In this paper, we investigate the extent to which we could classify task difficulty in the softwa... more In this paper, we investigate the extent to which we could classify task difficulty in the software testing domain, using psycho-physiological sensors. Following a literature review, we selected and adapted the work of Fritz et al. (2014) among software developers, and transposed it to the testing domain. We present the results of a study conducted with 16 professional software testers carrying out predefined tasks in a lab setting, while we collected eye tracking, electroencephalogram (EEG) and electrodermal activity (EDA) data. On average, each participant took part in a two-hour data-collection session. Throughout our study, we captured approximately 14Gb of biometric data, consisting of more than 120 million data points. Using this data, we trained 21 naïve Bayes classifiers to predict task difficulty from three perspectives (by participant, by task, by participant-task) and using the seven possible combinations of sensors. Our results confirm that we can predict task difficulty for a new tester with a precision of 74.4% and a recall of 72.5% using just an eye tracker, and for a new task with a precision of 72.2% and a recall of 70.0% using eye tracking and electrodermal activity. The results achieved are largely consistent with the work of Fritz et al. (2014). We conclude by providing insights as to which combinations of sensors would provide the best results, and how this work could be used to enhance well-being and workflow support tools in an industry setting.
Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Computer-Human Interaction Research and Applications
Breakthroughs in Brain-Computer Interfacing (BCI) have positively impacted the lives of individua... more Breakthroughs in Brain-Computer Interfacing (BCI) have positively impacted the lives of individuals who suffer from highly-restrictive physical disabilities. BCIs based on Steady State Visually Evoked Potentials (SSVEPs) rely on a neuronal response which takes place in the brain's visual cortex whenever a person focuses visual attention onto a flickering stimulus. Specialized hardware and software tools exist for stimuli generation, however little to no empirical evidence exists on the applicability of standard web technologies for producing accurate and stable stimuli, for use in BCI applications. With the aim of informing efforts for the development of lightweight, portable and low-cost browser-based BCIs, this paper produces initial evidence on the performance attained by widely-adopted web technologies, namely CSS and WebGL. Results demonstrate that for the square wave approximation method, CSS and WebGL are able to effectively render stable and accurate stimuli on both Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox. a
Proceedings of the 34th International Conference on Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering
Software testers are an integral part of software development teams, and consequently need to und... more Software testers are an integral part of software development teams, and consequently need to understand from different perspectives the project entrusted to them. While developers might be required to understand a particular module or area of specialisation within a project, testers' comprehension requirements are more far-reaching . Gaining insights into how testers fare in different comprehension tasks is useful because it sheds light on how we could potentially support the efforts of the testing community. This paper reports the results of a laboratory experiment involving 15 professional software testers. Using NASA Task Load Index as our instrument of choice, we asked participants to carry out eight comprehension and application tasks across four categories (test case design, test automation, bug finding and adequacy analysis). We then analysed the data collected to seek to understand the effect of different task types, education level and participant experience on effectiveness and cognitive workload. The results suggest that, while experience is a key element in successful task completion, this is also influenced by task type. In fact, the more experienced persons actually tended to fare worse than their less experienced counterparts in certain tasks (namely, test case design and adequacy analysis). Level of education had no significant bearing on successful task completion but differences in cognitive workload could be observed for both experience and education-level variables.
Various accessibility standards and guidelines exist, targeting different disabilities. Nonethele... more Various accessibility standards and guidelines exist, targeting different disabilities. Nonetheless persons suffering from Severe Motor Disabilities (SMD) are generally excluded from development efforts, mainly because of a lack in accessibility regulations, standards and developer support. This work presents Butterfleye, a novel developer-centric tool that facilitates the development of accessible gaze-driven web applications for SMD users. Butterfleye relies and builds upon a widely-adopted open-source front-end framework to incentivise frictionless developer adoption. Low cost eye-tracking devices are also examined to lower barriers for end-user adoption. We present an open-source library developed iteratively over a series of user-centric studies and report initial evidence of, and observations on, its effectiveness with SMD users.
