Requirements and reuse in an agile environment for tabletop-based gis applications

Abstract

This work studies an approach for gathering requirements, designing and developing an interactive collaborative multi-touch tabletop Geographic Information System (GIS) in an agile software development environment to support the operation of control centers in utility companies and potentially other similar domains. The research is based on two case studies. The first study focuses on agile approaches for gathering requirements and iteratively designing gesture-based, multi-touch GIS applications utilizing digital tables, where a prototype - eGrid - is developed for supporting the operation of the control centre in a local electricity company. The design is iteratively enhanced and assessed through interviews and observation sessions. The second study proposes an agile approach for generalizing the design and extracting a library of reusable components - GISforTT - to support the development of other interactive GIS applications. The two studies proposed agile software engineering practises that were found helpful in designing and supporting reuse of interactive tabletop applications.