End-User Development (EUD) tools for Virtual Reality (VR) environments have the potential to lower the barrier to creating interactive VR applications, yet most existing tools remain single-user and provide limited support for collaboration. At the same time, recent advances in artificial intelligence raise new opportunities for supporting collaborative authoring through AI assistance. In this paper, we present Co-VREUD, a web-based EUD tool that enables the co-creation of VR environments. Co-VREUD supports real-time collaboration between two users, as well as collaboration between a human user and an AI assistant, and allows authoring from both PC- and VR-based interfaces. We evaluated Co-VREUD in a controlled 2 × 2 between-subject study with 32 participants, comparing collaboration type (human–human vs. human–AI) and device type (PC vs. VR). Our results show that collaboration introduces additional coordination overhead without yielding overall efficiency gains. Participants consistently preferred PC-based authoring over VR-based authoring and favored collaboration with another human over collaboration with an AI assistant. Qualitative observations further revealed distinct collaboration behavior patterns during human–human collaboration. These findings suggest that while collaborative VR EUD tools are technically feasible, they are not yet perceived as suitable alternatives to PC-based authoring, particularly for VR-based authoring. We discuss implications for the design of collaborative VR EUD systems and outline directions for future research on integrating human and AI collaborators into immersive authoring environments.

Security vulnerabilities in software systems represent significant risks as potential entry points for malicious attacks. Traditional dashboards that display the results of static analysis security testing often use 2D or 3D visualizations, which tend to lack the spatial details required to effectively reveal issues such as the propagation of vulnerabilities across the codebase or the appearance of concurrent vulnerabilities. Additionally, most reporting solutions only treat the analysis results as an artifact that can be reviewed or edited asynchronously by developers, limiting real-time, collaborative exploration. To the best of our knowledge, no VR-based approach exists for the visualization and interactive exploration of software security vulnerabilities. Addressing these challenges, the virtual reality (VR) environment SecCityVR was developed as a proof-of-concept implementation that employs the code city metaphor within VR to visualize software security vulnerabilities as colored building floors inside the surrounding virtual city. By integrating the application’s call graph, vulnerabilities are contextualized within related software components. SecCityVR supports multi-user collaboration and interactive exploration. It provides explanations and mitigations for detected issues. A user study comparing SecCityVR with the traditional dashboard find-sec-bugs showed the VR approach provided a favorable experience, with higher usability (SUS score of 70 to 58.75), lower temporal demand (TLX subscale of 10 to 42.5), and significantly lower frustration (TLX subscale of 17.5 to 52.5) despite having longer task completion times. This paper and its results contribute to the fields of collaborative and secure software engineering, as well as software visualization. It provides a new application of VR code cities to visualize security vulnerabilities, as well as a novel environment for security audits using collaborative and immersive technologies.

In the realm of conceptual and system design, mod-eling stands out as a pivotal activity, emphasizing the significance of mastering modeling languages such as the Unified Modeling Language (UML). Despite the existence of numerous interactive UML learning applications and the emergence of gamification-based alternatives designed to enhance learner engagement, a gap persists in providing an immersive learning environment ca-pable of significantly increasing interactivity during the learning process. Current approaches fall short in creating a sense of presence that could positively impact learning outcomes, and the full potential of gamification remains underexplored. To address this gap, this paper introduces an innovative so-lution-a gamification-based UML learning environment within Virtual Reality (VR), named GaMo Vr.This immersive platform is specifically tailored for practicing the creation of class diagrams in an interactive manner, incorporating mini games to support the learning process. The study conducted to evaluate GaMo Vrinvolved 16 participants and utilized the MEEGA360 question-naire. In comparison to a similar desktop application, the results of the evaluation revealed that GaMo Vrsignificantly enhanced learners' motivation, enjoyment, and engagement, along with a perceivable improvement in the overall learning outcome. This groundbreaking approach not only bridges the existing gap in UML learning applications but also harnesses the potential of VR and gamification to revolutionize the way modeling is taught and learned.

Modern AR applications collect a wide range of data to leverage context-specific functionalities. This includes data that might be private or security-critical (e.g., the camera view of a private home), calling for protective measures, especially in collaborative settings where data is inherently shared. A literature research revealed a lack of development support for privacy and security in collaborative AR. This makes it difficult for developers to find the time and resources to include protection mechanisms, leading to very limited options for end-users to control what data about them is shared. To address this problem, we present TARPS, a development Toolbox for enhancing collaborative AR applications with Privacy and Security protection mechanisms. TARPS is an out-of-the-box solution to add protection features to collaborative AR applications in a configurable manner. In developer interviews, the idea of TARPS was well received and an end-user study with an application created using TARPS showed that the included protection features were usable and accepted by end-users.

