Discovering frequent work procedures from resource connections

Abstract

Intelligent desktop assistants could provide more help for users if they could learn models of the users' workflows. However, discovering desktop workflows is difficult because they unfold over extended periods of time (days or weeks) and they are interleaved with many other workflows because of user multi-tasking. This paper describes an approach to discovering desktop workflows based on rich instrumentation of information flow actions such as copy/paste, SaveAs, file copy, attach file to email message, and save attachment. These actions allow us to construct a graph whose nodes are files, email messages, and web pages and whose edges are these information flow actions. A class of workflows that we call work procedures can be discovered by applying graph mining algorithms to find frequent subgraphs. This paper describes an algorithm for mining frequent closed connected subgraphs and then describes the results of applying this method to data collected from a group of real users.