computer science

Semiotic engineering

Semiotic engineering is a computer science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Semiotic engineering rather than just read about it. In short: Semiotic Engineering was originally proposed by Clarisse de Souza as a semiotic approach to designing user interface languages. Over the years, with research done at the Department of Informatics of the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, it evolved into a semiotic theory of human-computer interaction (HCI).

Key takeaways

Semiotic engineering belongs to computer science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Semiotic engineering to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Semiotic engineering from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Semiotic Engineering was originally proposed by Clarisse de Souza as a semiotic approach to designing user interface languages. Over the years, with research done at the Department of Informatics of the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, it evolved into a semiotic theory of human-computer interaction (HCI). Semiotic Engineering views HCI as computer-mediated communication between designers and users at interaction time. The system speaks for its designers in various types of conversations specified at design time. These conversations communicate the designers' understanding of who the users are, what they know the users want or need to do, in which preferred ways, and why. The designers' message to users includes even the interactive language in which users will have to communicate back with the system in order to achieve their specific goals. So, the process is in fact one of communication about communication, or metacommunication. Semiotic engineering has two methods to evaluate the quality of metacommunication in HCI: the semiotic inspection method (SIM) and the communicability evaluation method (CEM). In the 2009 book Semiotic Engineering Methods for Scientific Research in HCI, Clarisse de Souza and Carla Leitão discuss how SIM and CEM, which are both qualitative methods, can also be used in scientific contexts to generate new knowledge about HCI. To illustrate their points, the authors present an extensive case study with a free open-source digital audio editor called Audacity. They show how the results obtained with a triangulation of SIM and CEM point at new research avenues not only for semiotic engineering and HCI but also for other areas of computer science such as software engineering and programming. René Jorna and Clarisse de Souza independently developed two different kinds of ‘semiotic engineering.’ Jorna's was originally closer to Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive Science. His ideas were later developed and applied to decision support systems and organizational semiotics rather than HCI. The authors were introduced to each other (and to each other's version of 'semiotic engineering') only in 1996, in a Dagstuhl Seminar on Informatics and Semiotics organized by Peter B. Andersen, Mihai Nadin and Frieder Nake.

See also Computational semiotics Organisational semiotics Semiotic information theory

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Semiotic engineering

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Semiotic engineering claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In computer science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Semiotic engineering before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Semiotic engineering ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Semiotic engineering

In research: Semiotic engineering appears in computer science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Semiotic engineering in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Semiotic engineering is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Human–computer interaction, Semiotics, Semiotics stubs, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Semiotic engineering outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Semiotic engineering in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Semiotic engineering means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Semiotic engineering out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Semiotic engineering in simple terms?

Why does Semiotic engineering matter?

Because it connects several computer science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Semiotic engineering?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Semiotic engineering.