bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Reflections on the concept of discourse community
Authors: Swales John M.
Published: March 2016

Cet article présente une réflexion sur le concept de communauté de discours, dont, en tant que chercheur, je me préoccupe de manière épisodique depuis trente ans. Il retrace tout d’abord le point de départ de mon intérêt personnel pour cette notion, en rappelant les résultats d’une étude qui portait sur des communautés au sein d’un petit bâtiment universitaire. Il explore ensuite la façon dont ce concept a été repris par ceux qui enseignent les techniques d’écriture universitaire dans le supérieur aux États-Unis. Trois types de communauté de discours sont ensuite proposés : les communautés locales, focales et « folocales », ces dernières présentant des caractéristiques communes aux deux premières. Les universitaires particulièrement actifs appartiennent typiquement aux communautés « folocales » car ils s’efforcent de maintenir un équilibre entre les exigences qui émanent du contexte local (enseignement, tâches administratives) et celles qui sont liées à la production savante intensive (communications, publications). Dans la seconde partie de l’article, les critères dans Genre Analysis (1990) sont amendés, étoffés et mis à jour, puis sont suivis de remarques conclusives.
Science as vocation? Discipline, profession and impressionistic sociology
Authors: Dubois Michel
Published: March 2016

Bien que les catégories de « profession » et de « discipline » occupent une place centrale en sociologie depuis Max Weber, elles sont souvent utilisées de façon imprécise, sans être rigoureusement définies. Cet article fournit des exemples d’approches impressionnistes de ces notions en s’appuyant sur l’étude du processus de socialisation dans le monde scientifique. En se fondant sur les travaux d’E. Freidson (1970 [1984]), de Y. Gingras (1991) et de R. Stichweh (1992), j’avance trois raisons principales qui justifient le besoin de considérer « discipline » et « profession » comme deux entités distinctes que le sociologue devrait étudier du point de vue de leurs interactions ainsi que de leur transformation.
What can linguistic approaches bring to English for Specific Purposes?
Authors: Gledhill Christopher , Kübler Natalie
Published: March 2016

Cet article explore les différentes contributions apportées par les études en linguistique à l’anglistique de spécialité. Nous établissons en premier lieu une distinction entre les approches conceptuelles et les approches contextuelles en linguistique. En théorie, ces approches sont incompatibles ; cependant, l’emploi de plus en plus répandu des corpus a généré une certaine convergence entre elles. Nous présentons ensuite quelques idées issues des présupposés théoriques et de la méthodologie que nous avons développés dans notre propre recherche et dans notre enseignement : 1) l’utilisation des corpus pour identifier les « schémas lexico-grammaticaux », qui représentent les unités de structure pour la construction des discours spécialisés, et 2) la formation à la phraséologie et à l’utilisation de bases de données comme facteurs d’amélioration, à la fois du processus d’apprentissage, et des compétences des futurs traducteurs spécialisés. Enfin, nous examinons comment d’autres linguistes ont contribué de manière générale au développement d’approches linguistiques dans l’histoire de la revue ASp.
Integrating corpus tools and techniques in ESP courses
Authors: Boulton Alex
Published: March 2016

L’un des buts de la recherche en anglais de spécialité, quelle que soit la définition que l’on en donne, est de fournir des analyses fines de différentes variétés de la langue. La linguistique de corpus offre de nombreuses possibilités à ce domaine, même si aucune description clés en main ne peut parvenir à répondre à tous les besoins ou à toutes les questions. Cet article suggère quelques propositions destinées à aider l’utilisateur final – apprenant ou enseignant – à mettre en œuvre des outils et des techniques de corpus afin d’observer, en fonction de ses besoins, des usages réels de la langue dans des contextes pertinents. L’approche est articulée avec des approches pédagogiques courantes (par exemple, l’étude exploratoire de documents authentiques) et de pratiques fréquentes (par exemple l’utilisation de moteurs de recherche sur Internet), ce qui permet à différent types d’utilisateurs de mieux intégrer ces outils et ces techniques dans leurs activités quotidiennes. Au-delà des recherches sur Internet, des corpus génériques en ligne peuvent être exploités à des fins spécifiques ; les utilisateurs qui ont des besoins pérennes très ciblés peuvent aller plus loin en construisant leur propre corpus. L’article fournit des exemples de ces divers usages, et conclut par une brève mise en perspective des résultats de la recherche dans ce domaine.
Research in ESP teaching and learning in French higher education: developing the construct of ESP didactics
Authors: Sarré Cédric , Whyte Shona
Published: March 2016

