bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Socio-Economic Impacts of Offshore Outsourcing of Information Technology
Authors: Knapp Karl , Sharma Sushil K. , King Kevin
Published: May 2011

Offshore information technology (IT) outsourcing has been becoming mainstream alternative to inhouse operations. While offshore development is a relatively new trend in IT, the concept of outsourcing manufacturing and service operations has been going on for more than 50 years. Many Asian countries are driving their economic success through taking offshore projects from developed countries. These countries have advantages of low-cost and available labor force. Various studies conducted over the last 10 years have shown that outsourcing allows firms to reduce high overhead costs, improve productivity, contribute flexibility, and thus improve overall performance of the firm. However, offshore IT outsourcing brings new challenges and risks. The skeptics believe that outsourcing may weaken the local business competitiveness of the region, investors’ confidence in investing in local businesses, and may create a spiral effect on economic indicators such as: unemployment, enrollment in schools, living styles, housing, and construction, and so forth`. This study investigates the socio-economic impacts of offshore IT outsourcing in the United States using a system dynamics model.
An Empirical Analysis of Cellular Phone Users' Convenience Perception and Its Impact on Shopping Intention in Mobile Commerce
Authors: Jih Wen-Jang
Published: May 2011

Two mutually reinforcing forces currently are at work to propel an upward spiraling in the business arena. As wireless communication technology continues to advance in providing broadband connection to both static and mobile users, innovative user-centric Web-enabled services also are routinely being experimented to provide an unprecedented level of convenience for online shopping. Although the concept of convenience has been discussed extensively in retailing and consumer behavior literature, there still is a dearth of research that empirically validates the construct in the context of m-commerce. This chapter presents a study that was conducted to examine the effect of convenience on customers’ intention of shopping via their mobile communication devices. Three research hypotheses were formulated to test the claims derived from the literature. Hypothesis 1 states that the customer perception of convenience is significantly related to m-commerce customers’ demographical characteristics. Hypothesis 2 states that m-commerce customers’ convenience perceptions are significantly correlated with product/service features. Hypothesis 3 states that m-commerce customers’ shopping intention is significantly affected by their convenience perception. Primary data collected from college students in Taiwan were analyzed to examine the relationship between perceived convenience and shopping intention. The result shows a significant relationship between the two variables, and a positive effect of convenience perception on shopping intention. The findings have practical implications for m-commerce strategists by providing more understanding of the m-commerce success factors from a consumer behavior point of view.
Strategic View on Creating Business Value through Mobile Technologies
Authors: Younessi Houman
Published: May 2011

Business value from any technology comes when it is applied, in practice, by the business to earn economic as well as social advantage. This is particularly true of mobile technologies, wherein their ability to provide location and time independence is a significant advantage to business. Such an advantage, however, can only be derived when mobile technologies are carefully incorporated, with a long-term strategic view in mind. This chapter describes and discusses such strategic view of mobile technologies in order to create business value.
A Methodology and Framework for Extending Mobile Transformations to Mobile Collaborations for SMEs
Authors: Marmaridis Ioakim (Makis)
Published: May 2011

Enabling interorganizational collaboration for SMEs holds a lot of promise for increased competitiveness and global reach in a connected economy (Ripeanu, 2008; Marmaridis, 2004; Ginige 2004). An earlier book (Marmaridis & Unhelkar, 2005) examined the unique constraints that SME organizations have in embracing new technology – such as mobile technology. The solution proposed for overcoming these constraints is a methodology that is referred to as m-transformation (Marmaridis, 2006). Building on this work, this chapter now presents the next step in SME evolution, mobile collaboration (m-collaboration). The chapter details the concerns that must be overcome for SMEs to start collaborating rapidly with each other. It examines the role of trust in collaboration and provides a methodology suitable for handling the variation of trust throughout each collaborative engagement. It also presents a conceptual framework that can be used to implement the methodology and empower SMEs into embracing collaboration and realizing tangible benefits from it. Aspects of the methodology and conceptual framework have been presented in a number of international conferences already (Marmaridis, 2005); this chapter, however, puts the pieces together and presents the methodology and framework in their entirety. Upon completing this chapter, the reader will have a very good understanding of the landscape of collaboration in the SME space. Furthermore, the reader will be familiarized with the field-tested mobile collaboration methodology for SMEs and the conceptual framework for implementing it in real life.
Impact of Mobile Technologies and Gadgets on Adolescent's Interpersonal Relationships
Authors: Gala Jigisha , Unhelkar Bhuvan
Published: May 2011

