Rationale: Change management - what is it, how can it be used to support software development, and how can/should it be implemented?
Keywords: (user) experiences with change management, version control, configuration management, coordination, CSCW, distributed development.
Description: Working with the computer - whether developing programs or other documents - we inevitably create more versions of our
document(s). Furthermore, "documents" are usually so big that they are composed and have an internal structure and thus need configuration
management. How do we properly integrate these two aspects and handle the changes that naturally occur to our compound "document"?
In some (simple?) cases the problem has been solved, but how do we use this to support more complex cases? And can we use the single use
solutions also for groups of people working together? Can change management be used to support CSCW (especially distribution) and what are the
(special?) demands CSCW put on the change management system? Can (or should) change management methods be used to coordinate more peoples
efforts?
We especially welcome user experiences with (lack of) change management, so you do not need to do research in the field to participate
in this sub-workshop.
Form: The format of this sub-workshop will be a structured discussion, rather than a mini-conference. Participants will be
asked to prepare one or more short (5 min. max.) discussion statements to encourage a very interactive exchange of ideas and research.
Such statements can be based on research that has been carried out or on identified problems. The statements will be thrown in
as needed to get the discussion moving in a positive direction.
The result of this sub-workshop will be a better common understanding of change management concepts and problems and an annotated list of
research topics.
If you are interested in participating in this subworkshop, and/or have any comments or suggestions, please mail in advance to
bendix@cs.auc.dk stating your topics of interest.
Organisers: Lars Bendix (bendix@cs.auc.dk),
Ulf Asklund (ulf@dna.lth.se)
Henrik Bærbak Christensen (hbc@daimi.aau.dk)
Programme:
Friday August 21 (16.30-18.30): Remote development:
Software configuration management tools and common work practices has grown out from a situation
where people as well as files has been in the same location. The common view on what functionality
to associate with CM has been formed in this situation. Other aspects of system development has
remained manual, without tool support, and handled by more or less informal meetings such as a chat
over a cup of tea or in the corridor, meetings for code review, design discussions, task assignment,
integration planning etc. When people who work closely together are geographically distributed we
need to think about how these aspects can be supported in addition to how the traditional tasks are
to be supported.
We will discuss different occurences of remote development, especially the demanding situation that
occurs when groups of people work together on common tasks, although geographically distributed. How
do we compensate for (the lack of) informal meetings and face-to-face communication? How do/don't
current tools support the different situations?
Saturday August 22 (16.00-18.00): Parts and wholes: We will focus on how to version complete programs
and systems. Traditionally this has always been done by versioning the single parts, creating a version
group for each module or unit in the system. This has the drawback that an explicit system model has to
be created to describe the structure or architecture of the composed system - and that this system model
has to be versioned separately. Lately, several alternative approaches, such as COOP/Orm, Ragnarok and
CoEd, have emerged that version the whole system - its structure AND contents - as a single entity, thus
avoiding explicit system models. We will discuss advantages and drawbacks of this new approach with
respect to the traditional one.
