For proprietary reasons, the original, reviewed version of this paper has been wifhdrawn from publication. The
authors,however,will present the originalpaper in the sessioncalled Argumentation. - Ed.
glBIS: A Hypertext Tool for Team
Design Deliberation
Jeff Conklin and Michael L. Begeman
MCC
Software Technology
Program
3500 West Balcones Center Drive
Austin, Texas 78759-6509
ARPA: conklin@MCC.COM
begeman@MCC.COM
ABSTRACT.
This paper introduces an application-specific
hypertext system designed to facilitate the capture
of early design deliberations,
which implements a specific design method called Issue Based Information
Systems (IBIS).
The hypertext
system described
use of color and a high speed relational
IBIS
here, gIBIS(for
database server to facilitate
graphical
building
IBIS),
makes
and browsing
typed
networks.
networks
Further,
gIBIS is designed to support the collaborative
construction
of these
by any number of cooperating team members spread across a local area network.
Early
experiments
graphical
suggest that the gIBIS
interface
tool,
and design method
while
still incomplete,
even in this experimental
forges a good match
between
version.
INTRODUCTION.
There
is a growing
environment
been working
recognition
that hypertext
In the MCC
for the system design process.
on a hypertext-based
project
team of system designers a medium
is an ideal framework
Software
called the Design Journal
on which
Technology
to base a support
Program
we have
which is aimed at providing
in which all aspects of their work can be computer
a
mediated
This includes the traditional
documents such as requirements
and specifications,
and supported.
but it also includes designers’ early notes and sketches and their design decisions and rationale.
By design rationale
are later rejected),
commitments
thrusts:
we mean the design problems,
tradeoff
analysis among these alternatives,
that were made as the problem
(i) to understand
the interface
the structure
inherent
within
in capturing
resolutions
(including
and record of the tentative
was discussed and resolved.
and between
large amounts
those which
design decisions,
Our research
and firm
has two
and (ii) to address
design information
and in
As part of the
providing
effective methods for the indexing and retrieval of this information.
latter thrust we have built a running prototype of the Design Journal called gIBIS, which is based
on a simple model of design deliberation
called Issue Based Information
System, or IBIS.
November 1987
problems
alternative
Hypertext ‘87 Papers
of informal
247
THE IBIS METHOD.
The IBIS method was developed by Horst Rittel [RIT70], and is based on the principle that the
design process for complex problems is fundamentally a conversation among stakeholders (e.g.
designers, customers, implementors, etc.) in which they bring their respective expertise and viewpoints to the resolution of design issues. The IBIS model focuses on the articulation of the key
Issues in the design problem. Each Issue can have many Positions, where a Position is a statement
or assertion which resolves the Issue. Often Positions will be mutually exclusive of one another,
but the method does not require this. Each of an Issue’s Positions, in turn, may have one or more
Arguments which either support that Position or object to it. Thus, each separate Issue is the root
of a (possible empty) tree, with the children of the Issue being Positions and the children of the
Positions being Arguments.
A typical IBIS discussion begins with someone posting an Issue node containing a question such as
“How should we do X7” That person may also post a Position node proposing one way to do X,
and may also post some Argument nodes which support that Position. Another user may post a
competing Position responding to the Issue, and may support that with their own Arguments.
Others may post other Positions, or Arguments which support or object to any of the Positions. In
addition, new Issues which are raised by the discussion may be posted and linked into the nodes
which most directly suggested them.
I
or
h
\
;SUE
rk
AS-SUGGESTED-BYj
RESPONDS-TO
Figure 1: The set of legal rhetorical
THE glBlS
moves in IBIS.
TOOL.
There were three technological themes guiding our design of gIBIS. The first was an interest in
exploring the capture of design rationale [CON87b]. The second theme was an interest in supporting computer mediated teamwork, and particularly the various kinds of design conversations
that might be carried on via networked computers, a la email or news [EVE86,HOR86].
Thirdly,
we wanted an application in which we would have a sufficiently large information base to investigate issues regarding the navigation (i.e. search and browsing) of very large and loosely structured
information spaces.
248
Hypertext ‘87 Papers
November 1987
The gIBIS tool which emerged from these themes has the following features:
.
Integral Browser:
state information
vantage points: a
the network, and
.
Context Sensitive Menus: The gIBIS interface provides context-sensitive menus which constrain the users to making only “legal” methodological moves, thereby ensuring the taxonomic
integrity of the networks.
.
Multiple Access Paths: Users can instantaneously access any node in the network by directly
The gIBIS browser uses iconic shapes and color to clearly indicate
for nodes and links. It displays the issue networks from two tightly
global (or zoomed-out) view from which users can view the entire
a local (or zoomed-in) view which reveals the fine structure of the
type and
coupled
scope of
network.
mousing it in the browser, by selecting it through the hierarchically-ordered
index window, or
by use of the NEXT button, which leads users through the network in a structure-based,
linearized fashion.
.
An integral search and query mechanism allows users to rapidly search
through issue networks by constructing a proto-node whose structure and content mirrors that
of the nodes they wish to retrieve (i.e. a “query by example” approach).
