Exploring ‘Canned Communication’ for coordinating distributed mobile work activities

Abstract

Communication between physically distributed people in industrial and safety-critical domains is often spoken and mediated through walkie-talkies, or closed-circuit intercoms. Because this kind of communication is hampered by noise, radio interference, lack of persistency, etc. vital information is sometimes lost. In response to this challenge, this paper discusses the use of 'canned' text-based messaging as a supplement for improving such communication. Based on data from ethnographic studies of work activities in an industrial domain, and grounded in a theoretical model of communication, we have designed and evaluated a mobile canned communication prototype system facilitating exchange of predefined text messages, a persistent graphical representation of the operation in progress, and a filtered list of completed tasks. Results from two evaluations show that in the domain considered, canned text-based communication has a potential to supplement voice and assist in overcoming some of the inherent problems of spoken communication. Yet using a textual and persistent mode of communication also raises new challenges such as choice of modality, speed, flexibility and handling situations deviating from standard procedures.

Was it worth the hassle?

“…Of the 23 papers reporting from lab evaluations, 14 involved some kind of context simulation. These simulation studies range from high-fidelity setups such as the use of a ship simulator in [38], to experimental setups where the level of simulation is rather low. As an example of the latter, Holzinger et al report from a study where the real life environment of an ambulance officer is simulated by the participant sitting on a chair in an office holding the PDA in his hands without laying down the elbows [23].…”

Designing a mobile communicator

“…Similar techniques were employed in the design of the maritime communicator (Kjeldskov and Stage 2006). The combination of OOA&D and Wisdom has been described in methodological form (Nielsen et al, 2006).…”

“…Research has shown that in such settings, increased value can be gained from the use of mobile and networked computer systems. Examples count remotely controlled service robots for the elderly or disabled (Hüttenrauch and Norman, 2001), wastewater treatment process control (Nielsen and Søndergaard, 2000), early diagnosing in emergency ambulances (van den Anker and Lichtweld, 2000) and coordination of distributed work activities on board large container vessels (Kjeldskov and Stage, 2006). Designing mobile computer systems for industrial domains is, however, not trivial.…”

“…The outcome of the study included design and evaluation of a maritime communicator; a handheld device to support communication and coordination on the container vessels. The literature from this study describes the basic design ideas as well as the design and evaluation processes (Kjeldskov and Stage, 2006). The user interface design of the maritime communicator integrates physical location, language, role and task.…”