Key Courses

2025: Systems Analysis and Design. FCUL. Synopsis: Acquire knowledge about methodologies, approaches and processes of information systems analysis and design. Develop an integrated view of the technological, socio-technical, and organizational dimensions of systems, processes, services, and applications. Understand the phases of initiation, discovery, exploration, construction and assimilation. Develop several artifacts characteristic of systems analysis and design. Syllabus: Idea development. Problem framing. Stakeholders Identification. Requirements gathering. Qualitative data collection and analysis. Requirements modeling. Business vision. Processes, exceptions and variations. Business rules. Process reengineering. Risk analysis. Services specification. Prototyping. Evaluation. Information architecture. Business environment. Systems resilience.

2025: Web Applications. FCUL. Master course. Synopsis: The course aims to convey knowledge about end-to-end development of web applications. There is a particular emphasis on the architectural issues of application development considering modern architectural approaches, in particular single-page applications, service orientation and micro-services. Syllabus: Architecting, web architectures, architecture-first, back-end architecture, microservices architecture, API-first, API design, everything-as-a-service, information architecture, business objects, front-end architectures, single-page applications, micro front-ends, DOM, front-end design, high-level design, DevOps, BizDevOps, end-to-end design, project blueprinting.

2024: Product and Service Design. University of Chile, Faculty of Economy and Business, Chile. Master course. Synopsis: This course teaches fundamental principles and methods of agile product and service design. The main focus is on the capacity to quickly generate and validate transformative, innovative, and useful solutions to wicked problems. Teaching and learning fosters collaboration, reflection-in-action, empathizing, storytelling, creativity, active exploration, and use of agile representation, prototyping, and evaluation methods. Syllabus: The course is organized around the realization of a design project, which considers the identification of value, problem and solution framing, empathizing with users, rapid prototyping, light evaluation, and communication of the solution to the stakeholders.

2021: Web Applications. FCUL. Master course. Synopsis: The course aims to convey knowledge about the complete lifecycle development of web applications and services. There is a particular emphasis on the architectural issues of application development, with an emphasis on modern approaches, in particular micro-services and RESTful. Syllabus: Business models (BMC, service BMC), high level design (processes, design canvas), detailed design (storytelling, story space), static front-end (MVC, bootstrap, grids, breakpoints), dynamic front-end (multi page apps, single page apps, Angular.JS, DOM, data binding, controllers, dependency injection, event handlers), data management (metadata, SGML, XML, JSON), systems architecture (layers, blueprints, styles, governance), back-end (architectures, SOAP, RESTful, Node.JS, callbacks, promises, statelessness, asynchronous operations, services, microservices, cloud, servitisation, OpenAPI).

2020–2023: Business Organization and Management. FCUL. Master course. Synopsis: Develop knowledge about methodologies, processes and tools that generate effective, innovative and useful information systems. There is a particular emphasis on solving complex problems and exploring creative solutions. The adopted approach emphasizes reflection-in-action, using techniques for data gathering in the field, from primary sources, and techniques for active solution exploration, which are supported by rapid prototyping tools. Several design artifacts are generated: problem and solution frameworks, empathy and affinity maps, wireframes, storyboards, and project canvas. Syllabus: Theory: Design thinking, reflection in action, problem framework, needfinding, empathizing, wicked problems, empathy maps, affinity maps, solution framework, evaluation, peer review, storytelling, service model, prototyping, design science, design artifacts, storyboarding, managing design projects, design processes. Practice: Information systems design project. Practical application of information systems design methods, techniques and tools. Development of several design artifacts throughout the project. Group activities, including brainstorming, primary data collection, peer reviews, and demos.

2020: INFO411 - Design Science Studio. VUW. Honors course. Synopsis: This course teaches fundamental principles and methods of Design Science. The teaching mode pays tribute to the Bauhaus school, mixing theory and practice in flexible work/thinking spaces, which explains the word ‘studio’ in the title. Teaching and learning in the Design Science studio fosters creativity, hands-on and solution-oriented attitudes, experimentation, prototyping, open exchange of ideas, and collaboration. In the Design Science studio, learning takes over teaching, as students define their objectives and teachers provide support with insights, expertise and critiquing. We will emphasise, ideas over process, and exploration over prescription. We will combine technology, science and theory with the purpose to take wicked problems as inputs and generate actions as outputs. The project assignments are open and will be defined in collaboration with students. We will focus on the development of artefacts with practical value. We will also foster teamwork. Syllabus: Design zeitgeist. Design melting pot. Design research framework. Design theory. Design as artefact. Design as action. Design as solution. Relevance. Rigor.

