
@subsubsection[On-Line Consulting System]

When Project Athena was established in 1983, one of the services to be
provided was a consulting service for users.  At the time, the
standard model of consulting was to provide a person to answer
questions.  However, Athena workstations were to be distributed across
the campus in different "clusters".  Providing full coverage by
student consultants in each "cluster" would have required over 10% of
the MIT student body, clearly impractical. Even if it were feasible,
each consultant would have to act as expert in every area of the
system.  The manger of user consulting addressed the problem by
designing a distributed consulting system, which includes live
consulting, a telephone service, and a program called
OLC@cite[coppeto].

The user types "OLC" at the Unix prompt and enters a question.  A
human consultant picks up the question (either immediately or as soon
as a consultant is available).  The consultant can send back a "stock
answer" (i.e. an answer from a database of the most commonly asked
questions), write a customized answer, or engage in a dialog with the
user to clarify the question.  If the user and the consultant are both
logged on at the same time, they use a system called Zephyr, which
pops up a window with text in it on the other person's screen.  If
either person logs out, the message is sent via electronic mail and
will appear in the inbox when the person next logs in.  Sometimes
conversations continue over several days.  If the consultant cannot
answer the question, he or she will send it to someone else who has
more expertise in the area.  Approximately 5-10% of the questions 
to the On-Line Consulting System are about how to customize software
and workstations for private use.

At the beginning of each semester, Project Athena introduces a new
software release.  The Fall '89 release required users to become aware
of "dot files", which users can use to customize different software
applications and the operating system works.  The Spring '90 release
introduced another user-visible change: a new window manager (MWM).  In
addition, the system for customizing one application (Zephyr) has been
completely revised.  This will only be visible to users who already
customize their use of Zephyr.  Other applications will be unchanged.


@section[Study Two:  Longitudinal Study of MIT Community]

Project Athena has an on-line consulting service in which users can
ask the consulting staff for help on a variety of topics.  One popular
type of question in the OLC database (5-10%) is how to customize
software.  I will examine the kinds of customization questions asked
and the circumstances under which they occur.  I will relate 
these findings to those in study one.

OLC is interesting for this study both because of the technology
itself (it is a technology that both resulted from and influenced the
technology at Athena) and because it records the critical issues for
users over a period of several years.  I have access to the logs of
all OLC questions for the past two years, and can correlate the
questions to changes in the external environment (such as upgrades to
the software or events in the school term).  I also plan to examine
the contents of the questions themselves, to get a feel for the kinds
of issues that users face and the how this relates the the kinds of
customization questions they ask.

I expect to see two competing processes: if the change in the software
causes total confusion, then the users will be LESS likely to
customize and will go into survival mode.  If the change in the
software makes them aware of the ability to customize, and doesn't
overload them, then I expect to see MORE customization.  I should be
able to differentiate these by looking at the individual questions and
by looking at the different types of changes.  I can also track
questions by user -- and users who ask more than one question -- and
check if they're confused and upset by the new release.  For example,
will an external event that affects the system increase overall levels
of customization?

Another interesting aspect of the OLC logs is that they include
dialogs between the questioner and the consultant, and often include
comments and suggestions by other consultants as well.  I have access
to the consulting staff and will ask them for their experience of the kinds
of customization desired and the problems that people face.

The OLC logs are interesting because they contain more than just
questions.  They contain dialogs between users and consultants, as
well as meta-dialogs among consultants.  Other consultants may look at
the interactions for a particular question and suggest other
alternatives at a later date.  This is important because it gives a
sense of the difficulty of the question and the social fabric
underlying the OLC consulting system itself.  (See Appendix
@ref[OLClogs] for examples of OLC dialogs about customization.)

@subsection[Participants]

Project Athena supports over 11,000 users on over 1,000 workstations
situated around the campus.  @comment[Of these, x% use the on-line
consulting system every semester.]  The consulting staff consists of
five full-time staff and approximately 20 volunteers, who answer
questions during consulting hours.  During non-consulting hours, the
questions are kept active and handled by the next available
consultant.

Prior to the fall of 1989, Athena accounts were restricted to MIT
undergraduates and faculty.  Accounts are now available to all members
of the MIT community, including undergraduate and graduate students,
faculty, MIT staff, research staff, Athena staff and visiting
scholars.

@subsection[Procedure]

I have developed a set of Unix shell programs to extract and summarize
questions from the OLC database.  Preliminary sampling suggests that
the number of questions specific to customization will not exceed
3,000 out of a pool of over 30,000 questions.  For some purposes,
simply identifying the questions and relating them to other events
will be sufficient.  For other purposes, a detailed reading of 
the questions will be important.

I plan to interview current and past consultants about the questions
they have handled about consulting.  I will show them graphs of the
OLC data and ask them if they can identify external events (e.g. a
system change or major breakdown) that might explain the results.  I
will cross-check the occurrence of these events with historical
documents.  I will also examine the creation and use of "stock
answers", because they represent the most commonly asked questions
by members of the Athena community.

@subsection[Proposed Analyses]

The dates of major changes in the system and major events in the
school year will be plotted against the dates of customization 
questions, to see if any patterns emerge.  The customization 
questions will be categorized according to topic and compared 
for differential sensitivity to external changes.

I will provide both qualitative and quantitative analyses.  Because
I have access to the text of the questions, which are actually
dialogs between the user and one or more consultants, I will 
be able to clarify a number of issues that might not be 
accessible with just summary data.


