1. Enhancing Groupware with multimedia Acknowledgements to Euan Wilson (Staffordshire University)

2. Why? Co-operative working involves a number of people working together to achieve a common goal The distribution of organisations often requires that personnel are forced to work with colleagues who are situated remotely  “Home working”

3. Email, document exchanger etc. have assisted but there is still a failure to provide the level of user interaction that is required for co- operative working

4. Computer Support for Co-operative Working (CSCW) Term coined by Grief and Cashman [1984] exact meaning of term is open to debate but most authors agree –work is a co-operative activity, generally involving groups of people interacting to achieve common goals –the designers of supporting computer systems must address this co- operative nature of work

5. Role of Multimedia in Asynchronous Co-operation Often referred to as message systems build and send messages widely accepted and used many systems provide textual some allow the user to embed / attach other types of media (sound, video etc.)

6. Synchronous Co-operation Requires –the present of co-operating users –a shared information space / resources Provides –multiple users with synchronous access to the same data –speeds up processes which require the involvement of remote users

7. Synchronous Co-operation –Joint access to information reduces many of the overheads of travel and pre-arranged visits –periods of interaction between remote users become more frequent and shorter in duration (reflecting more an inter-building style of communication)

8. Synchronous Groupware Goal of achieving a shared digital workspace 4 classes –Desktop conference systems –Shared screens / windows –electronic meeting / decision rooms –media spaces include audio / visual

9. Desktop conferencing systems –workstation based applications for collaborative work at a number of desktops outlining, writing, sketching, drawing, building spreadsheets etc. –originally intended to augment face- to-face interactions –later expanded to support distance conferencing –[Engelbart 1994]

10. –Basic concept that all users saw the same things on their screen (a shared view) and –each could take turns interacting with the system Xerox PARC –collaborative brainstorming, argument development, free style sketching –small groups of two to six individuals

11. System Infrastructure for Desktop Conferencing Two general approaches to building groupware –Collaboration transparency a single user application wrapped by system software to make it usable by a group –Collaboration aware an application that is modified or re- written

12. Issues with Groupware over a network Greenberg & Marwood 1994 outlined –distributed processing –replicated information consistency –creating and maintaining real-time consistent views of a shared digital workspace –synchronisation issues –concurrency control

13. Approaches A single-user application deployed to multiple workstations which accepts inputs from all (requires a screen sharing system) or A windowing sharing system which enables the user to have a private workspace and to be able to share work when it suits the individual user

14. Or –replicated verses centralised architecture

15. Issues - Shared view systems Both Screen and Windows sharing systems leverage existing software into groupware therefore off-the-shelf software can be utilised, which has a major benefit in terms of cost, training, deployment etc.

16. But … two serious limitations –shared software is collaborative transparent the systems offer limited group capabilities this forces the group to work around the system I.e. only one member may be able to work at one time –technical limitations of the software issues arise due to the infrastructure of both the underlying operating systems and technical design of the software

17. Therefore Most systems are developed with the technical issues rather than what the users require. This results in performance issues and usability problems

18. Resulted in Research –moving away from operating system issues to support groupware to –design and construction of environments, toolkits and languages for building groupware »[GroupKit, Greenberg and Roseman 1994] »[Rendezvous, Patterson 1993] –requirements for systems to facilitate customisation and application evolutions »[Dourish 1995]

19. Electronic Meeting Rooms Original pioneers where not in Computing or Commercial R&D but in management and business schools requirement to produce GDSS seen as primary product of “management”

20. GDSS Tools to support –idea generation –idea organisation –prioritising –voting (normally anonymous)

21. Issues concerning the design of GDSS Architectural and ergonomic –Aspects of room, placement of people, method of user participation can effect –effectiveness and usability of the system other issues –interior design, colours, shape of table, position of workstations with respect to table

22. Idea Organisation Tedious task of idea organisation has been attached by using semantic analysis programs to make a first pass at clustering ideas although imperfect it has been found that people enjoy this stage more when the software has made a first pass »[Nunamaker and Briggs 1994]

23. Media Spaces Is a computer-controlled teleconferencing system in which audio and video communication and shared digital workspaces are used to overcome the barriers of physical separation

24. Media Spaces support Interpersonal space as well as a shared task space »[Buxton 1992] They not only support an application in use but give its users an awareness of who is around and how they can be reached »[Cockburn and Greenberg 1993]

25. Research has shown that video Can reduce physical barriers (through transmission over a network) and temporal barriers (through recording and playback)

26. Xerox Parc Mid 80’s Linked two labs by a 56 Kps lease line Audio and video link with a central feature of a video window allowed both labs to function and feel like one group and to convey a sense of presence

27. Certain verbal and non verbal cues where not transmitted as well as they would have been in a face-to- face situation. Resulted in the need to alter social protocols, supplement face-to-face meetings for video, and to be sensitive to issues of privacy

28. Deployment & Use of Groupware Grudin (1988) –Most groupware requires that all group members that use the application, but not everyone benefits –Intuition is a less reliable guide in developing and selecting groupware that single-user applications –Evaluating groupware is more difficult than single-user applications

29. Additional challenges –The need to reach a critical mass –difficulty of supporting existing social conventions –high degree of exception handling and improvisation that characterise group activity –designing features that are unobtrusive yet accessible –developers must carefully meet the challenge of adoption of the system