Author Description

In the ten years of its existence the TC 8 group has made major contributions in the field of Information Systems. The basic assumption has always been that effective information systems require solid (or scientific) technical foundations, on the one hand, and extensive regard for organizational and human aspects, on the other. One consideration in particular, which emerges from this collection of papers, is that of ``information'' - in the sense of how organized (and informal) data streams support and influence people in their work. Also, the problem of making information ``shareable'' is tackled, since each TC 8 working group must interface the technical, scientific, organizational, practical and - above all - human aspects of information systems.