Papers by Giuseppe Fresta
Today end users are no longer mere consumers of computer tools but increasingly need to be more a... more Today end users are no longer mere consumers of computer tools but increasingly need to be more active producers of information and software artifacts. New techniques for engineering software are needed to support end users in this new role. This paper introduces one of ...
In several computer applications, end-users are experts in a specific domain, not necessarily exp... more In several computer applications, end-users are experts in a specific domain, not necessarily experts in computer science, who use computer environments to perform their daily tasks. In this paper we present a methodology for designing interactive systems based on the development of multimedia and multimodal environments for supporting the activities of such domain-expert users. We call these environments Software Shaping Workshops: they aim at easing the way people program and interact with computers, thus allowing domain-expert users to develop software applications without the burden of using a traditional programming language, but using high level visual languages tailored to their needs. It is shown how this design methodology is easily applicable through the software tool BANCO.
Visual Languages for Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) are a good basis for the development of sof... more Visual Languages for Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) are a good basis for the development of software environments to be used by professional people such as engineers, geologists, medical doctors, etc. The research we have conducted, along with the experience we have gained working with these people, has compelled us to develop software environments that not only are easier to learn and use, but also allow their users to tailor them to their own needs, and to even create or modify software artifacts. The design methodology that we have developed is refined in this paper, giving insights emerging from our recent experiences, and emphasizing how it supports human centric-computing and end-user development.
In our experience of computer scientists, we cooperate in participatory projects to develop compu... more In our experience of computer scientists, we cooperate in participatory projects to develop computer systems to be used by professional people, such us medical doctors, geologists, mechanical engineers. These professionals need to use computer systems for performing their work tasks exploiting all the communication and operation possibilities offered by these systems, but they are not and do not want to become computer experts. This has motivated the definition of a particular class of end-users, that we call domain-expert users (or d-experts for short) [4]: they are experts in a specific discipline (e.g. medicine, geology, etc.), not necessarily experts in computer science, who use computer environments to perform their daily tasks. These d-experts often complain about the systems they use, they feel frustrated because of the difficulties they encounters interacting with them.
... 56010 Ghezzano (Pisa) (*) tel: 050 3152943, e-mail: [email protected] (**)tel: 0... more ... 56010 Ghezzano (Pisa) (*) tel: 050 3152943, e-mail: [email protected] (**)tel: 050 3152933, e-mail: Giuseppe.Fresta@cnuce ... Il GML deve essere styled per poter essere presentato, generalmente come mappa o immagine, ma anche come testo o addirittura voce ...
Tailoring is an area of research in CSCW that allows interlacing design and use in a radical new ... more Tailoring is an area of research in CSCW that allows interlacing design and use in a radical new way. Tailoring is closely related to end-user programming (e.g. spreadsheet development) and a general term to encompass both endeavours is End-User Development. This workshop address tailorability in context of evolving existing systems and applications to the needs of cooperative work practices and organisations. It includes also the cooperative activates of tailoring itself; i.e. collaboration between end users to accomplish tailoring and indirect collaboration between developers and end users to simplify the understanding of tailorable systems.
Place names and administrative boundaries are changing over time. The importance of historical pl... more Place names and administrative boundaries are changing over time. The importance of historical place names and administrative/religious boundaries is widely recognized by scholars. In implementing a geographic names repository, several issues emerge, especially if the considered time range spans several centuries. Historical data get value if they can be put in their context, and this feature requires a solid data infrastructure. The pilot study leading to TGN relied on a database structure. The "ontological" approach and the LOD paradigm are offering even bigger advantages: interoperability and openness are the most relevant, because any information modeled using Semantic Web standards (like RDF and OWL) can be freely accessed and referenced by any web application. In addition, information is not bounded to be hosted on a single site/repository, but can be distributed everywhere on the Web. The project currently under way aims to make historical place names available acco...
ABSTRACT An important challenge for the coming years is to develop environments that allow people... more ABSTRACT An important challenge for the coming years is to develop environments that allow people without particular background in programming to develop and tailor their own applications. The aim is empowering people to flexibly employ advanced information and communication technologies. In this direction the European Community has recently funded EUD-Net, a Network of Excellence on End-User Development (EUD). In this paper, we discuss a framework for EUD and present our current work to design environments that support the activities of a special category of end-users, called domain-expert users, with the objective of easing the way these users work with computers.
