Background/Context : The objective of achieving higher sustainability in our lifestyles by information and communication technology has lead to a plethora of research activities in related fields. Consequently, Software Engineering for Sustainability (SE4S) has developed as an active area of research. \ud Objective/Aim: Though SE4S gained much attention over the past few years and has resulted in a number of contributions, there is only one rigorous survey of the field. We follow up on this systematic mapping study from 2012 with a more in-depth overview of the status of research, as most work has been conducted in the last 4 years. Method: The applied method is a systematic mapping study through which we investigate which contributions were made, which knowledge areas are most explored, and which research type facets have been used, to distill a common understanding of the state-of-the-art in SE4S. \ud Results: We contribute an overview of current research topics and trends, and their distribution according to the research type facet and the application domains. Furthermore, we aggregate the topics into clusters and list proposed and used methods, frameworks, and tools. Conclusion: The research map shows that impact currently is limited to few knowledge areas and there is need for a future roadmap to fill the gaps.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version
Requirements engineers are in a unique position to encourage the consideration of sustainability at a formative phase in the software development life cycle. In this paper, we look at how we can develop sustainability as a non-functional requirement (NFR). We describe an NFR framework that is informed by sustainability models and discuss how it can be used to appropriately elicit and describe sustainability related requirements of the software system to be developed. We outline a roadmap for how we may integrate sustainability in requirements engineering from a theoretical NFR framework to an applicable software quality and relevant software standards.
New forms of infrastructure are needed in a world characterized by the burdens of global climate change, a growing population, increasing socio-technical complexity, and natural and human stressors to our human systems. Enabling communities to transition to a more resilient configuration of infrastructures is crucial for establishing a distributed portfolio of processes and systems by which human needs may be met. This paper proposes a potential way to increase infrastructure resilience by supporting the creation of alternative, decentralized infrastructures (ADIs) composed of small-scale, heterogeneous systems and processes. We see two possible roles for these ADIs: first, they could be integrated with existing infrastructures in the industrialized world, thereby providing some redundancy during times of strain on larger centralized systems; and second, they could help developing communities leapfrog centralized and more capital intensive conventional infrastructure. We present a model for how ADI systems may be built, based on principles from software engineering. Finally, we identify some challenges that go beyond technical implementation details in the instantiation of ADIs, and offer some thoughts on how to address them.
Current software engineering efforts typically rely heavily on industrial infrastructure. In a situation of civilizational collapse — which various researchers have suggested could ensue in the next century via an assortment of environmental, economic, and/or social pathways — this infrastructure may become less reliable. Previous research has offered some thoughts about what new forms of software may be relevant in the context of collapse. However, those papers did not consider how these new kinds of software would arise. Building on previous work in software engineering for sustainability (SE4S), information and communications technology for development (ICT4D), and collapse informatics, this paper explores how various forms of civilizational collapse would affect the software development process.
This year, at the ACM CHI Conference, we gathered as a group of HCI researchers, designers, and practitioners, to reflect on our role in designing sustainable food systems [6]. Designing sustainable food systems is a challenge that involves all parts and actors of the food system [5], including: 1) production and agriculture, 2) processing and manufacturing, 3) wholesale and logistics, 4) retail and food services, 5) purchasing and consumption and 6) waste management. Fifteen participants represented and discussed ongoing investigations into designing technologies for food and sustainability [1]. We reconsidered the role of waste, the potential for food to be used as medicine, the repercussions of antibiotic resistance, the pervasiveness of poverty, and the tensions between local and global systems. The workshop culminated in a design session focused on techniques and paradigms for future components of a sustainable food system. Designing sustainable food systems, including the socio-technical systems that work towards that ideal, is key to producing stable climates, societies, and economies. The ongoing and future changes in climate, food security, and socioeconomic issues are further complicated by a tenuous geopolitical context. Given this reality, it is imperative that we are deliberate in our design of food system components and supporting technologies so that we can better contribute to the sustainability of our food system.
There is significant interest in designing technologies for the food system, from agricultural modeling tools to apps enabling humans to assess nutritional value of various food choices to drones for pest detection. However, a good food system must be a sustainable one. There is an urgent need for deliberation and thoughtfulness in designing for both technologies that support existing food systems and new modalities that work towards more sustainable food systems. This workshop will bring together HCI researchers, designers, and practitioners with an interest in exploring what constitutes a sustainable food system, as well as defining the role of HCI in this domain. Our key objectives for this workshop will be to identify what opportunities for design and collaboration exist and to lay the foundation for an active foodCHI community.
Abstract-Research is often inspired by visions of the future. These visions can take on various narrative forms, and can fall anywhere along the spectrum from utopian to dystopian.Even though we recognize the importance of such visions to help us shape research questions and inspire rich design spaces to be explored, the opportunity to discuss them is rarely given in a research context.Imagine how civilization will have changed in 15 years. What is your vision for systems that will be supporting sustainability in that time? Which transformational changes will have occurred in the mean time that allow for these systems? Is ICT even the right tool or does it contradict sustainability by making our world ever more complex? How can we make systems and our societies more sustainable and resilient by ICT4S?This paper presents a compilation of fictional abstracts for inspiration and discussion, and provides means to stimulate discussion on future research and contributes to ICT4S community building.
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