MiMeG eResearch

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MiMeG e-Research CSCW

• Mike Fraser, University of Bristol
• (thanks to colleagues at Kings College London)

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What everybody in CSCW knows e-Science should
know

• Studies of local work practice (science/
  research) are vital to understand and inform
  design of distributed research support tools
• Researchers do not collaborate simply because
  they have systems which are capable of sharing
  their information with each other (even very
  fast).

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Classic Grudin The adoption process

• Traditional approaches are problematic
• off-the-shelf model works for single user
  applications even if only half of users like it
  not so groupware
• top down push model works for organisation-wide
  information systems, but groupware does not
  command this level of support

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Classic Grudin The adoption process

• Implication exponentially increase the pricing
  of groupware (e.g. by providing bespoke hardware
  to run it on)
• Success hey presto, Ill buy ten access grid
  nodes please (at 30K plus space costs)
• Failure Everything else, especially open sourced
  material

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MiMeG

• We have open sourced our code!
• May 2006 Version 1 (GPL) Release
• Oct 2007 Version 2 (GPL) Release
• The software is a sturdy proof of concept but is
  not commercially viable neither are we in the
  business of producing industrial strength code
• We have been undertaking technical development
  and testing alongside studies of use in practice

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Some research shared real-time text and graphics
annotations
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Plan

• Enable remote understanding of pace and position
  of off-screen movement
• Especially off-screen to on-screen transitions
• Requires two components
• Real-time tracking of local off-screen position
• Visualising at remote site(s) appropriately

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Tracking Annotations
Gumstix Computer
Ultrasound Receiver
Electronic Whiteboard Marker
Bluetooth Aerial
Battery
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Response time results
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Response time results
1 second
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Studies of MiMeG system in use

• (full paper at ECSCW 2007 on Thursday)
• Some groups have agreed to be studied in using
  the software in greater depth
• describes the mechanisms researchers use to
  manage distributed analysis
• Local/remote activities
• Gestures and imitation
• Significant evidence that managing local work is
  useful for distributed collaboration

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Next Steps

• Do we aim to preserve/amplify existing practice?
  (which we have ethnographic evidence works for
  users) or do we aim to alter practice (based on
  experimental studies that say collaborative
  responses are easier to predict)
• What do we really want our software to do here
  to support or to alter existing practice?
• Can we generate new domains of practice in
  real-time distributed research is this a better
  commercial space than traditional workplaces?

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Next Steps

• Studies of distributed research practice in CSCW
  are few and lack detail
• Buxtons (1992) Telepresence challenge remains
  integrating task-focused activities with
  object-focused activities is still tough
• Real time groupware needs to move into the real
  world more, and perhaps researchers offer a
  better testbed than traditional workplaces for
  real-time distributed tools