2020: Systems Analysis and Design. FCUL. Undergraduate course. Synopsis: Develop knowledge about methodologies, processes and tools that generate effective, innovative and useful information systems. There is a particular emphasis on solving complex problems and exploring creative solutions. The adopted approach emphasizes reflection-in-action, using techniques for data gathering in the field, from primary sources, and techniques for active solution exploration, which are supported by prototyping tools. Several design artifacts are generated: problem and solution frameworks, empathy and affinity maps, wireframes, storyboards, and project canvas. Syllabus: Design thinking, reflection in action, problem framework, needfinding, empathizing, wicked problems, empathy maps, affinity maps, solution framework, evaluation, peer review, storytelling, service model, prototyping, design science, design artifacts, storyboarding, managing design projects, design processes. Practice: Information systems design project. Practical application of information systems design methods, techniques and tools. Development of several design artifacts throughout the project. Group activities, including brainstorming, primary data collection, peer reviews, and demos.

2016–2019: INFO226 - Application Development. VUW. Undergraduate course. Synopsis: Analyse fundamental programming concepts supported by a programming language. Plan business application development from business requirements with functional and structural models. Use fundamental data structures and programming constructs to solve business requirements. Use modern, object-oriented, software development frameworks and core libraries, with emphasis on user-interface and client functionality, for rapid application development. Syllabus: Agile. SCRUM. Development environments. Development patterns. Internet concepts. Hypermedia concepts. Static web. Dynamic web. Advanced web applications. JavaScript. DOM. Web architecture. Mashups.

2015-2016: MIM525 - Enterprise Systems. VUW. Master course. Synopsis: Describe the dynamics and current trends of the markets for enterprise systems. Analyse the business models, product development practices, and marketing practices of enterprise systems vendors. Evaluate and analyse the rationale for enterprise systems as an enabler of organizational and strategic change initiatives. Evaluate and analyse the technical and organizational challenges of selecting, implementing and maintaining enterprise systems. Describe and evaluate the practices required to capture organizational benefits from enterprise systems. Syllabus: Effectiveness. Steering. Agility. Flexibility. Design. Sensemaking. Reliability. Resilience.

2015–2020: INFO234 - Business Process Design. VUW. Undergraduate course. Synopsis: Assess the role and potential of IT to support business process management. Use a contemporary formal process modelling technique. Design improved business processes. Use simulation software to evaluate and develop business processes. Syllabus: BPM. BPM lifecycle. Essential modeling. Advanced modeling. Qualitative analysis. Quantitative analysis. Process redesign. Change management.

2015: INFO246 - User Experience Design. VUW. Undergraduate course. Synopsis: This course introduces the fundamental principles, methods and practices of user experience design (UXD). The UXD subject covers aspects related to human-computer interaction (HCI), usability, user experience (UX), service design, user interface (UI) design, prototyping, and evaluation. The course has a strong practical component. Students are involved in a project, which main purpose is to develop the UI of a business application. Syllabus: Design paradigms. Design processes. User research. Personas. User experience. Structural design. Wireframes. Layout design. Storyboards. Prototyping. Affordance design. Interaction design. Evaluation. Design thinking. Design guidelines. Design in business.

2015: INFO320 - Project in e-Commerce. VUW. Undergraduate course. Synopsis:This course provides students with an opportunity to apply their theoretical knowledge to a practical problem in the area of information systems. Students work in teams on real projects for real clients. The projects are identified by the course coordinator. Syllabus: The team meets with the sponsor, plans the project, determines and negotiates the sponsors’s scope requirements, designs a set of realistic deliverables and then develops a finished system, prototype or report as agreed and tests or presents that solution with the client. This may involves developing a technical artifact such as a software application or a databse although other types of outcomes are possible. Assessment is carried out throughout the course and culminates in a presentation of the project deliverables by each team and delivery of a portfolio that showcases the project.

2013-2015: INFO332 - Advanced Systems Analysis. VUW. Undergraduate course. Synopsis: Perform systems analysis and design activities with focus on business value. Manage the relationships between business and systems requirements. Manage the relationships between requirements determination, analysis, design, and communication. Use BPMN and UML, the languages and associated diagrams, as support to analysis and design activities. Design the major types of BPMN and UML diagrams using visual tools. Syllabus: BPMN, modeling the business architecture, modeling process patterns, modeling business problems, UML, use cases, activity diagrams, class diagrams, sequence diagrams, communication diagrams, package diagrams, modeling the system architecture, modeling the user interface.

2014: ELCM251 - Introduction to Internet Design and Development. VUW. Undergraduate course. Synopsis: Create and refine website and application designs based on industry’s usability standards. Conceive, specify, prototype, and evaluate design artefacts addressing the business case and the user experience requirements. Assess the suitability of various design principles for websites and applications. Apply the skills necessary for large-scale project development on the Web. Apply the technologies required to design and prototype Web-based information systems. Syllabus: UI lifecycle. Eliciting requirements. Design artifacts. Design thinking. Design principles. Design heuristics. Design rules. Design guidelines. Design production. Design evaluation. Design practice.

2013: INFO 102 - Business Application Programming. VUW. Undergraduate course. Synopsis: Perform requirements analysis for web application development. Understand the fundamental characteristics of visual application development platforms. Understand fundamental application development principles. Develop web applications using visual application development platforms. Syllabus: Web basics. Creating a website. Coding basics. From logic to code. Event handling. Web design. HTML and CSS. Methods. Data. Business systems analysis.