A Potential Design for a Prototype Online Communication and Collaboration Platform
-
Upload
sarah-jones -
Category
Education
-
view
236 -
download
0
description
Transcript of A Potential Design for a Prototype Online Communication and Collaboration Platform
A Potential Design for a Prototype Online Communication and Collaboration Platform
September 9, 2011Sarah Jones
Digital Library Services
Background
The Problem
Transportation planners and public health agencies are not working together effectively for regional development planning.
Background
A Cause for the Problem
There are barriers that keep them from working together effectively. One barrier relates to communication and collaboration.
– Transportation/regional level - fed laws require public input (environmental, minorities, community, etc.)
– Public health - input/planning has been lacking
Being overly dependent on automobiles → consequences, e.g., obesity.
Background
Hypothesis
Providing online tools will help them overcome the communication and collaboration barrier.
– provide an online destination for them to communicate, collaborate and share data amongst themselves
– use outputs from that destination to communicate with and engage the public
Background
This project
Provide a prototype online communication and collaboration platform with a set of tools that will address the barrier to transportation planners and public health agencies working together effectively.
Components of the online destination 1
Data storage and access• Hosting
– Self-hosting by the agencies– Professional data center hosting - commercial vs. non-commercial
(e.g., the UTA Data Center in Fort Worth)
• Value-added services (e.g., data search / parsing / analysis / visualization software)
• Security, privacy, protection of licensed content
Components of the online destination 2
Options for online communication:• Forums• Chat• Email• Meetings• Organization blogs• Individual blogs
Components of the online destination 3
Options for online collaboration:• Shared documents (text, presentation, spreadsheet,
whiteboard, desktop sharing)– e.g., Google docs, join.me, Dabbleboard
• Photo/image/video sharing– e.g., flickr, YouTube
Components of the online destination 4
Future options for providing a public-facing product:• Information sharing with the public
– e.g., news, agency blogs, individual staff blogs
• Gathering input from the public– e.g., through polls, blog or news comments, surveys
Back-end development requirements
• Data storage and access solution(s)– Whose servers? Who pays?
• Choice of web development platform– Local or commercial hosting with regular HTML– Use of a CMS, e.g., Drupal, Joomla, WordPress
• Integration of 3rd party web apps into the local user interface (e.g., the forums, chat, shared documents, etc.)
Support and maintenance requirements 1
• Data storage and access solution(s)– Who provides staffing? Who uploads new data? Who manages
the data selection and updating process?
• The web pages– Who provides staffing? Who manages, creates, updates
content? Who ensures content integrity?
Support and maintenance requirements 2
• If there is a public-facing portion of the web site:– Community manager (the public face/voice of the site/project
to the public)– Content strategy
• Unified marketing/public relations presentation of the agencies involved and of this particular project
User Interface Considerations
• Principles of User Interface Design (an entire field of study in itself!)
• Some places to start:– 10 Principles of Effective Web Design– User Interface principles in web design– A List Apart: Design– Key principles of user centered design
Issues related to overall management
• Who is/are the champion(s) for this project?– Enlisting support in the participating agencies– Cheerleading to maintain interest and participation among
individuals in the agencies
Questions and Discussion
Contact me:
Sarah JonesLibrarian, Digital Library ServicesUniversity of Texas at Arlington [email protected]