Revision of the Groupware Users Interface Development Methods

Complexity inherent to groupware systems implies a considerable effort in design and development because of the need of multi-discipline collaboration work and the technical difficulty involved in the task (shared data, complicated collaborative activities, task distribution, group awareness, feedthrough, etc.). A key element for usability is the groupware user interface disposed to the enhancement of the group work quality in such aspects as coordination, communication, collaboration, etc. Different fields of computer science, HCI (Human Computer Interaction), CSCW (Computer Supported Cooperative Work), UCD (User Centered Design), and SE (Software Engineering), have contributed with the methodology, process, and tools model, which facilitates and improves different aspects of user interface development for collaborative environments. Still, the analyzed proposals do not completely cover the development process of a complete groupware system where interactive aspects are integrated with collaborative issues, not only in the interface but also in the application itself. Methodological proposals are analyzed in this chapter to detect how far they go in covering the development issues and trying to detect the strong and feeble points of every one, identifying the relevant aspects not yet covered in the fields dedicated to user interface development in this kind of system.