This chapter discusses and depicts the wide range of changes induced in the lives of adolescents by the use of mobile gadgets, as viewed by a certain cross-section of the society–the adolescents themselves and the teachers of young adolescents. The various stakeholders who view the effect of mobility on adolescents include the parents, the teachers, peers and friends, and the young adolescents themselves. This chapter particularly focuses on the view of the adolescents and teachers on the effect of mobility on young emerging adults within the Indian context.
Developing Hypertext Reading Materials for the Teaching of Arabic
Authors: Ariew Robert , Palmer Jeremy
Published: May 2011

Enrollments in Arabic language programs are rapidly growing throughout the United States. Until recently, Arabic has received minimal attention in educational institutions. This chapter describes the textbook materials and software resources in the field of Arabic language teaching and learning. As Arabic programs and teachers rush to implement new teaching materials, modernize and improve curricula, attention is paid to enhancing the role of technology in teaching Arabic. This chapter presents a review of issues related to teaching and learning Arabic, software applications that may assist Arabic learners and an innovative example of hypertext software that may be used to facilitate reading proficiency in Arabic.
A Mandarin E-Learning System in Pervasive Environment
Authors: Ming Yue , Miao Zhenjiang
Published: May 2011

This chapter was inspired by the work of the designers of a Mandarin language e-learning as they attempted to find the best solution to deal with the problems occurring in e-learning. E-Learning environments designated to facilitate long-distance learning are gaining popularity. Pervasive computing has a great potential for many next-generation IT applications. The authors describe pervasive computing system design and implementation for Mandarin e-learning. The authors propose a Human-centered Pervasive Computing System Model (HPC) and Layered Architecture Analysis and Design Method (LAAD). Based on the HPC model and LAAD method, a pervasive computing based Mandarin e-Learning system is designed and implemented. They particularly focus on Mandarin pronunciation learning which estimates the intelligibility of foreign learners’ speech and ranks their errors from the view point of improving their intelligibility. Its design and implementation issues are discussed in details.
Synthetic Speech in Computer-Enhanced Foreign Language Learning
Authors: Kang Min
Published: May 2011

The goal of this chapter is to explain several experiments carried out by our research group to explore whether synthetic speech can be currently used to replace natural speech in listening materials for foreign language learning or not. For CALL purposes, synthetic speech in English was evaluated from the viewpoints of both foreign language learners and teachers. We conducted several surveys: (a) to find out if the synthetic speech generated by current TTS engines is as efficient as natural speech in training listening skills, (b) to identify the specific ways in which the evaluated synthetic speech is as good as natural speech, (c) to determine the relationship between changes in individual listening comprehension ability and the results of the quality evaluations of synthetic speech, and (d) to discuss the possible approaches for using synthetic speeches.
Culture-Based Language Learning Objects
Authors: Lambropoulos Niki , Christopoulou Martha , Vlachos Kosmas
Published: May 2011

This chapter presents culture-based language-learning objects (CLLOs) in computer-assisted language learning (CALL), supported by user-centered interaction design. CLLOs’ design has been drawn on (a) social constructivist pedagogical theories, (b) self-organised strategies in social contexts, and (c) Scandura’s structural analysis and Gange’s instructional events. This chapter discusses culture-based language-learning principles and the rationale on which the construction and use of CLLOs are founded on. It also makes suggestions about the ways CLLOs can be constructed by second/foreign language (L2) teachers. A CLLO example was designed and presented for the context of the Greek Diaspora in the United Kingdom (UK). Furthermore, this chapter introduces the combination of norm-based and culture-based language learning in CALL, the grey zone as the distance between second and foreign language learning, the open nature in Learning Objects with the use of forums or chats. Lastly, it suggests CLLOs networks use in the age of ubiquitous computing.
Seven Principles of Good Practice for Virtual International Collaboration
Authors: Boehm Diane , Aniola-Jedrzejek Lilianna
Published: May 2011

This chapter presents seven principles of good practice for conducting virtual international collaborations with students. The authors have conducted such collaborations with several different groups of American and Polish university students using different models. The collaborations were the basis for distilling these seven principles: develop cross-cultural awareness and mutual understanding of the culture of each group; create a multifaceted virtual environment; coordinate calendars; require intermediate level of English language proficiency; create relevant, engaging collaborative assignments with rubrics and shared understandings for evaluation of student work; establish methods for successful group interactions, including information-sharing and relationship-building; evaluate project outcomes. These seven principles of good practice can assist instructors to develop successful virtual intercultural collaborations that prepare students for the workplace of the 21st century.
The Theoretical Framework of Cognitive Informatics
Authors: Wang Yingxu
Published: May 2011

