We present a visual language for strategies in game theory, which has potential applications in economics, social sciences, and in general science education. This language facilitates explanations of strategies by visually representing the interaction of players’ strategies with game execution. We have utilized the cognitive dimensions framework in the design phase and recognized the need for a new cognitive dimension of “traceability” that considers how well a language can represent the execution of a program. We consider how traceability interacts with other cognitive dimensions and demonstrate its use in analyzing existing languages. We conclude that the design of a visual representation for execution traces should be an integral part of the design of visual languages because understanding a program is often tightly coupled to its execution.

3D web software visualisation has always been expensive, special purpose and hard to program. In this thesis we present a framework for evaluating software visualisation media. The framework is then applied in the evaluation of the new “eXtensible 3D ” (X3D) open standard for web 3D graphics, to determine how suitable X3D is for use in a web-based software visualisation environment. Our evaluation is based on our experience of replicating a representative sample of software visualisation techniques which are common throughout the software visualisation literature in X3D. The evaluation finds that a large range of software visualisation techniques can be implemented in X3D, however, the development of these visualisations is very time consuming and no specific software visualisation features exist. Acknowledgments I would first just like to say that my Mum and Dad and have been great support over the past few years in completing this degree and without them the struggle

Model Driven Architecture adopts a visual approach to software development. The main development activities are the construction of visual (typically Unified Modelling Language (UML)) models and the transformation of source models into target models, including application code generation. The use of visual models to produce application code often starts at the design (Platform Independent Model) level, and whereas business processes (Computation Independent Models (CIM)) have lately been considered, they are not used in MDA to either derive design models or application code. This paper enhances the MDA process by considering the early stages of software development that pertain to problem domain analysis. We argue that problem domain analysis and modelling can form valuable input to the more formal MDA phases at the CIM and PIM levels. We propose the use of a visual notation that allows informal modelling of domain-based concepts. Modelling at this stage using the proposed notation is geared to support involvement of non-technical business stakeholders whilst feeding into business process modelling at the CIM phase.

Visualising web server logs for a Web 1.0 audience