Cet article aborde la question de la recherche sur l’enseignement-apprentissage de l’anglais de spécialité (ASP) en France et présente les premières étapes d’un travail sur le développement d’un cadrage théorique spécifique à ce champ de recherche. Nous nous interrogeons ainsi sur la pertinence du développement du concept de didactique de l’ASP, cadre théorique spécifique à la recherche sur l’enseignement-apprentissage de l’ASP, et sur ses liens avec la didactique des langues et de l’anglais, d’une part, et avec la recherche en ASP, d’autre part. Nous proposons une analyse des différentes acceptions des concepts clés relatifs à l’enseignement-apprentissage des langues, avant de dresser un panorama de l’enseignement-apprentissage des langues dans l’enseignement supérieur français, et de l’ASP en particulier. La recherche est ensuite abordée à travers l’analyse des travaux présentés au sein du Groupe de travail Didactique et ASP du GERAS, analyse qui nous permet de souligner la variété des contextes et des approches, et d’identifier un certain nombre de thématiques et de préoccupations communes.
Real World Applications
Authors: Dabipi Ibibia K. , Perkins Judy A. , Moore Tierney
Published: March 2016

Over the years the supply chain industry has been transforming to improve the end-to-end (production to delivery) process. Supply chain management (SCM) allows various industries to oversee and better handle how their product is manufactured and delivered. It allows them to track and identify the location of the product and to be more efficient in delivery. Integrating total asset visibility (TAV) technology into the supply chain structure can provide excellent visibility of a product. This kind of visibility complemented with various packaging schemes can assist in accommodating optimization strategies for visualizing the movement of a product throughout the entire supply chain pipeline. The chapter will define SCM, discuss TAV, review how transportation as well as optimization impacts SCM and TAV, and examine the role of packaging in the context of SCM and TAV.
A Genetic Algorithm's Approach to the Optimization of Capacitated Vehicle Routing Problems
Authors: Frutos Mariano , Tohmé Fernando , Miguel Fabio
Published: March 2016

This chapter addresses the family of problems known in the literature as Capacitated Vehicle Routing Problems (CVRP). A procedure is introduced for the optimization of a version of the generic CVRP. It generates feasible clusters and, in a first step, yields a coding of their ordering. The next stage provides this information to a genetic algorithm for its optimization. A selective pressure process is added in order to improve the selection and subsistence of the best candidates. This arrangement allows improving the performance of the algorithm. We test it using Van Breedam and Taillard's problems, yielding similar results as other algorithms in the literature. Besides, we test the algorithm on real-world problems, corresponding to an Argentinean company distributing fresh fruit. Four instances, with 50, 100, 150 and 200 clients were examined, giving better results than the current plans of the company.
Application of Artificial Bee Colony Algorithms to Antenna Design Problems for RFID Applications
Authors: Goudos Sotirios K. , Siakavara Katherine , Sahalos John N.
Published: March 2016

In this chapter, the Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) algorithm and its variants are presented and applied to spiral antennas design for RFID tag application at the UHF band. The ABC variants include the Improved ABC (I-ABC), which is an improved version of the original ABC algorithm. The I-ABC introduces the best-so-far solution, inertia weight and acceleration coefficients to modify the search process. Furthermore, another ABC variant is the Gbest ABC (ABC), which includes global best (gbest) solution information into the search equation to improve the exploitation. These algorithms are applied to antenna design where the optimization goals are antenna size minimization, gain maximization, and conjugate matching. The algorithms performance is compared with other popular evolutionary algorithms. The optimization results produced show that the ABC family of algorithms is a powerful tool that can be efficiently applied to antenna design problems.
Optimization of Traffic Network Design Using Nature-Inspired Algorithm
Authors: Baquela Enrique Gabriel , Olivera Ana Carolina
Published: March 2016