Cognitive Informatics (CI) is a transdisciplinary enquiry of the internal information processing mechanisms and processes of the brain and natural intelligence shared by almost all science and engineering disciplines. This chapter presents an intensive review of the new field of CI. The structure of the theoretical framework of CI is described, encompassing the Layered Reference Model of the Brain (LRMB), the OAR model of information representation, Natural Intelligence (NI) vs. Artificial Intelligence (AI), Autonomic Computing (AC) vs. imperative computing, CI laws of software, the mechanism of human perception processes, the cognitive processes of formal inferences, and the formal knowledge system. Three types of new structures of mathematics, Concept Algebra (CA), Real-Time Process Algebra (RTPA), and System Algebra (SA), are created to enable rigorous treatment of cognitive processes of the brain as well as knowledge representation and manipulation in a formal and coherent framework. A wide range of applications of CI in cognitive psychology, computing, knowledge engineering, and software engineering has been identified and discussed.
On the Cognitive Processes of Human Perception with Emotions, Motivations, and Attitudes
Authors: Wang Yingxu
Published: May 2011

An interactive motivation-attitude theory is developed based on the Layered Reference Model of the Brain (LRMB) and the Object-Attribute-Relation (OAR) model. This chapter presents a rigorous model of human perceptual processes such as emotions, motivations, and attitudes. A set of mathematical models and formally described cognitive processes are developed. The interactions and relationships between motivation and attitude are formally described in real-time process algebra (RTPA). Applications of the mathematical models of motivations and attitudes in software engineering are demonstrated. This work is the detailed description of a part of the layered reference model of the brain (LRMB) that provides a comprehensive model for explaining the fundamental cognitive processes of the brain and their interactions. This work demonstrates that the complicated human emotional and perceptual phenomena can be rigorously modeled in mathematics and be formally treated and described.
A Selective Sparse Coding Model with Embedded Attention Mechanism
Authors: Li Qingyong , Shi Zhiping , Shi Zhongzhi
Published: May 2011

Sparse coding theory demonstrates that the neurons in the primary visual cortex form a sparse representation of natural scenes in the viewpoint of statistics, but a typical scene contains many different patterns (corresponding to neurons in cortex) competing for neural representation because of the limited processing capacity of the visual system. We propose an attention-guided sparse coding model. This model includes two modules: the non-uniform sampling module simulating the process of retina and a data-driven attention module based on the response saliency. Our experiment results show that the model notably decreases the number of coefficients which may be activated, and retains the main vision information at the same time. It provides a way to improve the coding efficiency for sparse coding model and to achieve good performance in both population sparseness and lifetime sparseness.
A Unified Approach to Fractal Dimensions
Authors: Kinsner Witold
Published: May 2011

Many scientific chapters treat the diversity of fractal dimensions as mere variations on either the same theme or a single definition. There is a need for a unified approach to fractal dimensions for there are fundamental differences between their definitions. This chapter presents a new description of three essential classes of fractal dimensions based on: (a) morphology, (b) entropy, and (c) transforms, all unified through the generalized-entropy-based Rényi fractal dimension spectrum. It discusses practical algorithms for computing 15 different fractal dimensions representing the classes. Although the individual dimensions have already been described in the literature, the unified approach presented in this chapter is unique in terms of its progressive development of the fractal dimension concept, similarity in the definitions and expressions, analysis of the relation between the dimensions, and their taxonomy. As a result, a number of new observations have been made, and new applications discovered. Of particular interest are behavioral processes (such as dishabituation), irreversible and birth-death growth phenomena (e.g., diffusion-limited aggregates, DLAs, dielectric discharges, and cellular automata), as well as dynamical nonstationary transient processes (such as speech and transients in radio transmitters), multifractal optimization of image compression using learned vector quantization with Kohonen’s self-organizing feature maps (SOFMs), and multifractal-based signal denoising.
Review on Texture Feature Extraction and Description Methods in Content-Based Medical Image Retrieval
Authors: Zhang Gang , Ma Z. M. , Yan Li
Published: May 2011

Texture feature extraction and description is one of the important research contents in content-based medical image retrieval. The chapter first proposes a framework of content-based medical image retrieval system. It then analyzes the important texture feature extraction and description methods further, such as the co-occurrence matrix, perceptual texture features, Gabor wavelet, and so forth. Moreover, the chapter analyzes the improved methods for these methods and demonstrates their application in content-based medical image retrieval.
Actor-Network Theory and Autopoiesis
Authors: Steiner Lars
Published: May 2011

A new knowledge management perspective and tool, ANT/AUTOPOIESIS, for analysis of knowledge management in knowledge-intensive organizations is presented. An information technology (IT) research and innovation co-operation between university actors and companies interested in the area of smart home IT applications is used to illustrate analysis using this perspective. Actor-network theory (ANT) and the social theory of autopoiesis are used in analyzing knowledge management, starting from the foundation of a research co-operation. ANT provides the character of relations between actors and actants, how power is translated by actors and the transformation of relations over time. The social theory of autopoiesis provides the tools to analyze organizational closure and reproduction of organizational identity. The perspective used allows a process analysis, and at the same time analysis of structural characteristics of knowledge management. Knowledge management depends on powerful actors, whose power changes over time. Here this power is entrepreneurial and based on relations and actors’ innovation knowledge.
Vagueness
Authors: Barinaga Ester
Published: May 2011

