CSCW Computer Supported Collaborative Work

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CSCW Computer Supported Collaborative Work

• Using computers communications to facilitate
  work by more than one person
• This material has been developed by Georgia Tech
  HCI faculty, and continues to evolve.
  Contributors include Gregory Abowd, Keith
  Edwards, Jim Foley, Beki Grinter, Elizabeth
  Mynatt, Jeff Pierce, Colin Potts, and John
  Stasko. Comments directed to foley_at_cc.gatech.edu
  are encouraged. Material also is used, with
  permission, from James Landay. Permission is
  granted to use this material, with
  acknowledgement, for non-profit purposes. Last
  revision December 2005.

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Outline

• Definitions of CSCW and Groupware
• Groupware Technologies
• Styles of CSCW
• Groupware Implementation Issues
• Human Issues in CSCW
• Impact of Media Types in CSCW
• Evaluating Groupware
• Successes and Failures of Groupware

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CSCW Definition

• CSCW The use of computers (and communications)
  to support groups of people in doing their work
• Research area study how people work together as
  a group (using the technology) and the effects of
  the technology on that work
• Includes individual, group and organizational
  effects

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CSCW Examples

• Scientists collaborating on a technical issue
• Authors editing a document together
• Programmers debugging a system concurrently
• Workers collaborating over a shared video
  conferencing application
• Buyers and sellers meeting on eBay
• Two ways to collaborate
• At the same time (synchronously)
• At different times (asynchronously)

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Groupware - Definition

• Groupware the computer and communications
  technologies that people use to work together
• Groupware enables CSCW
• Goal is to design groupware to support the social
  processes of work, often among geographically
  separated people, to make work more effective
  than without the technology
• Requires understanding the social processes of
  work!!

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Styles of CSCW
Time
Different (Asynchronous)
Same (Synchronous)
Same
Place
Different
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Styles of CSCW with Examples
How do italic entries differ from other entries?
Time
Different (Asynchronous)
Same (Synchronous)
Face-to-face meeting classroom
Post-it note Schedule board In/out board
Co-located
E-meeting room
Argument. tool
Place
Phone, hand signals
Letter, telegram
Remote
Video conferencing
Email
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Styles of CSCW Groupware to Support
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Groupware Technologies

• Styles of Systems
• 1. Computer-mediated communication aids
• 2. Meeting and decision support systems
• 3. Shared applications and tools
• 4. Games
• 5. Education
• 6. Communications
• 7. Awareness

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Computer-mediated Communication Aids

• Examples
• Email, Chats, MUDs, virtual worlds, desktop
  videoconferencing
• Example CUSee-Me

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Meeting and Decision Support Systems

• Examples
• Corporate decision-support conference room
• Provides ways of rationalizing decisions, voting,
  presenting cases, etc.
• Concurrency control is important
• Shared computer classroom/cluster
• Group discussion/design aid tools

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Shared Applications and Tools

• Examples
• Shared editors, design tools, etc.
• Want to avoid locking and allow multiple people
  to concurrently work on document
• Requires some form of contention resolution
• How do you show what others are doing?

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Example - TeamRooms

• Teamrooms - Univ. of Calgary, Saul Greenberg

Video, CHI 97
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TeamRooms
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Example - CoWeb
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CoWeb Features to support collaboration
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CoWeb Handling Contention

• No locking
• On the Web, how do you know if someone walks
  away?
• But if person A edits, then person B starts and
  saves edit before A saves, how do you deal with
  it?
• One way A wins, but Bs is available in
  history for retrieval
• Another way
• Each edit time is recorded
• If incoming edit time is earlier than last save,
  then note collision. Provide user with both
  versions for resolution.

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CoWeb Security

• Save everything,
• But its mostly social pressure that keeps it
  working

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Roomware Second Generation

• Dynawall, CommChairs, and ConnecTable
• Streitz et al, Integrated Publication and
  Information Systems Institute, Germany
• CHI 2002 video

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AR Collaborative Environment

• Regenbrecht et al, sharedreality.com, Germany
• CHI 2002 video

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Groupware Implementation Issues

• Group awareness
• Multi-user interfaces
• hard to design/conduct controlled experiments
• Concurrency control
• consistency and reconciliation
• Communication coordination
• cant see each other -gt lose visual cues
• floor control

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Implementation Issues (cont.)

