Active artifacts as bridges between context and community knowledge sources

Abstract

The aim of the paper is twofold: i) understanding how to provide additional information that is reflective of current organizational context in knowledge production and use ii) proposing an architectural solution that can be applied to this need. To this aim, we introduce the concept of Active Knowledge Artifact (KA), i.e., an electronically augmented (i.e., active) artifact that puts together the archival functions of artifacts belonging to organizational ISs with context- and content-aware functionalities to promote collaboration awareness and support knowledge management. Through a case study in the hospital domain, we illustrate an approach where documents are augmented with information intended to support context interpretation and evoke the knowledge that actors need to coordinate their actions in that context. The autonomous provision of Awareness Promoting Information (API) and Knowledge Evoking Information (KEI) by means of modular and reactive mechanisms embedded in each KA is what makes KAs active computationally.