The concept of Transitional Cross-Reality Interfaces where a user can seamlessly transition across the Reality-Virtuality-Continuum dates back to the introduction of the Magic Book in 2001 but recently gained new research momentum since head-mounted displays advanced by combining the former distinctive concepts of augmented reality and virtual reality into a single device. New technological capabilities require new ways of developing applications to satisfy user requirements. Especially in the context of operating in multiple realities, developing AR/VR applications is not a trivial task. In this context, the development of Transitional Cross-Reality Interfaces remains a complex engineering problem that requires specific methods, concepts, and tools. To address this problem and provide a systematic development approach, we propose a conceptual framework for both developing and evaluating Transitional Cross-Reality Interfaces. To evaluate our solution, we implemented a Transitional Cross-Reality Interface based on our framework and evaluated it with both the measurements provided by the framework and additional questionnaires. We found high usability and interesting transitional behavior of users indicating the usefulness of the proposed framework as an underlying software architecture for Transitional Cross-Reality Interfaces.

Abstract The development of new business models is essential for startups to become successful, as well as for established companies to explore new business opportunities. However, developing such business models is a continuous challenging activity where different tasks need to be performed, and business decisions need to be made. Both have to fit the constantly changeable situation in which the business model is developed to reduce the risk of developing ineffective business models with low market penetration. Therefore, a method for developing situation-specific business models is needed. As a solution, we refine the concept of situational method engineering (SME) to business model development. SME, in turn, provides means to construct situation-specific development methods out of fragments from a method repository. We develop a concept for the continuous situation-specific development of business models based on design science. The approach uses the roles of a domain expert, a method engineer, and a business developer together with a repository with method fragments for developing business models and a repository with modeling artifacts for supporting the development. Both repositories are filled by utilizing the experience of domain experts. Out of these repositories, situation-specific development methods for developing business models can be continuously composed based on the changeable situation by the method engineer and enacted by the business developer. We implement it as an open-source tool and evaluate its applicability in an industrial case study of developing a business model for a local event platform. Our results show that situation awareness supports the continuous development of business models.

Modeling is a key activity in conceptual design and system design. Through collaborative modeling, end-users, stakeholders, experts, and entrepreneurs are able to create a shared understanding of a system representation. While the Unified Modeling Language (UML) is one of the major conceptual modeling languages in object-oriented software engineering, more and more concerns arise from the modeling quality of UML and its tool-support. Among them, the limitation of the two-dimensional presentation of its notations and lack of natural collaborative modeling tools are reported to be significant. In this paper, we explore the potential of using virtual reality (VR) technology for collaborative UML software design by comparing it with classical collaborative software design using conventional devices (desktop PC/laptop). For this purpose, we have developed a VR modeling environment that offers a natural collaborative modeling experience for UML Class Diagrams. Based on a user study with 24 participants, we have compared collaborative VR modeling with conventional modeling with regard to efficiency, effectiveness, and user satisfaction. Results show that the use of VR has some disadvantages concerning efficiency and effectiveness, but the user's fun, the feeling of being in the same room with a remote collaborator, and the naturalness of collaboration were increased.

Modeling is a key activity in conceptual design and system design. Through collaborative modeling, end-users, stakeholders, experts, and entrepreneurs are able to create a shared understanding of a system representation. While the Unified Modeling Language (UML) is one of the major conceptual modeling languages in object-oriented software engineering, more and more concerns arise from the modeling quality of UML and its tool-support. Among them, the limitation of the two-dimensional presentation of its notations and lack of natural collaborative modeling tools are reported to be significant. In this paper, we explore the potential of using Virtual Reality (VR) technology for collaborative UML software design by comparing it with classical collaborative software design using conventional devices (Desktop PC / Laptop). For this purpose, we have developed a VR modeling environment that offers a natural collaborative modeling experience for UML Class Diagrams. Based on a user study with 24 participants, we have compared collaborative VR modeling with conventional modeling with regard to efficiency, effectiveness, and user satisfaction. Results show that the use of VR has some disadvantages concerning efficiency and effectiveness, but the user's fun, the feeling of being in the same room with a remote collaborator, and the naturalness of collaboration were increased.