In this chapter the application of a nature-inspired technique in conjunction with simulation models to optimize the siting of concentration nodes in a traffic network of urban area is presented. The solutions of this optimization problem involve the redesign of the network by adding nodes and arcs to the current traffic network. The problem is a sub-problem of the most general “Traffic Network Design Problem”. For this resolution a Genetic Algorithm approach was design and development. The popular Simulator of Urban Mobility (SUMO) is use as traffic simulator in order to evaluate the solutions obtained. This chapter contains the conceptual models and the results of the Optimization via Simulation technique proposed.
Cuckoo Search Algorithm for Hydrothermal Scheduling Problem
Authors: Nguyen Thang Trung , Vo Dieu Ngoc
Published: March 2016

This chapter proposes a Cuckoo Search Algorithm (CSA) and a Modified Cuckoo Search Algorithm (MCSA) for solving short-term hydrothermal scheduling (ST-HTS) problem. The CSA method is a new meta-heuristic algorithm inspired from the obligate brood parasitism of some cuckoo species by laying their eggs in the nests of other host birds of other species for solving optimization problems. In the MCSA method, the eggs are first classified into two groups in which ones with low fitness function are put in top group whereas others with higher fitness function are put in abandoned group. In addition, an updated step size in the MCSA changes and tends to decrease as the iteration increases leading to near global optimal solution. The robustness and effectiveness of the CSA and MCSA are tested on several systems with different objective functions of thermal units. The results obtained by the CSA and MCSA are analyzed and compared have shown that the two methods are favorable for solving short-term hydrothermal scheduling problems.
Imprecise Solutions of Ordinary Differential Equations for Boundary Value Problems Using Metaheuristic Algorithms
Authors: Sadollah Ali , Kim Joong Hoon
Published: March 2016

In this chapter, a general strategy is recommended to solve variety of linear and nonlinear ordinary differential equations (ODEs) with boundary value conditions. With the aid of certain fundamental concepts of mathematics, Fourier series expansion, and metaheuristic algorithms, ODEs can be represented as an optimization problem. The purpose is to reduce the weighted residual error (error function) of the ODEs. Boundary values of ODEs are considered as constraints for the optimization model. Inverted generational distance metric is utilized for evaluation and assessment of approximate solutions versus exact solutions. Four ODEs having different orders and features are approximately solved and compared with their exact solutions. The optimization task is carried out using different optimizers including the particle swarm optimization and the water cycle algorithm. The optimization results obtained show that the proposed method equipped with metaheuristic algorithms can be successfully applied for approximate solving of different types of ODEs.
A Service Cost-Base Supply Balance of Sustainable Power Generation
Authors: Watada Junzo , Melo Haydee Rocio , Choi Jaeseok
Published: March 2016

Recently, renewable power sources such as WTG and PV have become viable economic options for generating sustainable energy. However, WTG and PV have an inconstant power production problem. To solve this problem, multi-state models have been proposed. The electricity generated from these units varies with different time scales: hourly, daily and seasonally. Since planning an optimal size generates cost losses to the customer, three models should be built: a load model, generation model, and service cost model. Loss of energy expectation (LOEE) and loss of load expected (LOLE) are calculated for the load and generation model. The reliability value is calculated to determine the number of required renewable generators. As a result, the system is constructed to have sufficient capacity, and the utility cost became the main objective of the total service costs.
Hybrid Particle Swarm and Gravitational Search Optimization Techniques for Charging Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicles
Authors: Rahman Imran , Vasant Pandian , Singh Balbir Singh Mahinder , Abdullah-Al-Wadud M.
Published: March 2016