“How do we define our project goal?” “How are we going to coordinate our independent national studies?” “Who is responsible for what?” “How are newcomers introduced to the project?” During the first year of co-operation among researchers from a variety of disciplines (labor law, sociology and organizational theory) and countries (Sweden, Spain, The Netherlands, United Kingdom and United States) all efforts went to answer those, apparently simple, questions. Inspired by the late Wittgenstein’s ideas on the performative character of language, the chapter follows the process by which an international and multidisciplinary group of researchers agree on a research goal, coordinate their work, distribute responsibilities, and socialize newcomers. That is, the process of organizing knowledge intensive work is approached from a performative view of language.
Modeling the New Product Development Process
Authors: Owens Jonathan D.
Published: May 2011

Success in new product development (NPD) can be considered a general aim for any company wishing to survive in the 21st Century. It has been found that positive effects can result from the existence of formal “blueprints” and “roadmaps” of the NPD process. This chapter discusses numerous NPD processes which can assist a company to capture what it does, and follow a structured development route, from which it is possible to gain a better understanding of how to improve the development process, and thus reap the potential and tangible benefits. This chapter’s focus is at organisations that are considering implementing a new product development (NPD) process in order to improve repeatability and ultimately sustainability of their innovative capabilities, a necessary and vital component for survival. It aims to bring an understanding of the underlying characteristics that may contribute to a potential and successful outcome during the development process within organizations, through the adoption of a structured NPD process.
Complementary Filter Pairs
Authors: Milic Ljiljana
Published: May 2011

Digital filters with complementary characteristics find many applications in practice. In this chapter, we concentrate on the properties and construction of complementary filters and filter pairs. An important application of complementary property is deriving a new transfer function from the existing one. A highpass filter can be obtained as a complement of the lowpass filter, and also a bandstop filter can be considered as a complement of the bandpass filter. Complementary lowpass/highpass and bandpass/bandstop filter pairs are popular because of very attractive implementations. Namely, the two complementary filters in the pair are implemented at the cost of a single one. Complementary filter pairs, usually lowpass/highpass filter pairs, are widely used whenever there is a need to split the signal into two adjacent subbands and reconstruct it after some processing performed in the subbands. They are used as basic building blocks in constructing analysis and synthesis multichannel filter banks. Moreover, the complementary filter pairs are used in constructing low sensitivity complex filtering structures. In some applications, such as signal analysis, the complementary filter pairs are used to separate a signal into two bands, and the filtered signals are processed without need to reconstruct it. Another application is digital audio where the signal is separated into two (three) bands resulting in the signals that are feed inside two (three) loudspeakers. In this chapter, at the beginning we introduce the basic definitions of the complementary properties that will be used through the chapter. We use then the complementary properties to construct FIR and IIR highpass filters from the existing lowpass filters. In the sequel, we consider the analysis and synthesis filter pairs. We present the design and efficient implementations of FIR and IIR complementary filter pairs. Chapter concludes with MATLAB Exercises for individual study.
Multirate Techniques in Filter Design and Implementation
Authors: Milic Ljiljana
Published: May 2011

Digital filters with sharp transition bands are difficult, sometimes impossible, to be implemented using single-stage structures. A serious problem with a single-stage sharp FIR filter is its complexity. The FIR filter length is inversely proportional to the transition–width and complexity becomes prohibitively high for sharp filters, (Lim, 1986). IIR filters with sharp transition bands suffer from extremely high sensitivities of transfer function poles. In many practical cases, the multirate approach is the promising solution that could be applied for implementation of a sharp FIR or IIR filter. In this chapter, we present two methods for designing filters having narrow transition bandwidths: multistage filtering suitable for narrowband filters, and the method based on multirate and complementary filtering, which may be used for filters of arbitrary bandwidths.
Consistency of Replicated Datasets in Grid Computing
Authors: Pucciani Gianni , Donno Flavia , Domenici Andrea , Stockinger Heinz
Published: May 2011

Data replication is a well-known technique used in distributed systems in order to improve fault tolerance and make data access faster. Several copies of a dataset are created and placed at different nodes, so that users can access the replica closest to them, and at the same time the data access load is distributed among the replicas. In today’s Grid middleware solutions, data management services allow users to replicate datasets (i.e., flat files or databases) among storage elements within a Grid, but replicas are often considered read-only because of the absence of mechanisms able to propagate updates and enforce replica consistency. This entry analyzes the replica consistency problem and provides hints for the development of a Replica Consistency Service, highlighting the main issues and pros and cons of several approaches.
Service Discovery with Rough Sets
Authors: Li Maozhen , Qi Man , Yu Bin
Published: May 2011

