CSCW and Remote Collaboration

1. CSCW and Remote Collaboration Gloria Mark ICS 221

3. Distributed CAD: TeleFly

4. The trend toward distributed collaboration • Virtual collocation - using technology to enable teams to collaborate as if they were physically collocated • Virtual organizations • e.g. International Virtual Aviation Organization • Virtual universities, learning environments, libraries • Virtual Universities: Germany, Africa (World Bank), UK, Austria, U.S.: MSU, KYU, Libraries: Asia, India, etc. • Virtual communities • MediaMOO (media researchers) • Virtual towns • Blacksburg Electronic Village

5. Motivation • How can we design better systems to support collaboration? • This means moving beyond information exchange • Predicting system success is hard: there exist many “failures” • non-adoption: users, system, interaction of context, users, system • system constrains how we interact, e.g. we are constrained in how we organize information • Rethinking of how behavior and systems can together be considered

6. Collaborative Technologies:Some examples • Synchronous, same place Electronic Meeting Rooms • Synchronous, different place Collaborative virtual environments video Data-conferencing • Asynchronous, different place Shared workspaces Email • Asynchronous, same place Shiftwork: voice messages

7. POLITeam • Development and introduction of a groupware system for distributed ministries(4 year project) • Cooperation support by: • simple workflows • shared workspaces • awareness services • Participatory and evolutionary design process

8. Congruent Use of Groupware • Developing same assumptions, goals congruent procedures • Face-to-face groups achieve congruency through: • communicative behaviors • merging perspectives • PoliTeam approach: • Interplay of design, user support, and system use • Supplementing user-user communication • Establishment and maintenance of conventions

9. Design Elements

10. Medium vs. Mechanism • Interaction flexibility vs. explicit exception handling • No a priori representation of process within cooperation tools • Situated cooperation support via the mediumvs. coordination through embedded mechanisms

11. Design Aspects • Easy switching between actions • Combinable cooperation media • Easy exchange of between media,no loss of meta-data • Metaphors signal function to usersand developers

12. Technical development basic functions additional support for individual work system - integration and extension group - awareness and conventions Stages of System Development Usage phases learning individual work group work norms & conventions

13. Usage Phases Trying solutions Discovering problems with interdependencies Refining functionality Refining functionality Setting up group functionality Understanding system use Transferring individual practices Setting up group functionality 6 months 12 months 18 months 24 months 30 months 36 months

14. Convention Requirements: • Once coordination situations recognized, conventions needed for (some examples): • common information structure, archive • shared tasks, e.g. managing shared documents • storage (e.g. aging information) • electronic circulation folder • borders between public and private work • access rights • Conventions especially difficult for emerging work processes

15. Developing Congruent Actions • Developed group work patterns required time • Group recognized consequences of interdependencies • e.g. shared files not returned, organizing shared addresses, stalled electronic folders • problems early were not recognized as such • Workshops played important role in facilitating recognition • naming conventions • file codes, common structuring • new situations, choice of functionality, general system behaviors

16. Lessons Learned System design • prototyping, groupware platforms, awareness Usage • Supporting user-user communication, value of situated work, convention support

17. Lesson 1Opening Windows of Opportunity • Exists a limited timeframe for modifications to system • Timeframe also exists for development of appropriate group dynamics • Windows must be kept open (and reopened) to insure flexibility • Windows influenced by events • Workshops • User advocates

18. Lesson 2Use the Tolerance Window • System introduction opens the window • Immediate reaction on needs keeps it open • immediate solution • prototyping • presentation of alternatives • Give users a feeling of being part of the process • Goal: trust and resilience

19. Lesson 3Requirements through Real Work Support • Initial judgments may not hold up in work practice • Electronic circulation folders not used in practice • Users did not predict that shared workspaces: • would be primary means for work organization, joint text production • Requirements can be reasonable in theory, not in practice • users requested file code prompt; then used dummy codes • “Latent” needs discovered in situated work • e.g. awareness, conventions, membership administration

20. Lesson 4Medium Approach Requires Awareness • Awareness demanded by users • Implicit notification about actions • Awareness necessary • to discover system functionality • to understand system as shared system • The more flexibilty the more awareness • actions are not foreseeable

21. Lesson 5A View of the Cooperative “Forest” • Users saw only “trees” • User advocates could see overview of cooperative “forest” • Recognized incongruent work patterns • Presented other users’ viewpoints • Mediated differences • Discussed alternatives with users

22. Proactive and theoretical evaluation is difficult. • dynamic in use • mutual interference with the overall process • different views Lesson 6Prototypes as Design Specifications Proof of concept Evaluation „1. Product version“ Re-Implementation ?

