and text-based chat, and animated gestures with avatars. The qualitative findings imply that gestures with avatars in virtual space support Social TV and the experience of presence. Finally, we present an analysis of Social TV heuristics and their validity in the context of our designs.

User Experience in Machinery Automation: From Concepts and Context to Design Implications

Machinery automation (MA), e.g. different agriculture machinery, has traditionally been developed by experts in automation and in machinery engineering. As the role of interactive software is increasing, the principles and methods of human centered design (HCD) are being applied. This results in better usability of the systems particularly through efficiency of work processes and user interfaces (UIs). The user experience (UX) approach extends the HCD approach with broader motivational factors of using the systems. This paper describes the elements of UX in the MA from the interaction design perspective. After introducing the UX field, we describe the context to give an overview of the major factors affecting UX. Then we present what we consider to be the key elements of UX in MA and what implications they bring to the design of such systems. Finally we discuss the benefits and challenges of applying UX in this particular field.

Integrating Human-Centered Design into Software Development: An Action Research Study in the Automation Industry

Many companies struggle with problems caused by bad usability of their products although they have invested in human-centered design (HCD). Their processes may still lack a systematic approach, adequate knowledge, and clear definition of responsibilities in HCD. This article describes a study successfully integrating HCD process into the stage-gate development model of a large company in the automation industry. The research methods included usability maturity assessment, participant observation, interviews, and a period of piloting selected HCD methods in a product development project. As a result, the development model was revised to systematically include activities of human-centered design. All development projects are now divided into three categories based on their usability criticality and the process ensures certain activities during the life cycle. Also the central usability group the company already had was divided into two functions: managing usability and assisting in design issues.

Exploring usage scenarios on social devices: balancing between surprise and user control

Mobile devices and social media are designed primarily to support communication between remote people. However, the sensors in modern smart phones allow also proxemic interactions between the devices and their co-located users. In such interactions, mobile devices can act as smart, social objects -- or Social Devices -- proactively triggering interpersonal interactions. We present the results of our explorative user study about usage scenarios and user perceptions of Social Devices. We conducted three bodystorming sessions and eight laboratory sessions to expose altogether 39 participants to the concept of Social Devices. The bodystorming sessions resulted in a set of novel usage scenarios for Social Devices. The evaluations of the scenarios and prototypes show that participants valued Social Devices offering surprising social effects, such as discovering mutual interest between users. However, participants strongly expressed the need to control the device-initiated interactions. Based on the findings, we suggest five design implications for further development of related concepts.

A Pattern-Driven Process Model for Quality-Centered Software Architecture Design--A Case Study on Usability-Centered Design

Quality requirements of software systems typically affect large portions of the system, and should be taken into account early in the design process. Patterns have become a mainstream technique to associate frequent quality-related design problems with proven solutions. We present a generic pattern-driven design process model, and apply this to usability, obtaining a usability-centered design process model. As a case study, we have applied the model to the usability-centered software architecture design of a stone crusher control system.

Design framework enhancing developer experience in collaborative coding environment

Software development is teamwork, where the team members collaborate despite of their working environments ranging from shared office to working in separate sites around the globe. Regardless of location, the teams need support for their collaborative tasks. In this paper, we present results of utilizing collaborative online coding environment to create new, innovative cloud-based services. We collected data from 37 students in two separate coding exercises, each lasting several days. The results indicate that while some experienced coders saw no benefits of such system, in general participants reported both pragmatic benefits -- increased efficiency of coordinating actions -- and increased motivation due to perceived presence of team members. As our main contribution, we present a design framework for enhancing developer experience in collaborative environments.