Pablo Martín Vera

Measurement framework for evaluating e-governance on municipalities websites

This paper presents a measurement framework for evaluating the design, content and services offered to citizens by municipal web sites. The proposed framework comprises 152 metrics enabling to analyze web sites by calculating through a single numerical value the level of e-Governance reached by each site. To perform this analysis a sample of municipal sites is considered, consisting on the capital cities of 31 countries spread over different continents. The results are compared and analyzed, allowing countries categorization according to their approach to e-Governance.

Reducing Digital Divide: adult oriented distance learning

The present paper shows the digital divide that exists among the communities that use ICTs (Information and Communication Technologies) in their everyday lives, including access to local government web sites, and those that have total ignorance of the subject. A survey regarding information technology knowledge was performed in several communities with very different sociocultural characteristics. The results of the survey, from a technological scope, show the width of the technologic gap that separates those communities. Being aware of this digital divide, this research shows the results of the implementation of a strategy that allows deprived citizens, who live in the border zones, to reach information technology knowledge. This strategy includes face learning, distance learning, the use of massive communication media, practice in national universitys computer labs and, theory and practice exams.

Component Based Model Driven Development: An Approach for Creating Mobile Web Applications from Design Models

Current MDD methodologies are complex to use and require doing lots of models and configurations. Usually after all that effort only some part of the application source code can be automatically created. It would be desirable to have a more simple technique, but powerful enough for automatically creating a fully functional application. This works introduces a component based model driven development approach where a set of user interface components will be configured to define system behavior. Component configuration will be direct, simple and supported by a modeling tool which also includes automatic transformations for reducing the modeling task. The methodology requires the designer to build only two models: a class diagram, representing the data model of the application and a component diagram defining the user interface and the system navigation. Both components are based on UML extended with stereotypes and tagged values allowing configuring the system behavior.

Metodología para el Tratamiento del Proceso de Crowdsourcing en Aplicaciones Móviles Basadas en Servicios de Geolocalización

En este articulo se presenta una metodologia para el tratamiento del proceso de Crowdsourcing en aplicaciones moviles. Trata diferentes cuestiones como la valoracion de colaboraciones, definicion de criterios para aprobar o rechazar una colaboracion, determinacion del nivel de experticia de usuarios, etc. Todas estas cuestiones se analizan agregando el parametro de la geolocalizacion como parte influyente en las mismas dando por ejemplo mas valor a una colaboracion que se realice dentro del ambito geografico de incumbencia a una que se realiza posteriormente fuera de dicha locacion. Ademas, se establecen una serie de pasos que se pueden seguir para disenar en forma exitosa una aplicacion de crowdsourcing geolocalizada, ofreciendo al disenador un marco inicial sobre el cual establecer sus propios parametros.

Creating and Using Proximity Events on Mobile Websites

Nowadays mobile devices includes a large variety of hardware components and sensors which are used by several applications for obtaining context information or creating new ways of interaction. At the beginning hardware access was limited for installed applications only (native applications) but day after day new web standards arises allowing accessing hardware component and sensor. Geolocation, for example, can be used from web sites in the same way and with equivalent results than in a native application. This article analyses the proximity sensor API (Application Programming Interface) and proposes it use for the detection of different events that can be used in a web environment. For example for improving navigation by going back to the home page or opening a menu by simply moving a finger over the sensor.

Creating a usability lab for testing on mobile devices using free tools

Testing with final users allows evaluators to detect failures and problems that were not considered during the design and the different stages of development of an application or a web site. In order to be able to perform those tests is important to create an environment where users responses, reactions and opinions while interacting with an application or a web site can be analyzed. A usability lab provides a space to gather important information during the testing process and consequently this allows making a detailed analysis of everything done. This paper shows that is possible to create a usability lab for testing on mobile devices using free tools. Furthermore, at the end of this article a study case is shown to evidence the advantages of using this methodology.

Encouraging students participation in the classroom by taking advance of mobile devices and Ad Hoc networks

The present article shows a strategy to incorporate mobile devices as a didactic resource inside a university class. This is founded in the important insertion of mobile phones together with other technological devices such as tablets, laptops etc. At the technological side, building an Ad Hoc network will allow sharing resources in the class without depending on the availability of an existing network infrastructure in all classrooms.

Modeling Parallel Applications on Mobile Devices

Nowadays more and more users have mobile devices with high computing power. This fact allows taking advantage of that processing power to design applications that allow users to interact remotely with the system simply using, for example, their cell phones. This requires having a modeling tool that allows incorporating the concepts of mobile computing and their particular domain characteristics. This work shows an extension to the UML profile called PROCODI (Concurrent and Distributed Processes), which adds the possibility of incorporating mobile devices as nodes within the model. This fact allows a quick visualization using a single diagram, of structural and behavioral aspects of the system, also including, now, mobile devices with their peculiarities.

Improving user experience by taking advance of semantic information of microformats on municipal websites

This research regards about the use of microformats as a tool to add semantic information to government web sites. The use of microformats allows the developer to add different resources such as maps, calendars, etc, in an easy way. The paper also shows a survey of the already existing microformats and which of them are useful to be applied to government web sites.

Building didactic applications for the teaching of practical content in a virtual campus

Distance teaching becomes a tough task when its goal is to explain topics with high practical contents because it is necessary for the student to have the teachers guidance in order to understand the steps and method to solve a particular problem. On the other hand, theoretical contents adapt themselves more easily to this methodology by the use of tools such as text with hyperlinks, synoptic charts, etc. This paper demonstrates a solution that facilitates the virtual teaching of practical contents by the use of multimedia material specially designed to fulfill this task. This material not only allows the student to learn the practical contents, but also provides him with an overview method and several ways of automatically checking his knowledge and comprehension of content.