Electrification of Transportation has undergone major modifications since the last decade. Success of combining smart grid technology and renewable energy exclusively depends upon the large-scale participation of Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEVs) towards reach the desired pollution-free transportation industry. One of the key Performance pointers of hybrid electric vehicle is the State-of-Charge (SoC) which needs to be enhanced for the advancement of charging station using computational intelligence methods. In this Chapter, authors applied Hybrid Particle swarm and gravitational search Optimization (PSOGSA) technique for intelligently allocating energy to the PHEVs considering constraints such as energy price, remaining battery capacity, and remaining charging time. Computational experiment results attained for maximizing the highly non-linear fitness function estimates the performance measure of both the techniques in terms of best fitness value and computation time.
Planning of a Project with Imprecise Activity Time
Authors: Abu Nayeem Sk. Md. , Pal Madhumangal
Published: March 2016

A project where activity times are characterized by intervals or triangular fuzzy numbers is considered in this chapter. Classical project evaluation and review technique (PERT) cannot be directly applied to such projects. Comparison of two intervals or two triangular fuzzy numbers plays an important role in this problem. Ranking methods based on some fuzzy mathematical techniques are discussed and two algorithms for finding the critical path for such a project are given. An illustrative example is also provided.
Dantzig-Wolfe Decomposition and Lagrangean Relaxation-Based Heuristics for an Integrated Production and Maintenance Planning with Time Windows
Authors: Najid Najib Mohamed , Alaoui-Selsouli Marouane , Mohafid Abdemoula
Published: March 2016

In this chapter, two approaches are developed to solve the integrated production planning and maintenance problem. Moreover, Some Propositions and mathematical properties were suggested and applied in the proposed heuristics to solve the problem. The first heuristic developed is based on Dantzig-Wolfe decomposition. The Dantzig-Wolfe Decomposition principle reformulates the original model and Column generation is then used to deal with the huge number of variables of the reformulated model. A simple rounding heuristic and a smoothing procedure are finally carried out in order to obtain integer solutions. The second heuristic is based on Lagrangean relaxation of the capacity constraints and sub-gradient optimization. At every step of sub-gradient method, feasibility and improvement procedures are applied to the solution of the Lagrangean problem. Computational experiments are carried out to show the results obtained by our approaches and compared to those of commercial solver.
TOPSIS in Generalized Intuitionistic Fuzzy Environment
Authors: Adak Amal Kumar , Manna Debashree , Bhowmik Monoranjan , Pal Madhumangal
Published: March 2016

The aim of this chapter is to investigate the multiple attribute decision making problems to a selected project with generalized intuitionistic fuzzy information in which the information about weights is completely known and the attributes values are taken from the generalized intuitionistic fuzzy environment. Here, we extend the technique for order performance by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) for the generalized intuitionistic fuzzy data. In addition, obtained the concept of possibility degree of generalized intuitionistic fuzzy numbers and used to solve ranking alternative in multi-attribute decision making problems.
Adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards and the Changing Accounting Environment in Nigeria
Authors: Madawaki Abdulkadir
Published: March 2016

The purpose of this chapter is to examine the major differences between Nigerian financial reporting rules and International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) following Nigeria's accounting reporting convergence to IFRS. The chapter documented evidence of differences between Nigerian Statement of Accounting Standards (NSAS), Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990, Nigerian tax rules and IFRS requirements. It also discusses the IFRS adoption process in Nigeria and the benefits Nigeria stand to gain in adopting IFRS. The chapter discusses the challenges that might be encountered in the process of adoption of IFRS in Nigeria. Finally, the chapter provides recommendations through which these challenges can be addressed and suggest ways for further IFRS adoption research in Nigeria.
IFRS, Foreign Investment, and Prevailing Institutional Structure in Africa
Authors: Uchenna Efobi , Iyoha Francis
Published: March 2016

We revisit the effectiveness of IFRS adoption for FDI attractiveness by considering the adopting country's institutional structure. Attention was on the extent of corruption control (as a measure of institutional structure). Data was tested on 42 African countries for the period 2001-2012. Using the Panel Corrected Standard Error (PSCE) estimation technique, our result suggest that the effect of IFRS adoption on foreign investment differs based on the level of corruption control instituted in the sample countries. When the variable – IFRS adoption, was tested for the sample with corruption control below the median value, the coefficient was either negative or insignificant. However, the opposite was seen for the category of countries with corruption control above the median value. This result was robust to the inclusion of alternative measures of corruption, foreign investment, and control of global financial crisis and legal origin of the country.
IFRS Adoption in the EU and the Challenge of Nomenclature Evidence from the UK, France, and Germany
Authors: Nnadi Matthias , Tanna Sailesh
Published: March 2016