.
Multiuser Support:
Search and Query:
The tool supports simultaneous access and update of issue groups by
multiple users on a common Local Area Network. gIBIS provides the necessary concurrency
control, locking, and update notification to allow real-time interactive network construction
by teams of cooperating designers.
Node
index
-t
Figure 2: The glB1.S Interface.
November1987
Hypertext‘87 Papers
249
OBSERVATIONS.
In the first seven months that gIBIS was available
people
created
21 issue groups containing
limited
data we can make some preliminay
in the MCC
Software
Technology
Program,
a total of 1153 nodes and 1237 links.
observations,
both positive
16
Based on this
and negative.
The Synergy of Tool and Method: The limited set of node and link types in IBIS and the use of
Users were generally enthusicolor and hypertext in gIBIS seem to complement each other well.
astic about using the tool, and reported
“axe
grinding,
The Dangers
hand waving,
of Premature
is that it is sometimes
problem
Segmentation:
unnatural
is pronounced,
One common
to break ones’ thoughts
and those thoughts
because the IBIS
text into a single node,
A Problem
with Context
unwinding
thread
directly,
of context
that the reader
hypertext
discrete,
as ideas are proposed
ones.
which
exposed
in hypertext
systems
units, particularly
or shifting.
austere selection
node structures
Traditional
linear
and discussed
when the
With
gIBIS
of node
which will bring an Issue’s
Issue-based
text provides
- a context
discussions.
a continuous,
which the writer
is
to guide the reader to the salient points and away from the
Indeed,
may encounter,
into discrete
the flow of ideas within
Documents:
constructing
and distracting
but subtle difficulty
imposes a rather
composite
smoothing
in Non-linear
if unconsciously,
irrelevant
on discussions
are vague, confused,
method
and link types on the user. We are exploring
deliberative
a structure
and clever rhetoric”.
is not well understood
this effect
that it imposed
a good writer
and carefully
anticipates
the questions
crafts the text to prevent
and confusions
these problems.
The
(or at least gIBIS) author, however, is being encouraged to make his or her points
and to separate them from their context.
Even the careful author is in danger of not
anticipating
all the various routes by which a reader may reach a given node, and so may fail to
sufficiently
develop the context necessary to make the node’s contents clear, if not compelling.
We have as yet found no solution for this problem.
Annotative
discussion
or “Metu”
when a participant
the IBIS structure
description
Discussions:
to present
for collaborative
In IBIS
discussions
there
is sometimes
a need for a meta-
in an issue group feels that someone has poorly or inaccurately
used
In fact, it has been noted that there are three levels of
their ideas.
work:
substantive
(the content
of the work),
annotative
(comments
about substance), and procedural
(comments about procedures and conventions
for use of the
all three levels can be discretely represented
by Issuemedium}
[TRI 8 61. In our framework,
based conversations.
Macro-level
Organization
the problem
of the effective
than a few dozen nodes.
of the Browser
Space: One of the “hot issues” in hypertext
use of a graphical
This is linked
browser
to navigate
to the more general problem
in networks
research
that have more
of disorientation
[CON87a],
but bears particularly
gIBIS
browser
on the visual and spatial aspects of disorientation
in a large data space. The
ran into these difficulties
as well. The global view and mechanisms mentioned
above have helped
250
is
to reduce
this problem
significantly.
Hypertext ‘87 Papers
November 1987
CONCLUSIONS.
We have briefly described the IBIS method, the gIBIS tool, and some preliminary
observations
about the use of the tool. Our experiments with gIBIS are informing our theory about the structure of design decisions and design rationale, and are providing us with important insights about
the design of the Design Journal, a hypertext-based
environment
for system engineering which we
will continue to design, prototype, test, and transfer into our shareholders’
development environments .
REFERENCES.
[CON87a]
Conklin, J. “Hypertext:
a Survey and Introduction”.
No. 9, September, 1987.
[CON87b]
Conklin, J., “The Capture of Design Rationale”.
fall of 1987.
[EVE861
Eveland, J. and Bikson, T.
empirical
assessment.”
computer-supported
cooperative
“Evolving
PrOC.
work.
I.E.E.E.
Computer,
Vol.
20,
Paper in progress, to be MCC TR in
electronic
CSCw’86:
1986.
communication
networks:
MCCJACM
conference
an
on
[HORS 61
Horton, M. and Adams, R (Center for Seismic Studies, Arlington,
Va.).
“How to
read the network news.”
Distributed
by Mr. Adams quarterly over the USENET
news network.
[RIT70]
systems.” Working paper
Rittel, H. and Kunz, W. “Issues as elements of information
#13I.
Institut fur Grundlagen der Planung Z.A. University of Stuttgart.
[TRI86]
Collaboration
in
Trigg, Randall, Lucy Suchman, and Frank Halasz, “Supporting
NoteCard.,”
Proceedings of CSCW ‘86: the Conference on Computer-Supported
Cooperative Work, MCCJSTP, Austin, Texas, December, 1986.
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