Visualizing Workflow and Transparent Systems


I thoroughly enjoyed Jon Udell's interview with Ward Cunningham on IT Conversations. They talk a lot about Ward's efforts at the Eclipse Foundation to build transparent workflow systems. That is, as Jon puts it:

But what if you could find out, before pressing the Save button, what's going on in that black box? And what if your way of finding out wasn't by reading bogus documentation, but instead by probing the system itself using its own test framework?
From Ward Cunningham's Visible Workings « Jon Udell
Referenced Thu Mar 20 2008 08:42:43 GMT-0600 (MDT)

You'll want to read Jon's description of Ward's visible workings along with the podcast to get the most out of it. Better yet, I'd love to have a screencast of the system at work.

At one point Jon and Ward talk about how this might apply to eGovernment. Think about a button you could push at any point that would tell you how your current interaction with a government Web site was likely to proceed. I'd love to see it.


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Last modified: Thu Oct 10 12:47:18 2019.