Since the adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and the subsequent directive by the European Union (EU), all companies operating in the EU are required to report their consolidated financial statements in line with the IFRS. This study examines the consolidated financial statements of the top 170 listed companies in three major EU stock exchanges (UK, France and Germany) and uncovered a disparity in the use of common nomenclatures. The findings reveal that the inconsistencies in the application of terminologies such as statement of financial position instead of balance sheet and sequence of arrangement of assets in order of liquidity constitute the main differences for entities operating in the three countries. Such differences pose an imminent challenge in the comparability and interpretation of financial results.
Impact of Adopting IFRS in Ghana
Authors: Agyei-Mensah Ben K.
Published: March 2016

This chapter reports on the impact of the adoption of IFRS in Ghana. It first traced the history of accounting standards in Ghana and the reason for the adoption of IFRS in 2007. One of the key issues that IFRS talk about is the disclosure of financial and non financial information in corporate financial reports. Hence this chapter provides evidence on the extent of disclosures, the quality of the disclosures and the determinants of the disclosures. The disclosure of financial ratios, forward-looking information and internal control information in corporate annual reports were extensively studied and findings reported in this chapter. The results of the quality of financial information disclosure mean of 76.80% (pre adoption) and 87.09% (post adoption) for the two years indicate that the quality of financial reports has improved significantly after adopting IFRSs. The findings thus confirms that the implementation of IFRSs generally reinforce accounting disclosure quality. However, the low levels of other disclosures (accounting ratio disclosure quality 6.64%, level of disclosure 60%; forward looking information 35%; internal control information 42%) by listed firms in Ghana do not support signaling theory which suggests that firms with good performance will wish to signal their quality to investors, hence are more likely to disclose their performance by disclosing more voluntary information. It is therefore important for the SEC and The Ghana Stock Exchange to do more by enforcing adherence to the corporate code of corporate governance.
International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Adoption in Vietnam
Authors: Phan Duc Hong Thi , Joshi Mahesh , Mascitelli Bruno
Published: March 2016

The chapter is aimed at analyzing the collective perception of the accounting community of Vietnam towards the adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). This perception is premised on the twin issues of legitimacy and isomorphism. A broad sample survey of 728 persons out of 3000 accountants, auditors and academics was undertaken with a detailed questionnaire sent to each. With a net response rate of 24 per cent from this community, there emerged a definite influence of coercive, mimetic and normative isomorphisms as well as legitimacy motives. The study provides practical implications for the policymakers of Vietnam for the transformation of the accounting profession in the country and the strategic planning towards full mandatory IFRS adoption by 2020.
An Empirical Analysis of 7ps' Elements on Tourists Satisfaction
Authors: Ray Nilanjan , Das Dillip Kumar , Kumar Raj , Chakraborty Kaushik
Published: March 2016

Marketing plays a vital role to develop the tourism and encourage the tourists to visit the destination and involve the people to enhance their socio economic condition as well. The purpose of this study is to explore three research questions about marketing strategies, about marketing tools and integrated promotional strategies in general and in this particular destination. This study aims to analyze with the help of a questionnaire of 150 respondents. This present study concentrates on impact of 7Ps on Tourists satisfaction. Collected data has analyzed by regression model. There is a great scope of tourism because every village has unique art, culture, folklore, heritage, and lifestyle and so on. Due to lack of proper marketing practices, tourism has facing different problems to pursue parallel with the main stream entrepreneurs. This study is relevant for balancing the demand and supply of tourism motivational requirement indicators which can offer better tourism service excellence in Bishnupur. It will also play a vital role in terms of the policy implication and to analyze the impact for attaining sustainable tourism development in Bishnupur.
Assets Management of the Indian Pharma Sector in the Changing Socio-Cultural and Business Environment of Post-Liberalization Era
Authors: Chakraborty Kaushik
Published: March 2016

