“It Feels Better Than Filing”: Everyday Work Experiences in an Activity-Based Computing System

Summary:
In this paper, Stephen Voida (University of Calgary) and Elizabeth D. Mynatt (Georgia Institute of Technology) studied the use of an activity-based computing system named Giornata. Activity-based computing boils down to designing interfaces that allow users to organize their tasks and information in a personal way. This differs from typical desktop computing because users can tag/manipulate items and collaborate instead of simply placing items in hierarchical files and share the files without good descriptions. In order to better understand the potential benefits or hindrances of Giornata, the authors chose to create a full-featured system that was used over an average span of 54 days by the 5 focus users (two faculty members, two grad students, and an industry member).

Giornata was made for Mac OS X. Click the screenshot for a suck-free view.

Once opened, Giornata provides a virtual desktop for each activity, wherein all work pertaining to that unique activity is carried out. This can be compared to having multiple desktop tabs, where each desktop is devoted to something different. Tags can be applied to each activity, and documents that span different activities inherit all relevant tags. These tags can be searched over for easy recovery of information instead of just file names. Users were also able to collaborate with each other by sending activities via email directly from their activity's desktop.

The users reported generally positive experiences using Giornata. Because they were allowed to freely use the program without restrictions on time or features (as in a typical user study), each user developed their own habits of information manipulation and activity creation. Tagging was used by every person on at least one of their activities, but the users found it to be of limited use in the short-term, although they stated that they could anticipate long-term benefits. In addition, users kept all of their needed information on their virtual desktop instead of archiving it in a file system.

The authors concluded from their study that customizable visualized data is a benefit to users, allowing them to work freely instead of through a hierarchical structure. Also, they believe that having activity-based storage and areas allow people to more naturally organize their work as they would without using a computer.

Discussion:
I had never heard of activity-based computing prior to this paper, and I now find the topic to be pretty interesting. Being able to visually compartmentalize my work would be great. I have a habit of placing everything I need in a file structure, and then either forgetting how things are related or forgetting what items are due when. Giornata seems like it would help me with both issues. I would be interested in seeing this research expanded to include tools that are specific to certain activities, such as writing research papers and maintaining all needed information. Such an interface would be ideal for applications such as PowerPoint and Publisher as well.