TR158: CoMem: Evaluating Interaction Metaphors for Knowledge Reuse from a Corporate Memory

The objective of this research is to improve and support the process of design knowledge reuse in the architecture, engineering, and construction industry. Whereas internal knowledge reuse (reusing from one’s personal memory or experiences) is very effective, external knowledge reuse (reusing from an external digital or paper archive) often fails. Ethnographic studies of designers at work, performed within the framework of this research, show that the three key activities in the internal knowledge reuse process are:

• Finding a reusable item

• Exploring this item’s project context which leads to understanding

• Exploring this item’s evolution history which leads to understanding

The approach of this research is to support the external reuse process so that it matches the internal reuse process. The hypothesis is that if the designer’s interaction with the external repository enables him/her to:

• Rapidly find relevant items of design knowledge

• View each item in context in order to understand it, specifically:

• Explore its project context

• Explore its evolution history

then the process of reuse will be improved. This research addresses the following questions: (i) how do finding and understanding occur in internal knowledge reuse, and (ii) how can they be supported in external reuse?

This research presents a prototype system, CoMem (Corporate Memory), which consists of three modules to support each of these steps.

A usability evaluation of CoMem is performed using formal user testing. For this purpose, a usability testing framework and methodology is proposed. The key dimensions for the usability testing are the size of the repository, and the type of finding task: exploration versus retrieval. This research highlights the importance of exploration, which is normally overlooked by traditional tools.

The evaluation results show that CoMem offers greater support for finding and understanding than traditional tools, and reuse using CoMem is consistently rated to be more effective by test participants. This supports the hypothesis that finding and understanding lead to more effective reuse. This research makes important contributions by formalizing the reuse process, developing an innovative tool to support that process, and building a framework to study and assess such tools.