The computational grid is rapidly evolving into a service-oriented computing infrastructure that facilitates resource sharing and large-scale problem solving over the Internet. Service discovery becomes an issue of vital importance in utilizing grid facilities. This chapter presents ROSSE, a Rough sets based search engine for grid service discovery. Building on Rough sets theory, ROSSE is novel in its capability to deal with uncertainty of properties when matching services. Services with WSDL interfaces or OWL-S interfaces can be registered with ROSSE and then be discovered.
Resource Usage Accounting in Grid Computing
Authors: Piro Rosario M.
Published: May 2011

Large, geographically distributed and heterogeneous computing infrastructures, such as the Grid, often span multiple organizations and administrative domains. In such infrastructures, resource usage accounting, i.e. keeping track of the resources consumed by single users or entire organizations, is a non-trivial but very important task. This chapter introduces some general aspects and discusses the fundamental requirements that need to be fulfilled in order to guarantee an accurate resource usage accounting. Typical accounting procedures and current practices are described along with other related issues such as the normalization of resource usage information, the standardization of accounting interfaces, billing and charging, resource pricing, market-oriented resource allocation and economic scheduling.
Developing Biomedical Applications in the Framework of EELA
Authors: Aparicio Gabriel , Blanco Fernando , Blanquer Ignacio , Bonavides César , Chaves Juan Luis , Embid Miguel , Hernández Álvaro
Published: May 2011

In the last years an increasing demand for Grid Infrastructures has resulted in several international collaborations. This is the case of the EELA Project, which has brought together collaborating groups of Latin America and Europe. One year ago, the authors presented this e-infrastructure used, among others, by the biomedical groups for the studies of oncological analysis, neglected diseases, sequence alignments and computational phylogenetics. After this period, the achieved advances and the scientific results are summarized in this chapter
A Framework for Semantic Grid in E-Science
Authors: Liberati Diego
Published: May 2011

A framework is proposed that creates, uses, and communicates information, whose organizational dynamics allows performing a distributed cooperative enterprise in public environments, even over open source systems. The approach assumes the web services as the enacting paradigm possibly over a grid, to formalize interactions as cooperative services on various computational nodes of a network. The illustrated case study shows that some portions, both of processes and of data or knowledge, can be shared in a collaborative environment, which is also more generally true for any kind of either complex or resource demanding (or both) interaction that will benefit any of the approaches.
Grid Computing Initiatives in India
Authors: Sharma Jyotsna
Published: May 2011

Efforts in Grid Computing, both in academia and industry, continue to grow rapidly worldwide for research, scientific and commercial purposes. Building a commanding position in Grid computing is crucial for India. The major Indian National Grid Computing initiative is GARUDA. Other major efforts include the BIOGRID and VISHWA. Several Indian IT companies too are investing a lot into the research and development of grid computing technology. Though grid computing is presently at a fairly nascent stage, it is seen as a cutting edge technology. This chapter presents the state-of-the-art of grid computing technology and the India’s efforts in developing this emerging technology.
Visual Speech and Gesture Coding Using the MPEG-4 Face and Body Animation Standard
Authors: Petajan Eric
Published: May 2011

Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) is the most natural input modality from humans to machines. When the hands are busy or a full keyboard is not available, speech input is especially in demand. Since the most compelling application scenarios for ASR include noisy environments (mobile phones, public kiosks, cars), visual speech processing must be incorporated to provide robust performance. This chapter motivates and describes the MPEG-4 Face and Body Animation (FBA) standard for representing visual speech data as part of a whole virtual human specification. The super low bit-rate FBA codec included with the standard enables thin clients to access processing and communication services over any network including enhanced visual communication, animated entertainment, man-machine dialog, and audio/visual speech recognition.
3D Lip Shape SPH Based Evolution Using Prior 2D Dynamic Lip Features Extraction and Static 3D Lip Measurements
Authors: Gastelum Alfonso , Delmas Patrice , Marquez Jorge
Published: May 2011

This chapter describes a new user-specific 2D to 3D lip animation technique. 2D lip contour position and corresponding motion information are provided from a 2D lip contour extraction algorithm. Static face measurements are obtained from 3D scanners or stereovision systems. The data is combined to generate an initial subject-dependent 3D lip surface. The 3D lips are then modelled as a set of particles whose dynamic behaviour is governed by Smooth Particles Hydrodynamics. A set of forces derived from ellipsoid muscle encircling the lips simulates the muscles controlling the lips motion. The 3D lip model is comprised of more than 300 surface voxels and more than 1300 internal particles. The advantage of the particle system is the possibility of creating a more complex system than previously introduced surface models.
Similarity Learning for Motion Estimation
Authors: Zhou Shaohua Kevin , Shao Jie , Georgescu Bogdan , Comaniciu Dorin
Published: May 2011

