Information, Activity and Social Order in Distributed Work: The Case of Distributed Software Problem Management
Sandusky, Robert
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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/81534
Description
Title
Information, Activity and Social Order in Distributed Work: The Case of Distributed Software Problem Management
Author(s)
Sandusky, Robert
Issue Date
2005
Doctoral Committee Chair(s)
Gasser, Les
Department of Study
Library and Information Science
Discipline
Library and Information Science
Degree Granting Institution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Degree Name
Ph.D.
Degree Level
Dissertation
Keyword(s)
Computer Science
Language
eng
Abstract
Contributions from this project include the first detailed, empirically grounded description of the information practices used by a distributed F/OSS development organization to manage software problems, including the first description of a fundamental information object, the bug report network; clearly drawn distinctions between the information management work necessary to support the community's software problem management goals and the work that directly resolves software problems; identification of the processes and social arrangements that enable this community's distributed collective software problem management practices; explication of software problem management as a distributed, communal sensemaking enterprise; description of the layers of context and nested processes necessary to support distributed, information-intensive work; and the description of a new class of human information behavior, distributed collective information practices. Throughout, the ways in which information, activity, social order, context, and process are mutually constitutive are identified and explained. Bug report networks are used as a primary example of how activity leads to new forms of information, re-orders existing information, affects social order, and contributes to the community's efforts to bring problematic situations to closure.
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