Facilitating Asynchronous Participatory Design of Open Source Software: Bringing End Users into the Loop

TL;DR

This paper explores how to better include end users in open source software design through guidelines, personas, and a prototype tool, aiming to improve usability.

Contribution

It introduces design guidelines, personas, and a prototype tool to facilitate end user participation in OSS participatory design.

Findings

Identified key needs for OSS participatory design tools

Developed personas representing OSS designers and end users

Created a low-fidelity prototype to involve end users

Abstract

As open source software (OSS) becomes increasingly mature and popular, there are significant challenges with properly accounting for usability concerns for the diverse end users. Participatory design, where multiple stakeholders collaborate on iterating the design, can be an efficient way to address the usability concerns for OSS projects. However, barriers such as a code-centric mindset and insufficient tool support often prevent OSS teams from effectively including end users in participatory design methods. This paper proposes preliminary contributions to this problem through the user-centered exploration of (1) a set of design guidelines that capture the needs of OSS participatory design tools, (2) two personas that represent the characteristics of OSS designers and end users, and (3) a low-fidelity prototype tool for end user involvement in OSS projects. This work paves the road for future studies about tool design that would eventually help improve OSS usability.