Motion estimation necessitates an appropriate choice of similarity function. Because generic similarity functions derived from simple assumptions are insufficient to model complex yet structured appearance variations in motion estimation, the authors propose to learn a discriminative similarity function to match images under varying appearances by casting image matching into a binary classification problem. They use the LogitBoost algorithm to learn the classifier based on an annotated database that exemplifies the structured appearance variations: An image pair in correspondence is positive and an image pair out of correspondence is negative. To leverage the additional distance structure of negatives, they present a location-sensitive cascade training procedure that bootstraps negatives for later stages of the cascade from the regions closer to the positives, which enables viewing a large number of negatives and steering the training process to yield lower training and test errors. The authors apply the learned similarity function to estimating the motion for the endocardial wall of left ventricle in echocardiography and to performing visual tracking. They obtain improved performances when comparing the learned similarity function with conventional ones.
Image/Video Semantic Analysis by Semi-Supervised Learning
Authors: Tang Jinhui , Hua Xian-Sheng , Wang Meng
Published: May 2011

The insufficiency of labeled training samples is a major obstacle in automatic semantic analysis of large scale image/video database. Semi-supervised learning, which attempts to learn from both labeled and unlabeled data, is a promising approach to tackle this problem. As a major family of semi-supervised learning, graph-based methods have attracted more and more recent research. In this chapter, a brief introduction is given on popular semi-supervised learning methods, especially the graph-based methods, as well as their applications in the area of image annotation, video annotation, and image retrieval. It is well known that the pair-wise similarity is an essential factor in graph propagation based semisupervised learning methods. A novel graph-based semi-supervised learning method, named Structure- Sensitive Anisotropic Manifold Ranking (SSAniMR), is derived from a PDE based anisotropic diffusion framework. Instead of using Euclidean distance only, SSAniMR further takes local structural difference into account to more accurately measure pair-wise similarity. Finally some future directions of using semi-supervised learning to analyze the multimedia content are discussed.
Infoxication 2.0
Authors: Benito-Ruiz Elena
Published: May 2011

This chapter reviews the issue of information overload, introducing the concept of “infoxication 2.0” as one of the main downsides to Web 2.0. The chapter describes some of its potential effects on the learner, on the one hand, and puts forward some solutions to deal with the informational and communication barrage worsened by Web 2.0 plethora, on the other. The review of the issue reveals that although the problem of information overload has existed for many years, the massive abundance of fragmented Web 2.0 informational and communicative resources for the language learner might become an obstacle, i.e. it is often difficult to find what’s useful. Two kinds of solutions are identified, those based on common sense and time management, and those based on technology agents such as RSS readers and especially the future generation of RSS mash-up tools. An emphasis is placed on the role of the teacher as the facilitator to provide the know-how on these tools.
The Role of Community Formation in Learning Processes
Authors: Rasulo Margaret
Published: May 2011

The aim of this chapter is to discuss the effectiveness and the necessity of forming a community when engaged in online learning. The Internet and its online communities offer new learning opportunities for many who cannot attend full-time, residential training sessions or higher education courses. Web-based course delivery affords these students and professionals the opportunity to work together, “anytime, anywhere,” exchanging information, resources, expertise, without leaving their homes or their jobs
Producing Cell Phone Video Diaries
Authors: Gromik Nicolas
Published: May 2011

This chapter reports on an ongoing project conducted at Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan. A mixed group of seven advanced EFL learners produced weekly cell phone video diaries that were then delivered online via blip.tv. Participants completed this task as an independent learning project. Using the video recording feature of their cell phones, participants produced videos between 15 and 30 seconds long. As a piece of preliminary research, the aim was not to gather evidence about the linguistic gains that such technology affords, but rather to assess whether or not such a learning approach was feasible and suitable for students. The findings revealed that while the majority of the students found merit in this project, some had reservations. The outcome of this project demonstrates how Web 2.0 is redefining the Internet as a platform for individual content delivery, especially in terms of audio and visual productions.
The Pedagogical Potential of Interactive Whiteboards 2.0
Authors: Schmid Euline Cutrim
Published: May 2011

