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This thesis investigates effective ways of designing and integrating Interactive Multimedia (IMM) to facilitate teaching and learning of programming. Drawing on a preliminary investigation in IMM and learning, an initial design and integration approach was developed. The architecture and design features of IMM courseware and its integration were modelled to suppOli the learning activities defined by Laurillard's conversational and Mayes' learning frameworks and to accommodate the needs for the domain identified at two UK Universities. The approach aimed to improve the quality of student learning with IMM courseware through creating a learning context which supports the teaching and learning processes; encourages students to use the courseware for learning; and increases their motivation and interests in the subject matter they study. The primary emphasis of this approach lies in integrating IMM for lectures and tutorial. Sequent case studies were conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the approach in supporting teaching and learning. Two IMM courseware, consisting of resource-oriented and task-oriented materials, were developed and integrated into four programming modules at Napier and BruneI Universities. To explore the effects of hyperlinks in problem-solving contexts, three different variations of the task-oriented material were developed: one without hyperlinks, the second with questions (static), and the third with model answers when the questions were answered incorrectly (dynamic). The results suggested that student learning experience was enhanced by the use of the IMM courseware for teaching and learning: their performance and perceptions of the subject matters improved. Using the IMM courseware in lectures and tutorials enhanced the teaching and learning processes, promoted active learning and reflective thinking, and created collaborative learning environment. However, weaknesses were also identified in supporting student learning with different knowledge levels. As for the hyperlinks effects, the results showed that the 'dynamic' hyperlinks improved students' performance most effectively. They helped students become aware of their misconceptions and correct them through revisiting the resource-oriented material; and in the process reflect on what they learnt in lectures. The 'static' hyperlinks were found to be beneficial when students did not have sufficient knowledge to test. In addition, the results revealed various factors affecting student learning with IMM. Among them was students' familiarity with IMM, which emphasised the importance of integrating IMM courseware in a way that encourages students to use it for learning. The thesis presents a design and integration approach informed by the findings from the case studies, and proposes a design and integration process with IMM. The process consists of three phases (designing and integrating IMM, and facilitating learning with IMM) and the factors affecting the phases, and illustrates the relationship between them.

The necessity for scientists and others to use consistent terminology has recently been regarded as fundamental to advancing scientific research, particularly where data from disparate sources must be shared, compared or integrated. One area where there are significant difficulties with the quality of collected data is the field of taxonomic description. Taxonomic description lies at the heart of the classification of organisms and communication of ideas of biodiversity. As part of their working practice, taxonomists need to gather descriptive data about a number of specimens on a consistent basis for individual projects. Collecting semantically well-defined structured data could improve the clarity and comparability of such data. No tools however currently exist to allow taxonomists to do so within their working practice. Ontologies are increasingly used to describe and define complex domain data. As a part of related research an ontology of descriptive terminology for controlling the storage and use of flowering plant description data was developed. This work has applied and extended model-based user interface development environments to utilise such an ontology for the automatic generation of appropriate data entry interfaces that support semantically well defined and structured descriptive data. The approach taken maps the ontology to a system domain model, which a taxonomist can then specialise using their domain expertise, for their data entry needs as required for individual projects. Based on this specialised domain knowledge, the system automatically generates appropriate data entry interfaces that capture data consistent with the original ontology. Compared with traditional model-based user automatic interface development environments, this approach also has the potential to reduce the labour requirements for the expert developer. The approach has also been successfully tested to generate data entry interfaces based on an XML schema for the exchange of biodiversity datasets.

The perceived auditory environment is an increasingly important part of people's everyday interactive experiences. While sound design is an established discipline in media such as video games and cinema, this is not the case in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). HCI designers are rarely trained in sound design, and may not make the most effective use of sound in the design of interactions. Even when sound is at the centre of a design it is rarely evaluated to compare the experiences of designers and listeners. This dissertation reports work conducted to develop a way of comparing sound designers' intentions for a sound design with the experiences of listeners. Literature on methods of measuring, classifying and visualising sound was reviewed, as well as approaches to sound design in different forms of media and computing. A published method for representing auditory environments was selected for preliminary studies. The four studies addressed to the difficulties of describing auditory environments and how they might be visualised. Two surveys were conducted in order to identify attributes of sound that would be meaningful to 75 audio professionals and 40 listeners. A way of classifying and visualising sound events and their distribution in physical environments was developed and evaluated. The soundscape mapping tool (SMT) was trialled with sound designs from a range of fields within media and computing. The experiences of both the designer and listeners were captured for each of the designs using the SMT. This work demonstrated that the SMT was suitable for capturing the intentions of 10 sound designers and the experiences of 100 listeners. The trial also provided information about how the SMT could be developed further. The dissertation contributes evidence that auditory environments can be abstracted and visualised in a manner that allows designers to represent their designs, and listeners to record their experiences.