23. Lesson 7Conventions Need Technical Support • A variety of conventions neededin groupware use • Some conventions require extra cognitive overhead • foreign to one’s work pattern • extra work • Technical means can reduce extra actions • e.g. Leaving alias when removing object from folder • technically supported without enforcing it

24. access control communication create a share mediator container history member event admin. notification Lesson 8The Dilemma with Off-the-shelf Platforms • Restrictions • user interface • eventing • locking behaviour • access control • Re-implementation ofbasic functions • Problems with isolated evaluation

25. Conclusion • Design as a continuous development process • Design process and system designmust support congruency process • Window openers • Design process itself must reflect situated nature of group work

26. The Rise of Data-Conferencing Usage at Boeing

27. 54% learned about the technology from remote colleagues

28. Most contributed to diffusing the technology

29. Why they introduced technology to others

30. Technology Diffusion Across Distance • Unlike how other technologies are diffused, collaborative technologies are being introduced remotely • Desire to collaborate may be the driver for the diffusion of virtual collocation technologies • Technology diffusion process is changing

31. Supporting Virtually Collocated Teams: Desktop Conferencing • MS NetMeeting: client software • Shared application: all can display and interact w/info • Teleconferencing • Two meeting configurations: Conference room with remote sites All at remote sites

32. Problems with Virtual Teamwork • Inexperience with technology use impeded whole group • Problems with turn-taking, identifying speaker, who is present • strong turn-taking disadvantage for remote people • Members reported lacking knowledge to make sense of others’ on-line behaviors: • “reflective looks means they are thinking, silence on the line doesn’t” • “are they pausing for a comma, or for a period?” • Low involvement due to multi-tasking • low group commitment and meeting disruption

33. Developing New Roles and Means for Virtually Collocated Teams • Technology facilitator: leads to effective meetings • Meeting facilitator: integrates remote members into meeting • Chat window: additional communication channel • - enables parallel work without disrupting meeting • - advice for technology problems • - attendance check • - social communication

34. Scientific Team Attendance Face-to-face meeting Audio conferencing NetMeeting Number of Attendees Meeting Date

35. Attendance over Technology Phases: Greater Seattle

36. Total Number Sites for Scientific Team NetMeeting Face-to-face meeting Audio conferencing Number of Sites Meeting Date

37. Supporting Virtual Communities: Collaborative Virtual Environments • Goal: After mergers in which a company becomes more globally distributed, can a virtual environment provide connections among people, company-wide? • What value does a 3D graphical interface have for supporting informal interaction?

43. Work Roles of Users Manager 9% R&D 10% Engineer 33% Admin Support 17% Other 31%

44. Why Users Came Number of Users Other Learn about company Curiosity See new info To build Meet people

45. Biggest Benefits Number of Users Experience new tech Connected to others Meeting people Learning of co. Other

46. Reasons for Building 45 Number of Users 25 18 13 3 Test system Contribute to World Show to others Have own property Other

47. Enhancing Work I am able to confer with counterparts in other company groups... I can show off websites that I have developed for ISDS and he can then show them to others in his group by taking them to AW. I met a CAU who is helping to develop and maintain our virtual world site, and now is adding to our web site, providing tools for his group. Not so much one particular person, but the “connectedness” one experiences by dealing with people who are widely separated geographically in the real world. This technology, at least temporarily, removes that separation.... The contacts in Boeing World have made those distant places “feel like immediate parts of a whole.

48. Boeing World: Lessons Learned • No organizational support • non-work hours, disapproval of managers • User reports: CVE’s have potential, but technology not there yet • Events trigger usage (e.g. Town Hall meetings) • Need functionality to better “connect” people of similar interests

49. Extreme collaboration: Technology-enhanced warroom • Opportunity to study a warroom team using mix of technologies and human interaction • In 1995, Team X formed at the JPL to serve as internal consultants to NASA in designing new space mission proposals, e.g. Mars Probe • How can physical collocation and technology together enable a team to produce a space mission proposal in such a remarkably short time?

50. An Exploratory Study Using Life-size HDTV with Team X • NASA is interested in virtual collocation for these types of teams, to share expertise • Currently audio-conferencing used • Can another technology improve communication? • What impact does using high telepresence (using life-size HDTV) in virtual collocation have on team performance?