The first part of this chapter discusses the transformative potential of Interactive Whiteboards (IWBs), by analyzing the opportunities of using this technology in conjunction with Web 2.0 tools to support constructivist practice in the language classroom. The second part draws upon research data and literature review results to examine the role played by teachers in the realization of this potential. A special focus has been placed on the various evolutionary stages that teachers go through as they integrate IWB technology into their teaching. The research data derives from a case study conducted with nine English teachers from a secondary school in Germany. The study was conducted within an interpretative research paradigm, and data were collected via qualitative research instruments, namely interviews, classroom observations and the video recording of one IWB training session. Research findings revealed that the teachers investigated were gradually becoming aware of the transformative potential of IWB technology.
Is Regulation a Roadblock on the Information Highway?
Authors: Prieger James E. , Heil Daniel
Published: May 2011

Regulatory policy in telecommunications must balance short-term efficiency (low prices) against the firms’ incentives to innovate, which have longer reaching impacts on economic welfare. Historically, policy tended to sacrifice dynamic efficiency for the sake of competitive prices and static efficiency. In the last few decades, economists and other researchers have begun to document the large welfare costs of ignoring dynamic efficiency. We analyze the theoretical impact regulation has on innovation. We then turn to the empirical evidence that regulation dampens firms’ incentive to innovate in the telecommunications industry in general and the market for broadband Internet access in particular. Both product and process (cost reducing) innovation are discussed. The chapter forms a compendium of available research on the intersection of telecommunications regulation and innovation. We conclude with lessons the literature provides to policy makers and a discussion of future regulatory trends.
Digital Convergence and Home Network Services in Korea
Authors: Han Hyun-Soo , Lee Heesang , Sawng Yeong -Wha
Published: May 2011

In South Korea, the home network industry has been the object of great expectations among the government and business community. Thus far, however, it has proved unable to fulfill these expectations. In this study, we categorized three classes of typical services and five industrial participants with regard to Korean home network industry. We first reviewed the government plans on home network services in the early stage of evolution. Second, consumer value expectations and current home network service levels were examined to understand the issues regarding weak diffusion of home network services. Next, we investigated business interests of the industrial participants comprising convergent home network services, and explored the causes of conflicts among them. On the base of the analyses, we offered policy suggestions from digital convergence perspective to help removing the obstacles that hinder business cooperation among industrial participants of the home network industry. Managerial implications for the participating firms were discussed in Part II adopting business model framework.
IP Address Management
Authors: Kamoun Faouzi
Published: May 2011

IP network connectivity is becoming so important for business that it is being compared today to basic utilities, such as water and electricity. As key enablers of IP network connectivity, IP addresses are positioned today among the most important resources to be managed. Ready access and flawless handling of IP address usage, assignment, tracking and reallocation help in enhancing network reliability and security, while enabling more efficient network expansion and troubleshooting. Today, more than any time before, companies are realizing the need to adopt and implement a comprehensive IP Address Management (IPAM) strategy. Such a strategy, backed by automated IPAM tools, will enable organizations to address the stringent requirements imposed by new converged technologies. This chapter turns the spotlight on the most important challenges in IPAM and attempts to address some of the solutions and best practices to tackle these challenges. The author’s views on future IPAM perspectives are discussed and some open research issues are pointed out. The paper underlines the need for organizations to adopt proven IPAM best practices and deploy good automated IPAM tools. This will put them in a better position to expand and leverage their existing networks, while optimizing their IP address space in a secured and controlled fashion.
The Diffusion of WiMax Technology
Authors: Olla Phillip
Published: May 2011

A fundamental goal of the wireless industry is to economically offer ubiquitous broadband access to a large number of people in diverse geographical settings. WiMax technology has the potential to be a leading cost-effective technology in the wireless industry, providing opportunities to mobile service providers who lack a Third Generation (3G) license or related infrastructure. WiMax benefits from widespread industry backing and established standards. This chapter will focus on the potential of WiMax technology to deliver personal broadband and fixed Internet capabilities. The chapter applies the diffusion of the Global Internet framework to analyze the current state of WiMax deployments along with the difficulties in developing a WiMax network and building a subscribers base.
Emerging Security Issues in VANETS for E-Business
Authors: Manvi S. S. , Kakkasageri M. S.
Published: May 2011

This chapter presents the emerging security issues in Vehicular Ad hoc Networks (VANETs) for e-business along with some of the solutions provided by the research community. The VANET will facilitate new applications for e-business that will revolutionize the driving experience, providing everything from instant, localized traffic updates to warning signals when the vehicle ahead abruptly brakes. In the emerging global economy, e-business has increasingly become a necessary component of business strategy and a strong catalyst for economic development. In near future, vehicles may be equipped with short-range radios capable of communicating with other vehicles and highway infrastructure using a VANET. However, providing security in VANETs for e-business raises privacy concerns that must be considered. The deployment of VANETs for e-business is rapidly approaching, and their success and safety will depend on viable security solutions acceptable to consumers, manufacturers and governments.
The Playout Control Management
Authors: Lobina Mirko Luca , Atzori Luigi , Boi Fabrizio
Published: May 2011

