Ontological Sketch Modelling focuses on the structures that people are working with when using an interactive system (rather than tasks or processes). An OSM representation describes entities, attributes and relationships that are relevant to the user who is using a device to support their work in a domain of application.
In this talk, I will present the background to this work and describe OSM, and report on results of a case study in which we applied OSM to the domain of time management. This domain stretches the modelling approach in some important respects. Firstly, the relationship between information in the head and information in the device is often ill-defined: the user's tasks are not achieved through the device, but with some support from it. Secondly, it would be an over-simplification to consider one user and one device as a closed system: usage of a particular device is strongly influenced by external factors such as the organisational and administrative structures within which they work, and the roles they play within that organisation. People use a broad selection of devices to support their time management, from their own memories, bits of paper and paper diaries through to sophisticated electronic diaries that can be accessed by co-workers and support group time management.
By focusing on structures rather than tasks or scenarios, it is possible to use OSM as a bridging representation that relates domain and device representations as conceptualised by users. This, in turn, allows the analyst to assess the quality of fit between the domain and device models.
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