1st Workshop, Human Factors and the Semantic Web

IN CONJUNCTION WITH ASWC, THAILAND 2008, 8-11 December // POSTPONED TO FEBRUARY 2ND 2009 DUE TO FORCE MAJEUR//

GOALS

To identify and bring to the attention of the research community the human factors in semantic web technology at large, and some of the challenges faced by general users to come to terms with the semantic web To identify differences in behaviour and perception of semantic web technologies arising from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds

NOTE: by semantic technologies we refer to any technology capable of supporting relationship associations on the open web, including technologies that are labelled as ' web 2.0' and not only RDF/OWL standards

RATIONALE

New semantic web tools are being released (primarily RDF based but Ontology editors and other semantic technologies too) that look promising and useful but little or no 'usability good practices' are in place to make such applications useful to those who have never seen one before (ie the majority of the intended users)

People (non developers) don't know

a) what to do with them

b) how to do it

Great advances have been achieved in in term of internet usability/accessibility of web based applications, so that now even grandparents can manage to check emails without prior knowledge - Semantic web applications are in a similar phase: non developers, otherwise intelligent users with different operational business and diverse IT background, need/want to learn how to use SW technologies, and give feedback to developers, but cannot even manage to run most of them, semantic technologies today are still designed to be used by specialists, and without the guidance of a user model. Understandable as these are mostly alpha/beta, but as they become adopted, usability must increase.

The workshop aims to expand the above list of 'issues' with inputs from different viewpoints, identify what is the cause of lack of usability, discuss possible initiatives that could increase usability, including possibly some futuristic web based application/service to collect all the user comments from semantic test environments and gather them in a repository that could be used to develop tutorials (support the users) as well as guidelines (help the developers develop

more friendly tools following appropriate guidelines). Anything else that interested contributors feel should be added/discussed

TARGET, WHO IS THE WORKSHOP DESIGNED FOR?

Researchers and practitioners in the semantic web should be increasingly aware of HCI in the context of new technologies, especially from a 'global' perspective, so this workshop would be of interest to all conference participants, as well as students of IT based in Asia/Indochina

TENTATIVE WORKSHOP AGENDA

=======================

Introduction and overview (workshop organizers)

Presentations

Break

Presentations

OPEN FLOOR DISCUSSION ON WORKSHOP ISSUES, FUTURE RESEARCH AGENDA AND DEBATE (all)

Conclusion

NOTE: EACH PRESENTATION WILL BE FOLLOWED BY QUESTION

Date and Duration

Half day during conference dates, to be announced

SUBMISSIONS ARE INVITED

We welcome scientific, academic and practitioners contributions from qualified authors and researchers as follows:

position papers (up to 2 pages) short papers (up to 4 pages) and full papers (up to 14 pages), as well as posters and virtual contributions, although only papers conforming to conference proceeding guidelines will be included in the proceedings

Note: Scientific and academic contributions should adhere to the formalisms and requirements of international research standards, practitioners contributions may be the result of less

formal investigations, deriving from professional or first person work in the field.

FORMAT

English, PDF, word or OD formats

Springer Verlag guidelines (HERE), OR OTHER FORMAT TO BE DISCUSSED/AGREED AMONG PARTICIPANTS

If conformant to paper submission guidelines, workshop papers will be included in the

workshop Proceedings to be published separately from the conference proceedings, otherwise just link your work here

SUBMISSIONS URL FOR REGISTERED AUTHORS AND REVIEWERS

NOTE: must log in EASYCHAIR.ORG before can view the pages below

EasyChair submission page:

http://www.easychair.org/conferences?conf=swaha08

EasyChair programme committee login page:

http://www.easychair.org/conferences?conf=swaha08

REVIEW PROCESS: Submissions will be peer reviewed by at least 2 qualified committee members

Contributions will be evaluated as follows:

- Originality and novelty of the research topic

- Contribution to Knowledge in the field (considerng it is an emerging area of research)

- Clarity of exposition

- Inclusion and appropriate citation to sources of knowledge and theories in the discipline, and related disciplines

- Conformance to guidelines

SUGGESTED SUBMISSION TOPICS (not limited to)

Usability of semantic web applications

- Issues, factors, metrics

Human and Semantic Web Interaction (HSWI)

Methodologies for developers (how to make geeks speak natural language)

Methodologies and Metrics for assessing SW usability

Human Factors in SW Applications Development

Case studies, findings,

Exploring Global Perspectives:

Cultural and linguistic factors in SW Applications

Ethnographics and the Semantic Web

Semantic Web functionality and acceptance, and regional human development issues

IMPORTANT DEADLINES X T E N D E D

Submission: 15 September 30 SEPTEMBER

Acceptance Notification: 15 OCTOBER

Camera Ready Copy: 30 OCTOBER (at the latest) - (sorry the planned extension to 15.11 was incorrect)

COMPLETE, CORRECTED, FORMATTED AND PROOFREAD PAPERS SHOULD REACH THE W/ORGANISERS NO LATER THAN 30 OCTOBER FOR INCLUSION IN THE PROCEEDINGS, LATER PAPERS WILL BE ACCEPTED BUT MAY NOT MAKE IT IN THE SPRINGER VOLUME AND CD!

Workshop Organisers

Paola Di Maio <paoladotdimaioatgmaildotcom>University of Strathclyde

Hanmin Jung <jhmatkisti.re.kr> - KISTI

Committee Members

Marco Ronchetti UNITN, ITALY

Lloyd Rutledge Open University, Netherlands

DoWan Kim, Paichai Univ Korea

Kyung koo Min, SK Telecom

Kyunsun Kim, Diquest

Christine Chan U OF REGINA, CANADA

Paul Janecek, AIT Thailand

Ernesto Damiani UNIMI, ITALY