ICSE 2011: Conversation with Kumiyo Nakakoji

ICSE, the International Conference on Software Engineering,®is the premier software engineering conference, providing a forum for researchers, practitioners and educators to present and discuss the most recent innovations, trends, experiences and concerns in the field of software engineering.

Thankfully, I got to attend ICSE 2011 and, even better, got to record a bunch of Expert to Expert episodes that feature the great Wolfram Schulte leading the conversations with specialists in various areas of computer science and engineering. What a treat! Thank you, Wolfram.

Kumiyo Nakakoji, Director at Key Technology Laboratory, Software Research Associates Inc., Japan, received B.S. in computer science from Osaka University, Japan, in 1986, and M.S. in 1990 and Ph.D. in 1993, both in computer science from University of Colorado, Boulder, certified in Institute of Cognitive Science. She has been spending her research career both in industry and academia. She has served as chairs, editors, and members for numerous research committees, journals, conferences, and government funding agencies, in the fields of Human-Computer Interaction, Software Engineering, and Design and Creative Knowledge Work Support. She was awarded Distinguished Engineering Alumni Award from College of Engineering, University of Colorado, Boulder, in 2006.

Dr. Nakakoji gave the Day 1 keynote at ICSE 2011, "Interactivity, Continuity, Sketching & Experience". The topic was design, both designing software(the world of making) and user-centric software design(the world of using). Often, these two worlds collide rather than work in unison - you have design professionals painting pictures and building out a user-centric experience and then you have software engineers who design and implement the software systems and algorithms that realize and drive the overall user experience of the software. The best case scenario is one where designers and implementors/engineers work in tandem throughout the development lifecycle. Let's find out from Dr. Nakakoji why this is the case.