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A Three-Layer Meta-Design Model for Addressing Domain-Specific Customizations

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New Perspectives in End-User Development

Abstract

Meta-design has been proposed as a model to design systems able to support End-User Development (EUD). Meta-design means “design for designers.” Differently than in traditional design, professional developers do not directly create a final application, but they build software environments thorough which non-technical end users, acting as co-designers, are enabled to shape up the application while they are using it. Allowing end users to participate to the creation of their applications, by modifying or even creating from scratch software artifacts, is very challenging. To make this possible, end users have to be provided with software environments customized to their specific domain, which they can easily understand and use. In order to cope with domain specificity, this chapter presents a new meta-design model that specifically addresses the customization to a domain of interest. Customization, performed by domain experts possibly in collaboration with professional developers, becomes the key activity to provide non-technical end users with software environments that are adequate to their knowledge and needs, thus allowing them to actually become co-designers of their applications. The model is illustrated by describing its successful application to the design of a mashup platform that allows end users to create new applications by integrating data and functionality taken from different resources. The customization of the platform to different domains, such as Cultural Heritage and Technology Enhanced Learning, is discussed.

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Acknowledgments

This work is partially supported by the Italian Ministry of University and Research (MIUR) under grants PON03PE_00136_1 - “DSE - Digital Services Ecosystem” and CTN01_00128_111357 - “SHELL - Cluster Smart Living Technologies”.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dipartimento di Informatica, Università degli Studi di Bari Aldo Moro, Via Orabona 4, Bari, 70125, Italy

    Carmelo Ardito, Maria Francesca Costabile & Giuseppe Desolda

  2. Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informazione e Bioingegneria, Politecnico di Milano, Piazza Leonardo da Vinci 32, Milano, 20134, Italy

    Maristella Matera

Authors
  1. Carmelo Ardito
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  2. Maria Francesca Costabile
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  3. Giuseppe Desolda
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  4. Maristella Matera
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Correspondence to Carmelo Ardito .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. ISTI - C. N. R. , Pisa, Italy

    Fabio Paternò

  2. FB 5, Wirtschaftsinf.k u. N. Medien, Universität Siegen FB 5, Wirtschaftsinf.k u. N. Medien, Siegen, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany

    Volker Wulf

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Ardito, C., Costabile, M.F., Desolda, G., Matera, M. (2017). A Three-Layer Meta-Design Model for Addressing Domain-Specific Customizations. In: Paternò, F., Wulf, V. (eds) New Perspectives in End-User Development. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-60291-2_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-60291-2_5

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