Design and knowledge work are pervaded by the use of computers. Yet, designers, architects, educators and scientists struggle every day with managing their digital tools and materials.
Modern software is rooted in assumptions of personal computing: a lone individual working on a single computer with pre-defined tools for an isolated task. These assumptions no longer match the dynamic, diverse and collaborative nature of modern work. DropBox for file sharing, Google Docs for collaborative editing, or Apple’s Continuity for moving work between personal devices are all makeshift solutions to fundamental challenges in the way we think and design software.
This project establishes an interdisciplinary research group at Digital Design and Information Studies (DDINF) and CAVI with the objective of identifying and articulating the challenges design and knowledge workers face in their use of software. This will inform a fundamental rethinking of the way we can conceptualise, design, develop and use software. The work of the group is an iterative interplay between theoretical and technical work and studies of and interventions in real work.
Thomas Plank, Hans-Christian Jetter, Roman Rädle, Thomas Luger, Clemens Klokmose Nylandsted, Harald Reiterer (2017) Is Two Enough?! Studying Benefits, Barriers, and Biases of Multi-Tablet Use for Collaborative Visualization. To appear in Proceedings of Proceedings of the 35th international Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '17). ACM.