Recent advances in Virtual Reality (VR) technology and the increased availability of VR-equipped devices enable a wide range of consumer-oriented applications. For novice developers, however, creating interactive scenes for VR applications is a complex and cumbersome task that requires high technical knowledge which is often missing. This hinders the potential of enabling novices to create, modify, and execute their own interactive VR scenes. Although recent authoring tools for interactive VR scenes are promising, most of them focus on expert professionals as the target group and neglect the novices with low programming knowledge. To lower the entry barrier, we provide an open-source web-based End-User Development (EUD) tool, called VREUD, that supports the rapid construction and execution of interactive VR scenes. Concerning construction, VREUD enables the specification of the VR scene including interactions and tasks. Furthermore, VREUD supports the execution and immersive experience of the created interactive VR scenes on VR head-mounted displays. Based on a user study, we have analyzed the effectiveness, efficiency, and user satisfaction of VREUD which shows promising results to empower novices in creating their interactive VR scenes.

Virtual reality (VR) has evolved into a trending technology that has proven its worth in various application domains. VR is especially helpful for the training of complex tasks in special environments. In the area of logistics, warehouse management involves a complex workflow that consists of different order picking activities. Due to this complex workflow, stock discrepancies and misplaced wares are typical problems that often occur. To overcome this problem, we have developed a VR training application that integrates an existing warehouse management system and trains typical order picking processes. In our VR training demo, we simulate a real warehouse that is supplied with real stocks and real orders.

Abstract Modern user interfaces (UIs) are increasingly expected to be plastic, in the sense that they retain a constant level of usability, even when subjected to context changes at runtime. Self-adaptive user interfaces (SAUIs) have been promoted as a solution for context variability due to their ability to automatically adapt to the context-of-use at runtime. The development of SAUIs is a challenging and complex task as additional aspects like context management and UI adaptation have to be covered. In classical model-driven UI development approaches, these aspects are not fully integrated and hence introduce additional complexity as they represent crosscutting concerns. In this paper, we present an integrated model-driven development approach where a classical model-driven development of UIs is coupled with a model-driven development of context-of-use and UI adaptation rules. We base our approach on the core UI modeling language IFML and introduce new modeling languages for context-of-use (ContextML) and UI adaptation rules (AdaptML). The generated UI code, based on the IFML model, is coupled with the context and adaptation services, generated from the ContextML and AdaptML model, respectively. The integration of the generated artifacts, namely UI code, context, and adaptation services in an overall rule-based execution environment, enables runtime UI adaptation. The benefit of our approach is demonstrated by two case studies, showing the development of SAUIs for different application scenarios and a usability study which has been conducted to analyze end-user satisfaction of SAUIs.

Migration of test cases has a twofold benefit in software migration projects: reuse of valuable knowledge as well as time and cost savings. The diversity of software migration project contexts require a flexible and modular construction method to address several aspects like different system and test environments or the impact of the system changes on the test cases. When an inappropriate migration method is used, it may increase the effort and the costs and also decrease the overall software quality. Therefore, a critical task in test case migration is to provide a transformation method which fits the context. To address this problem, in this paper, we present a framework that enables a modular construction of context-specific migration methods for test cases by assembling predefined building blocks. Our approach builds upon an existing framework for modular construction of software transformation methods and consists of a method base and a method engineering process. Method fragments are the atomic building blocks of a migration method, whereas method patterns encode specific migration strategies. The guidance on development and enactment of migration methods is provided by the method engineering process. We evaluate our approach in an industrial case study where a part of the Eclipse Modeling Framework was migrated from Java to C#.

Modern User Interfaces (UIs) are increasingly expected to be plastic, in the sense that they retain a constant level of usability, even when subjected to context (platform, user, and environment) changes at runtime. Adaptive UIs have been promoted as a solution for context variability due to their ability to automatically adapt to the context-of-use at runtime. However, evaluating end-user satisfaction of adaptive UIs is a challenging task, because the UI and the context-of-use are both constantly changing. Thus, an acceptance analysis of UI adaptation features should consider the context-of-use when adaptations are triggered. Classical usability evaluation methods like usability tests mostly focus on a posteriori analysis techniques and do not fully exploit the potential of collecting implicit and explicit user feedback at runtime. To address this challenge, we present an on-the-fly usability testing solution that combines continuous context monitoring together with collection of instant user feedback to assess end-user satisfaction of UI adaptation features. The solution was applied to a mobile Android mail application, which served as basis for a usability study with 23 participants. A data-driven end-user satisfaction analysis based on the collected context information and user feedback was conducted. The main results show that most of the triggered UI adaptation features were positively rated.