Developing collaborative social software

The Internet has an increasing role in facilitating communication between people and groups of people. As access to the Internet and World Wide Web is widely available, collaborative services enabled over the Internet are also burgeoning. In this paper, we present the current issues and our techniques for developing collaborative social software. We discuss online communities in the context of social collaborative systems. We then describe our approach to the development of supporting software for online communities and collaboration.

Evolution in software systems: foundations of the SPE classification scheme

The SPE taxonomy of evolving software systems, first proposed by Lehman in 1980, is re-examined in this work. The primary concepts of software evolution are related to generic theories of evolution, particularly Dawkins' concept of a replicator, to the hermeneutic tradition in philosophy and to Kuhn's concept of paradigm. These concepts provide the foundations that are needed for understanding the phenomenon of software evolution and for refining the definitions of the SPE categories. In particular, this work argues that a software system should be defined as of type P if its controlling stakeholders have made a strategic decision that the system must comply with a single paradigm in its representation of domain knowledge. The proposed refinement of SPE is expected to provide a more productive basis for developing testable hypotheses and models about possible differences in the evolution of E- and P-type systems than is provided by the original scheme. Copyright (C) 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Strategic organization in projects and firms through software integration

As integrated software solutions reshape project delivery, they alter the bases for collaboration and competition across firms in complex industries. This paper synthesises and extends literatures on strategy in project-based industries and digitally-integrated work to understand how project-based firms interact with digital infrastructures for project delivery. Four identified strategies are to: 1) develop and use capabilities to shape the integrated software solutions that are used in projects; 2) co-specialize, developing complementary assets to work repeatedly with a particular integrator firm; 3) retain flexibility by developing and maintaining capabilities in multiple digital technologies and processes; and 4) manage interfaces, translating work into project formats for coordination while hiding proprietary data and capabilities in internal systems. The paper articulates the strategic importance of digital infrastructures for delivery as well as product architectures. It concludes by discussing managerial implications of the identified strategies and areas for further research.

Generic unified modelling process for developing semantically rich, dynamic and temporal models

Models play a vital role in supporting a range of activities in numerous domains. We rely on models to support the design, visualisation, analysis and representation of parts of the world around us, and as such significant research effort has been invested into numerous areas of modelling; including support for model semantics, dynamic states and behaviour, temporal data storage and visualisation. Whilst these efforts have increased our capabilities and allowed us to create increasingly powerful software-based models, the process of developing models, supporting tools and /or data structures remains difficult, expensive and error-prone. In this paper we define from literature the key factors in assessing a model’s quality and usefulness: semantic richness, support for dynamic states and object behaviour, temporal data storage and visualisation. We also identify a number of shortcomings in both existing modelling standards and model development processes and propose a unified generic process to guide users through the development of semantically rich, dynamic and temporal models.

Developing a mobile visualization environment for construction applications

There is a renewed interest in immersive visualization to navigate digital data-sets associated with large building and infrastructure projects. Following work with a fully immersive visualization facility at the University, this paper details the development of a complementary mobile visualization environment. It articulates progress on the requirements for this facility; the overall design of hardware and software; and the laboratory testing and planning for user pilots in construction applications. Like our fixed facility, this new light-weight mobile solution enables a group of users to navigate a 3D model at a 1:1 scale and to work collaboratively with structured asset information. However it offers greater flexibility as two users can assemble and start using it at a new location within an hour. The solution has been developed and tested in a laboratory and will be piloted in engineering design review and stakeholder engagement applications on a major construction project.