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analysis of the actual operators' activities in real work situations for the design of new
work situations [5]. An important theoretical hypothesis that the course-of-action
framework states about human activity, is that human activity is dynamically situated,
i.e. always appeals to resources, individual as well as collectively shared to varied de-
grees, which stem from constantly changing material, social, and cultural circumstances.
The course-of-action analysis add to various theories of “situated activity” the consid-
eration of the domain of experience, i.e. that of the agent's course-of-experience, of the
constructing process of this experience at any moment, and takes an interest in the ar-
ticulation between the cognitive domain and the course-of-experience. Theureau in [6]
defines the theoretical object called "course of action" as follows: “
what, in the observ-
able activity of an agent in a defined state, actively engaged in a physically and socially
defined environment and belonging to a defined culture, is pre-reflexive or again sig-
nificant to this agent, i.e. presentable, accountable and commentable by him/her at any
time during its happening to an observer-interlocutor in favourable conditions”.
2.2 The Observatory of Course-of-Action
This paragraph is reproduced from [7].
The course-of-action analysis is based on an observatory that allows to specify the
material conditions of situated recall (time, place, material elements of the situation),
the follow up and the guiding of presentations, accounts and commentaries by the
agents as well as the cultural, ethical, political and contractual conditions that are
favorable to observation, interlocution, and creation of a consensus between the agent
and the observer-interlocutor [6].
A methodology has been developed to collect data on the courses-of-action. It con-
nects continuous observations and recordings of the agents' behavior, the provoked
verbalizations of these agents in activity (from the "thinking aloud" for the observer-
interlocutor to the interruptive verbalizations at privileged moments) and the agents'
comments in self confrontation with recordings of their behavior [6].
Continuous observations and recordings together with verbalizations and self-
confrontation let us access to a representation of dynamics of the structural coupling
between the actor and his/her situation (including other actors) [9]. A “semiological
framework” [6] provide us with a theory of activity allowing to describe the activity
in abstract terms expressing hypothetical invariants. Explaining and using this theory
is out of the scope of this paper focused on the observatory of course-of-action. It is
sufficient to tell that this semiologic stems from the hypothesis that any period of
course-of-action may be described in smaller units. This description of the intrinsic
organisation of the course of action articulates two complementary descriptions: a
description of its global dynamics, characterising the units of the course of action and
the relations of sequencing and embedding between these units; a description of its
local dynamics, characterising the underlying structure of the elementary units [5].
2.3 An Observatory of Software Engineers' Activity
The intervention of an ergonomist in an organization intended to produce software
concern the analysis of human-system interaction - of the software engineer with