Proceedings of the 16th International Joint Conference on Computer Vision, Imaging and Computer Graphics Theory and Applications, 2021
Responding to a digital interruption requires software developers to transfer their attention fro... more Responding to a digital interruption requires software developers to transfer their attention from their ongoing task to the contents of the notification: a shift which will disrupt their original flow of work. This paper distinguishes between different types of notifications (intrusions and interruptions) and reflects upon the results of a survey with 88 respondents. This study contributes to research by providing insights consistent with literature, particularly related to how users react to push-based notifications during varying contexts, how the software developers perceive the cost and benefits of a notification, what features stand out in a notification and the strategies used to continue their work following a notification. a
International Conferences on Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering, 2019
This paper presents a study on surface roughness of workpiece when grinding SKD11, SUJ2 steels us... more This paper presents a study on surface roughness of workpiece when grinding SKD11, SUJ2 steels using Al 2 O 3 and CBN grinding wheels. The method on modeling and predicting of surface roughness of workpiece in the grinding theoretical research was applied. However, when applying this method, it is necessary to identify the value of the roughness adjust factor in practical case. In this paper, this factor was found by experimental process when surface grinding SKD11 and SUJ2 steels by Al 2 O 3 and CBN wheels. It helps values of calculating surface roughness to be similar to experimental datas.
International Journal of E-Services and Mobile Applications, 2018
Enrolment processes could make or break the success of an e-government service, and bad design de... more Enrolment processes could make or break the success of an e-government service, and bad design decisions could build up to a cataclysmic failure in e-service take-up. This article reviews a number of public-sector and commercial services which experienced adoption issues (or successes) arising from enrolment-related design decisions. A set of design shortcomings was synthesised, drawing on literature to assess their impact on end users, as well as on the service provider. These design shortcomings, along with a set of actionable recommendations, are discussed and presented with respect to the user, the task at hand and the environment of use, thus aligning this discussion to the core pillars of ISO-9241-210 (Ergonomics of human-system interaction – Part 210: Human-centred design for interactive systems).
Giving a voice to personas in the design of e-government identity processes
ABSTRACT Identity processes, such as enrolment and authentication, can have a negative impact on ... more ABSTRACT Identity processes, such as enrolment and authentication, can have a negative impact on the user’s experience. By using personas designers get a better understanding of the end-user during the design process. Personas represent a user archetype to assist in the development of [digital] products. However this technique involves a measure of subjective interpretation. Following a qualitative empirical exercise we extend the persona concept to include statistical capabilities in order to inform the decision making process through measurable and comparable feedback. This feedback indicates how acceptable an identity mechanism is for a specific group of users. For this purpose we propose calibrated personas, an extension of the persona design tool that encapsulates the necessary regression coefficients which can help us predict perceived workload and users’ willingness to complete a task given specific design decisions.
User registration can have a serious impact on the success of online government services. Differe... more User registration can have a serious impact on the success of online government services. Different services require different levels of identity assurance, and different registration processes are put in place to deliver them. But from the citizen's perspective, these processes often require a disproportionate amount of effort, which reduces users' acceptance. Typically, when sign-up to high-effort services is not mandatory, take-up is low; when it is compulsory, it causes resentment, and neither is desirable. Designers of services requiring registration currently have no way of assessing likely user acceptance at design time. We are introducing a tool that allows system designers to identify the impact of registration processes on different groups of users, in terms of workload and friction. Personas have been successfully applied to assist security designers, and we extend the concept with statistical properties, and introduce the Persona Group Calibration (PGC) exercise to calibrate the different personas for sensitivity to specific identity-related elements.
This paper discusses a web-based eTutor for learning electrical circuit analysis. The eTutor syst... more This paper discusses a web-based eTutor for learning electrical circuit analysis. The eTutor system components, mainly the user-interface and the assessment model, are described. The system architecture developed provides a framework to support interactive sessions between the human and the machine for the case when the human is a student and the machine a tutor and also for the case when the roles of the human and the machine are swapped. To motivate the usefulness of the data gathered, some examples of interactive sessions are given and models to capture both declarative and procedural knowledge during learning are discussed. A probabilistic assessment model is reviewed and future directions in the field of eTutors for electrical circuits are
User-centricity is a pre-requisite for a truly transformational e-government strategy. This goes ... more User-centricity is a pre-requisite for a truly transformational e-government strategy. This goes beyond visual design and appeal, and ties down to a rudimentary measure of how far people are willing to go to enrol for and use e-government services. Enrolment can have a serious impact on the success of online government services. Different services require different levels of identity assurance, and different enrolment processes are put in place to deliver them. But from the citizen's perspective these processes often require a disproportionate amount of effort, producing hurdles that affect user acceptance and ultimately service adoption. When enrolling to high-effort services is not mandatory, take-up is low; when it is compulsory, it causes resentment, and neither is desirable. Despite existing work on the impact of security and identity processes on end users there has been little work on how these contributions could be operationalised and adopted by practitioners and policy...
