Tutorial 1: Why Is Coming up With a Research Question Difficult? Mimicking Agile Methodologies for Defining Research Questions in Conversation With the Literature. 11:00 AM – 12:30 PM
Bio: Dr. Oscar Diaz is full professor at the University of the Basque Country (Spain). His current interests include Web Engineering, Software Product Lines, and Design Science Research. He leads a fifteen-member R&D group, ONEKIN. He has over 50 international publications that include VLDB Journal, ACM TOIT, ACM Computing Surveys or IEEE Software, and conferences such as VLDB, ICSE and WWW.
Bio: Dr. Jeremías P. Contell received the PhD, MSc, and BSc degrees in Computer Engineering from the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU). Currently, he is a lecturer at the Department of Computer Languages and Systems of the UPV/EHU. His research interests include design science research, web engineering and computer-based education. He is a member of the Onekin Research Group.
Abstract: Information System research rests on the understanding of practical problems and their solution counterparts. Frequently, solutions are not absolute but relative to the context where the problem is observed. This tends to imply that the solution and the problem unveil gradually together, and hence, researchers are not always in the position to state the research question (RQ) at the onset. Like software engineers when facing blurred requirements, researchers might not be familiar enough with the problem in the early phases of a research to properly scope their RQs. Here, the literature may play the role of the stakeholders in Agile methods: keeping the focus on the aspects that are essential (vs. accidental) of the RQ. Informed by Inductive Top-Down Theorizing and the Double Diamond design thinking model, this tutorial introduces RQ scoping as an iterative and incremental process, moving from systematic literature reviewing to agile literature reviewing. Specifically, this tutorial has three main objectives:
Raising awareness about the difficulties of coming up with a well-defined RQ.
Providing insights into the operationalization of the RQ scoping process.
Exploring the features of the FRAMEndeley extension for conducting RQ scoping in Mendeley.
Tutorial 2: The Work System Perspective: An Integrated Approach for Describing, Analyzing, Designing, and Evaluating IT-Enabled Systems. 2:00 PM – 3:30 PM
Bio: Steven Alter is a Professor Emeritus at the University of San Francisco. His experience as vice president of a manufacturing software start-up and author of four editions of a major IS textbook led to development of the “work system method,” a systems analysis and design approach that business professionals can adapt and use for their own understanding and for collaborating with IT professionals, consultants, and vendors. The underlying ideas were formalized as work system theory, which has been extended in many articles and conference papers over several decades. His continuing research aims to articulate a broader work system perspective that can serve as an integrated lens for high level discussions of sociotechnical and totally automated work systems while also providing paths for exploring specific aspects of work systems in substantial detail.
Abstract: This tutorial explains the most updated version of work system perspective, which extends work system theory (WST) and related ideas about the work system method (WSM). The tutorial covers the following aspects of the work system perspective:
Overview and nuances of the ideas in the work system framework and work system life cycle model.
Relevance to sociotechnical systems and totally automated systems
Analysis and design based on those ideas
Theories and frameworks that extend those ideas to address topics such as projects, service systems, workarounds, compliance and noncompliance, system interactions, facets of work, smartness of systems and devices, and an agent view of information systems.
Challenges in the continuing evolution of the work system perspective.
Tutorial 3: Open Source Software for Information Systems. 2:00 PM – 3:30 PM
Bio: Anthony I. (Tony) Wasserman has been a Professor in the Software Management program at Carnegie Mellon University’s Silicon Valley campus since 2005. At CMUSV, he created the Center for Open Source Investigation, a center that serves as a focus for his research. Tony’s research interests include organizational evaluation, adoption and use of open source software (osspal.org), software development environments, and software engineering practices for startups. Previously, Tony was the founder and CEO of Interactive Development Environments (IDE), a company that was one of the first 100 dot-coms and created the innovative multiuser platform for Software through Pictures (StP). Early in his career, Tony was Professor of Medical Information Science at the University of California – San Francisco, leaving to start IDE. Tony is a Life Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and a Fellow of the ACM, honored for his contributions to integrated software engineering environments. He was recently selected as an IFIP Fellow and a Fellow of the International Society on Product Management. From 2010 to 2016, he served on the Board of Directors of the Open Source Initiative (OSI) and served as the chair of IFIP Working Group 2.13 (Open Source Systems) from 2015-2022. He has been a member of IFIP WG 8.1 since 1977, and has served as both General Chair (1994) and an invited Keynote speaker at the annual CAiSE conference.
Abstract: This tutorial defines free and open source software (FOSS), and describes the benefits of FOSS software, and the ways it can be most effectively used by individuals and organizations. The focus is on open source components that are most relevant for building modern information systems, such as content management systems, NoSQL database management systems, AI tools, containers and microservices, as well as techniques for scalable cloud deployments. This tutorial describes the benefits of FOSS software for organizations, the ways it can be most effectively used within those organizations, and the likely future directions for it.