The field of coordinated and multiple views (CMVs) has been for over a decade, a promising technique for enhancing data visualization, yet that promise remains unfulfilled. Current CMVs lack a platform for flexible execution of certain kinds of open-ended tasks consequently users' are unable to achieve novel objectives. Navigation of data, though an important aspect of interactive visualization, has not generated the level of attention it should from the human computer interaction community. A number of frameworks for and categorization of navigation techniques exist, but further detailed studies are required to highlight the range of benefits improved navigation can achieve in the use of interactive tools such as CMVs. This thesis investigates the extent of support offered by CMVs to people navigating information spaces, in order to discover data, visualize these data and retrieve adequate information to achieve their goals. It also seeks to understand the basic principle of CMVs and how to apply its procedure to achieve successful navigation. Three empirical studies structured around the user's goal as they navigate CMVs are presented here. The objective of the studies is to propose a simple, but strong, design procedure to support future development of CMVs. The approach involved a comparative analysis of qualitative and quantitative experiments comprising of categorised navigation tasks carried out, initially on existing CMVs and subsequently on CMVs which had been redesigned applying the proposed design procedure. The findings show that adequate information can be retrieved, with successful navigation and effective visualization achieved more easily and in less time, where metadata is provided alongside the relevant data within the CMVs to facilitate navigation. This dissertation thus proposes and evaluates a novel design procedure to aid development of more navigable CMVs.

The creative industries sector faces a constantly changing context characterised by the speed of the development and deployment of digital information systems and Information Communications Technologies (ICT) on a global scale. This continuous digital disruption has had significant impact on the whole value chain of the sector: creation and production; discovery and distribution; and consumption of cultural goods and services. As a result, creative enterprises must evolve business and operational models and practices to be sustainable. Enterprises of all scales, type, and operational model are affected, and all sectors face ongoing digital disruption. Management consultancy practitioners and business strategy academics have called for new strategy development frameworks and toolkits, fit for a continuously changing world. This thesis investigates a novel approach to organisational change appropriate to the digital age, in the context of the creative sector in Scotland. A set of concepts, methods, tools, and processes to generate theoretical learning and practical knowing was created to support enterprises to digitally adapt through undertaking journeys of change and organisational development. The framework is called The AmbITion Approach. It was developed by blending participatory action research (PAR) methods and modern management consultancy, design, and creative practices. Empirical work also introduced to the framework Coghlan and Rashford's change categories. These enabled the definition and description of the extent to which organisations developed: whether they experienced first order (change), second order (adaptation) or third order (transformation) change. Digital research tools for inquiry were tested by a pilot study, and then embedded in a longitudinal study over two years of twentyone participant organisations from Scotland's creative sector. The author applied and investigated the novel approach in a national digital development programme for Scotland's creative industries. The programme was designed and delivered by the author and ran nationally between 2012-14. Detailed grounded thematic analysis of the data corpus was undertaken, along with analysis of rich media case studies produced by the organisations about their change journeys. The results of studies on participants, and validation criteria applied to the results, demonstrated that the framework triggers second (adaptation) and third order change (transformation) in creative industry enterprises. The AmbITion Approach framework is suitable for the continuing landscape of digital disruption within the creative sector. The thesis contributes to practice the concepts, methods, tools, and processes of The AmbITion Approach, which have been empirically tested in the field, and validated as a new framework for business transformation in a digital age. The thesis contributes to knowledge a theoretical and conceptual framework with a specific set of constructs and criteria that define first, second, and third order change in creative enterprises, and a robust research and action framework for the analysis of the quality, validity and change achieved by action research based development programmes. The thesis additionally contributes to the practice of research, adding to our understanding of the value of PAR and design thinking approaches and creative practices as methods for change.