IP Telephony provides a way for an enterprise to extend consistent communication services to all employees, whether they are in main campus locations, at branch offices, or working remotely, also with a mobile phone. IP Telephony transmits voice communications over a network using open standard-based Internet protocols. This is both the strength and weakness of IP Telephony as the involved basic transport protocols (RTP, UDP, and IP) are not able to natively guarantee the required application quality of service (QoS). From the point of view of an IP Telephony Service Provider this definitely means possible waste of clients and money. Specifically the problem is at two different levels: i) in some countries, wherelong distance and particularly international call tariffs are high, perhaps due to a lack of competition or due to cross subsidies to other services, the major opportunity for IP Telephony Service Providers is for price arbitrage. This means working on diffusion of an acceptable service, although not at high quality levels; ii) in other countries, where different IP Telephony Service Providers already exist, the problem is competition for offering the best possible quality. The main idea behind this chapter is to analyze specifically the state of the art playout control strategies with the following aims: i) propose the reader the technical state of the art playout control management and planning strategies (overview of basic KPIs for IP Telephony); ii) compare the strategies IP Telephony Service Provider can choose with the aim of saving money and offering a better quality of service; iii) introduce also the state of the art quality index for IP Telephony, that is a set of algorithms for taking into account as many factors as possible to evaluate the service quality; iv) provide the reader with examples on some economic scenarios of IP Telephony.
Overlay Networks
Authors: Haßlinger Gerhard
Published: May 2011

Service and content delivery over the Internet is currently supported by overlay architectures of different types. There is a trend towards distributed computing and service creation in peer-to-peer and grid networks, which are able to overcome performance bottlenecks of client server architectures. Overlays are deployed for single applications or as multi purpose infrastructure for communities with focus on their special demands. Various overlay structures have also developed on lower network layers. The motivation for those overlays is to bridge or extend one networking technology on top of another in order to build common widespread platforms through heterogeneous telecommunication environments. We address such approaches especially within the standardization of Internet protocols (IP), where the main focus is on evolving techniques on higher layers.
Anonymity-Featured Group Support Systems and Creativity
Authors: Klein Esther E.
Published: May 2011

Until recently, creativity has been a neglected research topic (Steinberg & Lubart, 1999), although it is a central concern for schools and universities. Steinberg and Lubart have defined creativity as “the ability to produce work that is both novel (i.e., original, unexpected) and appropriate (i.e., useful, adaptive concerning task constraints)” (p. 3). Teachers in classrooms challenge students to generate creative ideas so as to foster independent thinking. This article aims to investigate normative influence as a barrier to creative idea generation that is present in the classroom and to propose information technology (IT)-based solutions to remove these barriers. Specifically, the article considers the influence of group support systems (GSS) on creativity within the classroom, reviews the pertinent literature, and suggests relationships between the use of GSS and creative idea generation.
Applying Change Creation to Improve Online Learning
Authors: Lick Dale W. , Kaufman Roger
Published: May 2011

Technology offers tremendous opportunities for increasing the effectiveness and efficiency of online learning in the future. Over the past few years, technology has been integrated into most areas of education. Most students, faculty, staff, and administrators now use technology extensively in their daily activities and have become reasonably computer and technology literate. However, with this rapid and broad introduction of technology into education and online learning, it, unfortunately, has done surprisingly little towards significantly enhancing the quality and productivity of our learning programs. Meaningful examples of where technology has led to significant improvements in the quality or productivity of online learning are atypical.
The Beam Analysis Tool (BAT)
Authors: Burrage Peter , Pelton Leslee Francis
Published: May 2011

In Houghton’s (1989) review of educational paradigms, he highlights the gaining importance of chaos theory. Chaos theory is often characterized by the term non-linear. Chaos theory can be found in many disciplines; in structural engineering, the behaviour of a structure under earthquake loads is often seen in terms of non-linear behaviour. Another characteristic of chaos theory is unpredictability. The implications for educational theory, as Houghton suggests, is that we have a realistic model for what happens in highly interactive systems. If the process of teaching and learning is seen as a highly interactive environment, then the parallels to chaos theory can be easily seen. The nature of a lecture can change when a student asks a question. This results in a non-linear learning environment. Students affect how something is taught by their own unique ways of understanding. Houghton (1989) suggests that the use of computers in education is supported by chaos theory. He suggests that computers should play a significant and active role with learning. Chaos theory not only supports the concept of using computers in education, it suggests that with non-linear programming (e.g., hypertext), education can change from the traditional linear format to a non-linear methodology that is alive and vibrant.