Rikke Ørngreen

Enabling user centered design processes in open source communities

Drawing on tenets from action research, this paper presents a yearlong intervention designed to facilitate knowledge of actual users and use in an Open Source Software (OSS) development community. Results from the interventions are presented and the influence of central characteristics of the OSS community and its communication is discussed. Initial findings show that the ideology and praxis based approach of the OSS community, as well as their primary media of communication, present a challenge to the introduction of end-user issues.

Themes in human work interaction design

This paper raises themes that are seen as some of the challenges facing the emerging practice and research field of Human Work Interaction Design. The paper has its offset in the discussions and writings that have been dominant within the IFIP Working Group on Human Work Interaction Design (name HWID) through the last two and half years since the commencement of this Working Group. The paper thus provides an introduction to the theory and empirical evidence that lie behind the combination of empirical work studies and interaction design. It also recommends key topics for future research in Human Work Interaction Design.

Exploring the use of iPads in Danish schools

Mobile devices, especially the integration and adoption of iPads in school classrooms, is gaining emphasis across the research and development forums of academic, policy, organizational, political, and public spheres. In April 2012, the Danish government announced that they would allocate DKK 500 million to develop the use of IT in elementary schools in Denmark. Since then, many municipalities have purchased iPads for schools for large sums. The existing literature, however, says very little about how these IT resources are being used or should be used in teaching. This paper contributes to the knowledge of how teachers and students use iPads in school contexts. During fall 2013, three elementary schools’ second and sixth graders were observed, and their subject teachers were interviewed. The researchers applied a social constructivist perspective and a qualitative research design, using grounded theory methodology. The relevant factors identified were available knowledge and adoptable practice (including innovation evaluation, subject culture, learning activity design, and teachers’ and students’ skill level with iPads); advantages (including mobility, multimodality, access to information, startup time, and differentiated learning environments); and adoption barriers (including accessibility, training, and economy) as seen in relation to technology, pedagogy, and content. The paper concludes that the identified nature of knowledge, practices, and barriers are similar to the trend of integrating and adopting desktop computers and other educational technologies. However, there are some unique advantages that iPad and other mobile devices can enable through apps, readiness, etc. Policies and strategies should be adopted to combine training and maintenance along with ensuring access to iPads.

CHI 2013 human work interaction design (HWID) SIG: past history and future challenges

In this SIG we aim to introduce the IFIP 13.6 Human Work Interaction Design (HWID) approach to the CHI audience. The HWID working group aims at establishing relationships between extensive empirical work-domain studies and HCI design. We invite participants from industry and academia with an interest on empirical work analysis, HCI, interaction design and usability and user experience in work situations and in the workplace. This SIG is a vital step towards creating a CHI2014 workshop on this topic.

Human work interaction design for e-government and public information systems

Varied backgrounds of users, heterogeneous delivery media and diverse socio-cultural and organizational contexts pose new challenges of human work interaction design in the field of e-government and public information systems. The workshop will consolidate the empirical case studies of how human work analysis and interaction design has benefited in enhancing the user experience of e-government and public information systems and a set of effective methods, techniques and theories for this purpose. Selected research papers from the workshop will be published in the International Journal of Public Information Systems (IJPIS), Sweden.

Mobile Probing and Probes

Mobile probing is a method, developed for learning about digital work situations, as an approach to discover new grounds. The method can be used when there is a need to know more about users and their work with certain tasks, but where users at the same time are distributed (in time and space). Mobile probing was inspired by the cultural probe method, and was influenced by qualitative interview and inquiry approaches. The method has been used in two subsequent projects, involving school children (young adults at 15-17 years old) and employees (adults) in a consultancy company. Findings point to mobile probing being a flexible method for uncovering the unknowns, as a way of getting rich data to the analysis and design phases. On the other hand it is difficult to engage users to give in depth explanations, which seem easier in synchronous dialogs (whether online or face2face). The development of the method, its application to the two projects, and the challenges and potentials which were found are discussed in this paper.

Analyzing cultural usability of mobile keypad and displays for textual communication in internationalization and localization perspectives

The aim of this paper is to identify the cultural usability aspects that need to be considered while internationalizing or localizing the interaction design of mobile keypads and displays for textual communication. The analysis is based primarily on heuristics tests, where: Hindi, Arabic and Danish mobile phones are evaluated based on assumptions of user needs, and in comparison to English. We have also referred the existing research on Chinese mobile phones to further complement our work. The study provides an insight into the much needed local-language centred approach in contrast with the current English centred approach of existing mobile keypad designs and display of text.

Reflections on Design-Based Research

Design-Based Research (DBR) is a relatively new intervention method investigating educational designs applied to real-life settings, and with a dual purpose to develop domain theories and to develop the design, iteratively. This paper is an integrative review, which draws on literature and empirical projects to identify and discuss critical elements in DBR, in particular when doing research in online educational projects, where the learning process expands from a traditional classroom to everyday work and life practices, as in competence development projects. Elements from two older, more mature, intervention approaches Interaction Design and Action Research, is included into the DBR discussion, and possible ways to work with the critical incidents are suggested. The paper argues that there is a risk of avoiding real-life factors by isolating the real-life intervention to the actors and actions in the classroom and thus mirroring some of the draw-backs in laboratory experimental research that DBR wanted to distance itself from. The discussion raises issues as users’ needs, resistance, organizational relations, and alternative design solutions. Also, this type of online and competence development processes needs new empirical methods, and an argument for rigour in the DBR analysis and theory generation phases isDesign-Based Research (DBR) is a relatively new intervention method investigating educational designs applied to real-life settings, and with a dual purpose to develop domain theories and to develop the design, iteratively. This paper is an integrative review, which draws on literature and empirical projects to identify and discuss critical elements in DBR, in particular when doing research in online educational projects, where the learning process expands from a traditional classroom to everyday work and life practices, as in competence development projects. Elements from two older, more mature, intervention approaches Interaction Design and Action Research, is included into the DBR discussion, and possible ways to work with the critical incidents are suggested. The paper argues that there is a risk of avoiding real-life factors by isolating the real-life intervention to the actors and actions in the classroom and thus mirroring some of the draw-backs in laboratory experimental research that DBR wanted to distance itself from. The discussion raises issues as users’ needs, resistance, organizational relations, and alternative design solutions. Also, this type of online and competence development processes needs new empirical methods, and an argument for rigour in the DBR analysis and theory generation phases is presented.

Usability in a Cultural Context: A Report on the Scope, Process and Research Results of CultUsab - The Cultural Usability Project

This paper focuses on presenting and discussing the aim, context, challenges, results, and impact of the Cultural usability project named as CultUsab. This project was a four year international research effort from 2006 to 2009, which was supported by a grant from the Danish Research Councils for Independent Research in Culture and Communication. The project aimed at innovating processes in Information and Communication Technology development through an understanding of culturally sensitive aspects of usability evaluation methods.

Virtual Teams and Human Work Interaction Design - Learning to Work in and Designing for Virtual Teams

The boundaries and work processes for how virtual teams interact are undergoing changes, from a tool and stand-alone application orientation, to the use of multiple generic platforms chosen and redesigned to the specific context. These are often at the same time designed both by professional software developers and the individual members of the virtual teams, rather than determined on a single organizational level. There may be no impact of the technology per se on individuals, groups or organizations, as the technology for virtual teams rather enhance situation ambiguity and disrupt existing task-artifact cycles. This ambiguous situation calls for new methods for empirical work analysis and interaction design that can help us understand how organizations, teams and individuals learn to organize, design and work in virtual teams in various networked contexts.