Socio-technical Design of Ubiquitous Computing Systems

By using various data inputs, ubiquitous computing systems detect their current usage context, automatically adapt their services to the user’s situational needs and interact with other services or resources in their environment on an ad-hoc basis.

Designing such self-adaptive, context-aware knowledge processing systems is, in itself, a formidable challenge. This book presents core findings from the VENUS project at the Interdisciplinary Research Center for Information System Design (ITeG) at Kassel University, where researchers from different fields, such as computer science, information systems, human-computer interaction and law, together seek to find general principles and guidelines for the design of socially aware ubiquitous computing systems. To this end, system usability, user trust in the technology and adherence to privacy laws and regulations were treated as particularly important criteria in the context of socio-technical system design.

During the project, a comprehensive blueprint for systematic, interdisciplinary software development was developed, covering the particular functional and non-functional design aspects of ubiquitous computing at the interface between technology and human beings. The organization of the book reflects the structure of the VENUS work program. After an introductory part I, part II provides the groundwork for VENUS by presenting foundational results from all four disciplines involved. Subsequently, part III focuses on methodological research funneling the development activities into a common framework. Part IV then covers the design of the demonstrators that were built in order to develop and evaluate the VENUS method. Finally, part V is dedicated to the evaluation phase to assess the user acceptance of the new approach and applications.

The presented findings are especially important for researchers in computer science, information systems, and human-computer interaction, but also for everyone working on the acceptance of new technologies in society in general.

The Editors are all members of the Interdisciplinary Research Center for Information System Design (ITeG) at the University of Kassel in Germany.

The ITeG focuses on a socio-technical perspective on the design of information technology, and encourages it’s members to work with researchers outside of their own discipline. The research carried out within the center addresses the process of technical development from multiple perspectives including system usability, user trust and confidence in technology, and adherence to the law. In 2013 four research fields participated in the ITeG: Computer Science, Information Systems, Human-computer Interaction, and Law. All of these are represented in this book.