• Latency
• e.g., user points at an object and talk
• Security and privacy
• more...

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Implementation Issues Asynchronous Groupware

• Each user may have own copy of data
• Must integrate changes at some point
• example programmers working on source
• Problems when conflicts between changes
• lock portions of work
• keeps state well defined, although doesnt stop
  semantically incompatible changes
• resolve conflicts via integration mechanism

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Implementation Issues Synchronous Groupware

• gtTwo users working on same data, at the same
  time, in cooperation
• Extend Model View Controller (MVC)
• views copies of the model are distributed
• Propagate command history
• must resolve conflicts among N histories
• at what level are commands?
• mouse position not good enough (e.g., different
  font sizes, etc.)

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Human Issues in CSCW

• People bring different perspectives and views to
  a collaboration environment
• Goal of CSCW systems is often to establish some
  common ground and to facilitate understanding and
  interaction

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Social Issues

• Can these technologies replace human-human
  interaction?
• can you send a handshake or a hug
• how does intimacy survive?
• Are too many social cues lost?
• facial expressions and body language for
  enthusiasm, disinterest, anger
• will new cues develop? e.g., )

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Turn-taking, back-channeling

• In a face-to-face meeting, people do a lot of
  self-management
• Preparing to speak lean forward, clear throat,
  shuffle paper
• Unfortunately, these are subtle gestures which
  dont pass well through todays technology
• Network delays make things much worse

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Breakdowns

• Misunderstandings, talking over each other,
  losing the thread of the meeting
• People are good at recognizing these and
  recovering from them repair
• Mediated communication often makes it harder
• E.g. email often escalates simple
  misunderstandings into flaming sessions

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Usage issues

• Communication in the real world has both
  structured unplanned episodes
• meeting by the Xerox machine
• Much face-to-face communication is really
  side-by-side, w/ some artifact as focus

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Turn Taking

• There are many subtle social conventions about
  turn taking in an interaction
• Personal space, closeness
• Eye contact
• Gestures
• Body language
• Conversation cues

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Geography, Position

• In group dynamics, the physical layout of
  individuals matters a lot
• Power positions

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Impact of Media Types in CSCW

• Video Rich, but problems with gaze, gesture,
  non-verbal communication.
• Audio Conveys meaning well but not necessarily
  location
• Text Good for synchronous or asynchronous
  communication
• Ink Good for expressing ideas and brain-storming

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Video

• Eye contact problems
• Offset from camera to screen
• Mona Lisa effect
• Gesture has similar problems try pointing at
  something

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Audio

• Good for one-on-one communication
• Bad for meetings. Spatial localization is
  normally lost. Can be put back but tricky.

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Evaluation of Groupware

• Evaluating the usability and utility of CSCW
  tools is quite challenging
• Need more participants
• Logistically difficult
• Apples - oranges
• Often use field studies and ethnographic
  evaluations to assist

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Evaluation Efforts at Calgary

• Uses modified heuristic evaluation techniques
• www.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/grouplab/papers/2001/01-Heuri
  siticsMechanics.EHCI/talk/EHCI_2.html

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Successes of Groupware

• Email
• ubiquitous (Probably your grandparents have it)
• Newsgroups and mailing lists
• Videoconferencing
• growing slowly but steadily
• Lotus Notes
• integrates email, newsgroups, call tracking,
  status, DB searching, document sharing,
  scheduling
• very successful in corporations
• will the Web erode? Notes is more structured

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Failures of Groupware

• Shared calendars
• making a come back? web-based?
• Why does groupware fail? (Grudin)
• disparity between workers beneficiaries
• threats to existing power structures
• insufficient critical mass (Web reduces)
• violation of social taboos
• rigidity that counters common practice or
  exceptions

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Success/Failure of Groupware

• Depends on competing alternatives
• collaborators down the hall or across country?
• If users are committed to system, then etiquette
  and conventions will evolve
• tend to arise from cultural task background
• users from different orgs or cultural contexts
  may clash
• Synchronous systems that work well for 2 users
  may be less effective with more users