GP.Workspace

	GP	Workspace	Version:	0.4
	Document type:	Generic Pattern	Owner:	J.A.H. Schoonderbeek

Description

This Generic Pattern belongs to "Commons". This Pattern models the generic user workspace. The goal of this pattern is to give a human consumer a means to interact with the digital world that's provided by ICT systems.

By and large there are three types of workspace:

1. A "fat client": a workspace that delivers its user (most or all) computational resources from that user's own location, resulting in less dependance on the organization's central IT. However, the workspace may well make use of centralized resources such as shared file storage, and the workspace may be services from a centralized facility, e.g. applications may be deployed from a remote deployment service. The user can have all necessary rights and abilities to manage the workspace, or these rights and abilities can be partially or wholly restricted, e.g. by centrally managed policies
2. A "thin client" providing access to a centralized personal workspace: the workspace has all the properties of a fat client, except that the computational resources are delivered from one or more centralized locations. At the location of the user, only a minimal device ("thin client") is required for handling input and output, and connectivity to the centralized location.
3. A "thin client" providing access to a centralized shared workspace: the workspace has the properties of the centralized personal workspace, except that groups of users share the same workspace, with limited or no personalization, and little or no flexibility in installing applications for the user itself. Every update or new application is handled at the centralized location, resulting in uniform workspaces between users in the same group, and predictible maintenance load for the centralized facility.

Note that while the fat client and thin client characterizations point toward "traditional" computers, this Pattern is equally suitable to model different form factors, purposes and information delivery, ranging from tablets and mobile devices through gaming consoles and wearable IT. The different form factors and other properties of these clients are then represented in the User Input and User Output functionality, and in Workspace Accommodation if need be.

The Pattern depends on many adjacent services, only some of which have been included in this Pattern Type description.

Services realized

This Pattern realizes the following service(s):

• Workspace (This Service delivers a (generic) digital workspace, which acts as a gateway between the digital and physical world.)

Functional and Integration view

This is the graphic representation of the functional model of this Generic Pattern:

Generic Pattern Workspace

Generic Pattern Composition

This pattern is an aggregation of the following (mandatory and optional) functions, expressed in Generic Functions:

Icon

Function

Inclusion

Rationale

Services connected with this Generic Pattern

This Generic Pattern has the following mandatory and optional relations with adjacent Generic Services.

Service

Adjacency

Summary

Rationale

Applied Patterns based on this Generic Pattern

The following Applied Patterns are based wholly or in part on this Generic Pattern: