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Detecting and understanding reasons for defects and inadvertent behavior in software is challenging due to their increasing complexity. In configurable software systems, the combinatorics that arises from the multitude of features a user…
These patterns describe the strategies I use to find novel or unorthodox insights in the area of software design and research. The patterns are driven by inconsistencies between what we say and what we do, and they provide techniques for…
Divergent thinking in the ideation stage of creative problem-solving demands that individuals explore a broad design space. Yet this exploration rarely follows a neat, linear sequence; problem-solvers constantly shift among searching,…
Creativity is a critical skill that professional software engineers leverage to tackle difficult problems. In higher education, multiple efforts have been made to spark creative skills of engineering students. However, creativity is a vague…
Social coding platforms such as GitHub have become defacto environments for collaborative programming and open source. When these platforms do not support specific cognitive styles, they create barriers to programming for some populations.…
Design creativity, the originality and practicality of a solution concept is critical for the success of many software projects. However, little research has investigated the relationship between the way desiderata are presented and design…
Despite popular media interest in uncovering the creative habits of successful people, there is a surprising paucity of empirical research on the diversity of tendencies and preferences people have when engaged in creative work. We…
Agile approaches tend to focus solely on scoping and simplicity rather than on problem solving and discovery. This hampers the development of innovative solutions. Additionally, little has been said about how to capture and represent the…
Over the last 20 years, a very large number of startups have been launched, ranging from mobile application and game providers to enormous corporations that have started as tiny startups. Startups are an important topic for research and…
AI foundation models have the capability to produce a wide array of responses to a single prompt, a feature that is highly beneficial in software engineering to generate diverse code solutions. However, this advantage introduces a…
That computers should be easy to learn and use is a rarely-questioned tenet of user interface design. But what do we gain from prioritising usability and learnability, and what do we lose? I explore how simplicity is not an inevitable truth…
There is considerable anecdotal evidence suggesting that software engineers enjoy engaging in solving puzzles and other cognitive efforts. A tendency to engage in and enjoy effortful thinking is referred to as a person's 'need for…
Creativity assessment in science and engineering is increasingly based on both human and AI judgment, but the cognitive processes and biases behind these evaluations remain poorly understood. We conducted two experiments examining how…
This paper explores software's role in visual art production by examining how artists use and develop software. We conducted interviews with professional artists who were collaborating with software developers, learning software…
Three decades of empirical research in high-performing software development teams provides evidence that creativity can be promoted by an effective, disciplined development culture. This paper describes 'contrasting' as a key driver for…
Software systems are increasingly making decisions on behalf of humans, raising concerns about the fairness of such decisions. Such concerns are usually attributed to flaws in algorithmic design or biased data, but we argue that they are…
There are both benefits and drawbacks to cultural diversity. It can lead to friction and exacerbate differences. However, as with biological diversity, cultural diversity is valuable in times of upheaval; if a previously effective solution…
Current approaches to making programming languages and reasoning assistants more effective for people focus on leveraging feedback from users and on evaluating the success of particular techniques. These approaches, although helpful, may…
\textbf{Background:} Fairness and diversity are receiving growing attention in software engineering, particularly as AI and machine learning systems increasingly influence decision-making processes. While fairness is often examined at the…
Recommender systems are vital for shaping user online experiences. While some believe they may limit new content exploration and promote opinion polarization, a systematic analysis is still lacking. We present a model that explores the…