Proceedings of the 15th International Joint Conference on Computer Vision, Imaging and Computer Graphics Theory and Applications, 2020
The automation of people's roles at work brings changes to their lives and work, bringing advanta... more The automation of people's roles at work brings changes to their lives and work, bringing advantages of increased effectiveness and efficiency, yet potentially life-changing effects, including redundancy. The software industry's purpose is to automate people's tasks and activities, and this applies also to jobs within the software industry, including teams who specialise in testing software. Test automation projects are not always successful, and our research initially set out to discover whether the challenges were usability-related, and whether HCI methods could help improve tools. We discovered a much richer story, which told of emotional stresses and life experiences within the software testing community. We discuss how automation, with all its benefits, affects motivation, causing disassociation of testers from their roles, and affecting their job-task mix. We show reasons why software test automation affects testers. Finally, we set out our position for our research about the lived experience of software testers using automation, which we are calling TX: The Testers' Lived Experiences of Tools and Automation, and argue that the effect of automation and tooling on testers' lived experience and its effect on their motivation is an area of study worthy of research.
Proceedings of the 31st International Conference on Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering, Jul 10, 2019
Software testing is widely perceived to be the main activity in the software development process ... more Software testing is widely perceived to be the main activity in the software development process that provides confidence in the quality of a product prior to release. However, the term software testing itself provokes a multitude of different definitions and opinions as to the nature of the profession, the role of software testers and the utility of different processes and tools that come with the territory [1][2]. We argue that in order for researchers to effectively study the field and contribute to its progress, a consensus first needs to be reached about the entity being studied. In this paper we present an empirical study based on the modified Delphi card sort method involving four cohorts of testers in Malta and London. The result of this study is a consolidated consensus-based mental model outlining how software testers perceive their profession. This mental model can be used to align any future research efforts and tool development with testers' own perception of their context.
Choral activities are generally led by a conductor who uses visual cues and non-verbal instructio... more Choral activities are generally led by a conductor who uses visual cues and non-verbal instructions to drive the performance. Song dynamics are generally well rehearsed however live performances may necessitate unrehearsed messages in order to correct errors or to introduce dynamics in response to external factors. These messages are communicated by the choir master just-in-time, to which however, visually impaired choristers have no access. This paper outlines an investigation into how technology can contribute to this end while presenting a solution which adopts optoelectronic devices for gesture recognition, real-time communication protocols and over-the-air haptic-feedback to enable participation while minimising adoption barriers via intuitive and low-friction interaction. Insights from both qualitative and quantitative techniques will be presented along with techniques used to understand, assess and evaluate the domain in an iterative series of interventions. Human-computer interaction in choral activities, gesture recognition and interpretation, realtime communications
2015 IEEE/ACM 37th IEEE International Conference on Software Engineering, 2015
Exploratory software testing is an activity which can be carried out by both untrained and formal... more Exploratory software testing is an activity which can be carried out by both untrained and formally trained testers. In this paper, we propose using Human Computer Interaction (HCI) techniques to carry out a study of exploratory testing strategies used by the two groups of testers. This data will be used to make recommendations to companies with regards to the mix of skills and training required for testing teams.
Based on standardized protocols, Federated Identity Management is an emerging IdM approach which ... more Based on standardized protocols, Federated Identity Management is an emerging IdM approach which allows for identity sharing across institutional domains. Applied in both aeronautical and educational industries amongst many others [3], FIM is a preferred IdM technique since it allows for improved authentication workflows and enhanced security across institutional domains. This is mainly due to the improvement in identity mobility and hence, the reduction of redundant identity information across domains [6, 7]. Trust is fundamental in a federation and this paper will explore the challenges and opportunities of federating identity information across educational institutions in order to provide seamless authentication for students and academics. This paper will demonstrate how federated identity management can help students and academics within two Maltese educational institutions, MCAST and the University of Malta. It will also show how these can share resources, specifically with the...
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Papers by Chris Porter