Human Machine Interaction - Getting Closer, 2012
International Journal of Remote Sensing, 2003
ABSTRACT This paper introduces BANCO (Browsing Adaptive Network for Changing user Operativity) - ... more ABSTRACT This paper introduces BANCO (Browsing Adaptive Network for Changing user Operativity) - a software prototype designed to explore how to support users in their interaction with remote sensing, spatial and multimedia data accessed from remote Web servers - and how standard technologies evolve spatial and non-spatial Web sites. Meeting the request of new software environments, technologically up to date and handling both remote sensing and spatial data, BANCO proposes a novel architecture, in which users can, at the client side, customize their environment according to their role, culture and needs. As far as new technologies are concerned, BANCO relies on Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) - the recommendation of W3C for representing vector graphics on the Web - which is applied to specify not only the display properties but also the interaction mechanisms and the behaviour of 'objects' and tools, well beyond its original scope of mark-up language for vector graphics. The prototype is illustrated within a case study aimed at monitoring Alpine glaciers on the Web via information derived from remote sensing images.
Today end users are no longer mere consumers of computer tools but increasingly need to be more a... more Today end users are no longer mere consumers of computer tools but increasingly need to be more active producers of information and software artifacts. New techniques for engineering software are needed to support end users in this new role. This paper introduces one of ...
4th Italian Symposium on, Sep 13, 2005
Abstract. Computer users are evolving from passive consumers of computer tools and data to a more... more Abstract. Computer users are evolving from passive consumers of computer tools and data to a more active role of information and software artifacts producers. Current work practices require end-users to tailor their software environments for better adapting them to their needs, and even to create or modify software artifacts. We describe our meta-design methodology that allows user representatives to be involved in the design of systems that will be used by all the end-users.
Abstract Software shaping workshops (SSWs) described in this paper are software environments desi... more Abstract Software shaping workshops (SSWs) described in this paper are software environments designed to support various activities of end-user development (EUD) and tailoring. A design methodology to create easy-to-develop-and-tailor visual interactive systems that are organised as SSWs is illustrated. Users of an interactive system are in many cases experts in some domain different from computer science, who need to perform some task with the aid of the computer system.
Abstract Visual languages for human-computer interaction (HCI) are a good basis for the developme... more Abstract Visual languages for human-computer interaction (HCI) are a good basis for the development of software environments to be used by professional people such as engineers, geologists, medical doctors, etc. The research we have conducted, along with the experience we have gained working with these people, has compelled us to develop software environments that not only are easier to learn and use, but also allow their users to tailor them to their own needs, and to even create or modify software artifacts. The design ...
In several computer applications, end-users are experts in a specific domain, not necessarily exp... more In several computer applications, end-users are experts in a specific domain, not necessarily experts in computer science, who use computer environments to perform their daily tasks. In this paper we present a methodology for designing interactive systems based on the development of multimedia and multimodal environments for supporting the activities of such domain-expert users. We call these environments Software Shaping Workshops: they aim at easing the way people program and interact with computers, thus allowing domain- ...
Psychnology Journal, 2004
In the Information Society, end-users keep increasing very fast in number, as well as in their de... more In the Information Society, end-users keep increasing very fast in number, as well as in their demand with respect to the activities they would like to perform with computer environments, without being obliged to become computer specialists. There is a strong request of providing end-users with powerful and flexible environments, tailorable to the culture, skills and needs of very diverse end-user population. In this paper, we discuss a framework for End-User Development (EUD) and present our methodology to design software environments that support the activities of a particular class of end-users, called domain-expert users, with the objective of easing the way these users work with computers. Such environments are called Software Shaping Workshops in analogy to artisan workshops, since they provide users with the tools, organized on a bench, that are necessary to accomplish their specific activities by properly shaping software artifacts. The methodology is discussed, outlining its implementation through a web-based prototype.
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Papers by Giuseppe Fresta