The methodologies of systems design, rooted in engineering and in cognitivist conceptions of human action, have been stretched to the limit by the complexity of uses to which information and communication technologies are being turned. Within segments of the broader design community there has been a 'turn to the social' - a perception that there is a need now for richer stories about the everyday practices systems designers build tools to support. This thesis is presented as a contribution to the corpus of 'richer stories' about the what, how, why, when and where of information gathering. The thesis presents findings from an ethnographic study of newsroom information gathering at a UK daily newspaper. Adopting an analytical perspective based upon cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT), it describes and analyses journalistic information gathering on two mutually constitutive levels; that of activity and that of artefact mediation. Its starting point is that neither information gathering, nor the artefacts of information gathering, can be understood without consideration of the social, cultural and historical contexts within which they are situated. Ethnographic data is drawn upon to argue that journalistic information gathering can only be understood within the particular context of the 'story lifecycle'. Stories are the principal object of journalistic enterprise, and the thesis examines in detail how everyday working practices are oriented towards this lifecycle. Based on an analysis of the artefacts of newsroom information gathering, and of the discourses of information systems designers, it is also argued that the discourses of systems designers over-emphasise the importance of the category 'information'. In palticular it is argued that sources are how journalists orient themselves in the vast, heterogeneous information spaces they simultaneously inhabit and populate. The background to these discussions is the often controversial relationship between ethnography, theory and systems design. This relationship is examined and it is argued that the CHAT perspective provides design ethnographers with an opportunity to move from ethnographic intuition to design insight. It is also argued that at a more pragmatic level, CHAT helps the fieldworker navigate the apparently never-ending mass of 'potentially interesting material' any field experience throws up.

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With the increased complexity of Very Large Scale Integrated (VLSI) circuits, Computer Aided Design (CAD) plays an even more important role. Top-down design methodology and layout of VLSI are reviewed. Moreover, previously published algorithms in CAD of VLSI design are outlined. In certain applications, Reed-Muller (RM) forms when implemented with AND/XOR or OR/XNOR logic have shown some attractive advantages over the standard Boolean logic based on AND/OR logic. The RM forms implemented with OR/XNOR logic, known as Dual Forms of Reed-Muller (DFRM), is the Dual form of traditional RM implemented with AND /XOR. Map folding and transformation techniques are presented for the conversion between standard Boolean and DFRM expansions of any polarity. Bidirectional multi-segment computer based conversion algorithms are also proposed for large functions based on the concept of Boolean polarity for canonical product-of-sums Boolean functions. Furthermore, another two tabular based conversion algorithms, serial and parallel tabular techniques, are presented for the conversion of large functions between standard Boolean and DFRM expansions of any polarity. The algorithms were tested for examples of up to 25 variables using the MCNC and IWLS'93 benchmarks. Any n-variable Boolean function can be expressed by a Fixed Polarity Reed-Muller (FPRM) form. In order to have a compact Multi-level MPRM (MMPRM) expansion, a method called on-set table method is developed. The method derives MMPRM expansions directly from FPRM expansions. If searching all polarities of FPRM expansions, the MMPRM expansions with the least number of literals can be obtained. As a result, it is possible to find the best polarity expansion among 2n FPRM expansions instead of searching 2n2n - 1 MPRM expansions within reasonable time for large functions. Furthermore, it uses on-set coefficients only and hence reduces the usage of memory dramatically. Currently, XOR and XNOR gates can be implemented into Look-Up Tables (LUT) of Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs). However, FPGA placement is categorised to be NP-complete. Efficient placement algorithms are very important to CAD design tools. Two algorithms based on Genetic Algorithm (GA) and GA with Simulated Annealing (SA) are presented for the placement of symmetrical FPGA. Both of algorithms could achieve comparable results to those obtained by Versatile Placement and Routing (VPR) tools in terms of the number of routing channel tracks.

Ubiquitous Computing promises to enrich our everyday lives by enabling the environment to be enhanced via computational elements. These elements are designed to augment and support our lives, thus allowing us to perform our tasks and goals. The main facet of Ubiquitous Computing is that computational devices are embedded in the environment, and interact with users and themselves to provide novel and unique applications. Ubiquitous Computing requires an underlying architecture that helps to promote and control the dynamic properties and structures that the applications require. In this thesis, the Networking package of Communicating Sequential Processes for Java (JCSP) is examined to analyse its suitability as the underlying architecture for Ubiquitous Computing. The reason to use JCSP Networking as a case study is that one of the proposed models for Ubiquitous Computing, the π-Calculus, has the potential to have its abstractions implemented within JCSP Networking. This thesis examines some of the underlying properties of JCSP Networking and examines them within the context of Ubiquitous Computing. There is also an examination into the possibility of implementing the mobility constructs of the π-Calculus and similar mobility models within JCSP Networking. It has been found that some of the inherent properties of Java and JCSP Networking do cause limitations, and hence a generalisation of the architecture has been made that should provide greater suitability of the ideas behind JCSP Networking to support Ubiquitous Computing. The generalisation has resulted in the creation of a verified communication protocol that can be applied to any Communicating Process Architecture.