Presentation at the MATURE Workshop on User Centred Requirements Processes for E-Learning and Knowledge Management – A European-Wide Perspective, London, July 2009

1. MATURE
Continuous Social Learning in Knowledge Networks
MATURE Approach to
Requirements
Engineering
Andrew Ravenscroft,
John Cook (LTRI)
Andreas Schmidt (FZI)
http://mature-ip.eu
London, July 2, 2009

2. Outline
 Methodological outline
 Year 1 Design Studies
 Formative evaluation
 Use Case Development & Initial Requirements
 Year 2 Demonstrator Planning
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3. Design-based research (DBR)
“The challenge of design-based research is in flexibly
developing research trajectories that meet our dual
goals of refining locally valuable innovations and
developing more globally usable knowledge for the
field.”
(Design-based research collective, 2002, Educational
Researcher)
“The design-science paradigm seeks to extend boundaries
of human and organizational capabilities by creating
new and innovative artefacts”
(Hevner et. al., 2009), MIS Quarterly)
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4. Design Study Approach in Year 1
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5. Design Studies
 8 critical experiments in design
• explored key aspects that needed to be validated prior to
embarking on a full-scale draft requirements specification
 Characteristics
• Exploratory not confirmatory
• Focussed and time limited
• Based on existing tools with limited further developments
• Incorporated both conceptual and software development foci
• Application partner involvement (consortium/associate)
o Inspired by real user needs
o Developed in close interaction with end user representatives
o Collected feedback on the end result
• Evaluated
o Cover key aspects and phases of knowledge maturing?
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6. Design Studies in the project organization
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7. Evaluation and coordination: DS Grids
 DS grids linked design activities to conceptions and
activities consistent with knowledge maturing (KM),
through 12 questions
• What aspects? (conceptual, technical, user)
• Specified whether PLME, OLME, both
 Provided an aggregated picture of design activities
 KM: phases covered? commonalities? gaps? candidates
for integration?
…advance organisers to get design teams thinking in
terms of KM, ‘user requirements in context’
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8. Use Case Development & Requirements
Definition
Use Case Development &
Requirements Specification
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9. Overview of activities
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10. SER Model by Fischer
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11. SER applied to the use case process
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12. Coverage:
Use cases with focus on maturing phases
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13. On to Year 2:
from Use Cases to Demonstrators

14. Prioritizing use cases:
where should focus on first?
 Useful and user-driven:
Solving a real problem of application partners
 Focussed:
Adressing a key knowledge maturing issue,
yielding a distinctive solution
 Relevant to TEL research:
Adressing a key challenge for technology-enhanced
learning research (using the PROLEARN TEL priorities)
 Feasible:
Feasible within the project timeframe and resource
constraints
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15. How did we approach it?
 Collecting priorities from application partners and
scientific partners
 Aggregating high priority use cases into groups
 Development of demonstrator definitions
• Scenario
• Relevance for knowledge maturing
• Benefit for application partners
• Research challenges
 Cross-checking demonstrator definitions with
TEL priorities from the PROLEARN Roadmap
 Concrete planning (time, resources, involvement)
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16. Demonstrators
 Demonstrators covering groups of use cases
• Implementing a coherent scenario
• Feasible within one year
• Can be evaluated within the next year
• Clearly illustrate the added value of MATURE in an example
 Will evolve into the “MATURE solution”
(OLME/PLME/Maturing Services)
• built on a shared infrastructure
• Key architectural issues will be solved across demonstrators
 The other use cases will be added or redefined at a
later stage
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17. Overview of Demonstrators
 Demonstrator 1
Co n
Assuring Quality for Social Learning in Content ten
t
Networks
 Demonstrator 2 Sem
Developing Collaborative Understanding an t
ics
 Demonstrator 3
People Tagging for Organizational Peo
ple
Development
 Demonstrator 4 P ro
Maturing Process Knowledge and Learning Support cesses
in Business Processes
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18. Summary
 Design-based research as an underlying methodology
 First year activities were 8 focused design studies
• early and critical experiments in design that informed further
design activities prior to Use Case process (year 1)
 Use case definition as a moderated bottom-up process
 4 Demonstrators covering groups of use cases
with high priority and a coherent theme for year 2
• will constitute the 1st Prototype after year 2
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