Efficiency of assets management is an absolutely unavoidable issue in accomplishing the wealth maximization objective of business. In India, the changing scenario in the front of demographic, social and cultural made a prominent impact on the growth of pharmaceutical industry. In fact, during the last two decades the changing socio-cultural and business environment of India witnessed a rapid change in various managerial as well as financial applications of the Indian pharma sector. Assets management is no doubt a vital part of the overall strategy for achieving financial objectives of any industry. In this backdrop, the present study empirically investigates the relationship between the efficiency of assets management and profitability of the Indian pharmaceutical industry during the period 1998-99 to 2012-13 and also examines whether its findings conform to the theoretical arguments. Besides this, the paper also tries to make a comparison, in respect of the efficiency of assets management, between multinational and domestic companies in the Indian pharmaceutical industry during the same period to know whether changing socio-cultural and business environment gives an age to domestic companies in respect of assets management or not. The sample size of the study consists of ten pharmaceutical companies by taking five multinational and five domestic companies from the Indian pharmaceutical industry. The issues analyzed in this study have been tackled using relevant statistical tools and techniques.
Can Codes of Conduct Work? Evaluating the Effectiveness of Privatised Corporate Governance
Authors: Virkar Shefali
Published: March 2016

Over the last couple of decades, the world has witnessed a spectacular increase in the size and number of Transnational Corporations (TNCs). This explosion has resulted in the overseas practices of such companies coming under intense scrutiny, and has highlighted that in most cases, governments lack the resources necessary to ensure TNC compliance to international standards in key areas such as labour rights, environmental pollution, and social justice. As a direct result of the failure of national and international attempts to regulate corporate behaviour, recent years have seen the mushrooming of a number of codes aimed at regulating corporate behaviour, and an increased focus on corporate social responsibility. This chapter will attempt to evaluate the effectiveness of such codes of ethical corporate conduct in the light of available evidence, focusing on the conceptualisation of such regulatory mechanisms, and their relationship to the larger corpus of corporate social, commercial, and ethical interactions. The work will then seek to evaluate the effectiveness of such codes as instruments of privatised governance, particularly through the examination of corporate stakeholder behaviour and recent examples of global best practice.
Basel III
Authors: Gujrati Shishir Kumar
Published: March 2016

Banking sector is considered as a backbone of any economy. It not only transacts money but also helps in promoting trade credit and various social welfare schemes of government. With the changing scenario of business, banking has also undergone a paradigm shift. From manual banking it has shifted to computerized core banking and moving fast towards paperless banking with the use of internet and mobile technology. With the expansion of banking activities, various types of risks associated with banking business have also expanded. To counter them, Basel I guidelines were issued in 1988, the loopholes of which were covered in improved guidelines issued in 1996 known as Basel II. The economic slowdown of 2008 revealed that risk containing measures were not enough to enable the banks in absorbing shocks arising from financial and economic stress. Thus, to improve the ability of banks to withstand the economic and financial stress, Basel III guidelines were issued in December 2010. The present paper attempts to explore the areas where Basel III supersedes its previous accord and how it strengthens the banks to face the periods of economic and financial adversaries.
Green Manufacturing
Authors: Sen Saurabh , Sen Ruchi L.
Published: March 2016

The manufacturing sector has greater responsibility for conducting and operating its business. The primary objective of every unit is to maximize profits. The manufacturing sector is the key driver of energy consumption and if an automobile consumes high fuel or if the resources are under-utilized, it is definitely the fault of the manufacturer. If we seriously need a solution to these problems, we need to change the way we design, manufacture, and sell the products. The manufacturing sector must use energy and resources efficiently. ‘Green Manufacturing' or sustainable industrial activity is the need of the hour and the Government of India requires the manufacturing sector to play a bigger role in the country's economy. This paper focuses on the initiative taken by the industries to make the environment eco-friendly. The paper further will emphasize upon a case study of Hero MotoCop.
Human Resource Development in Globalized Era
Authors: Sinha G.K.
Published: March 2016

Human resources development is the process of increasing the knowledge, the skills, and the capacities of all the people in a society. In economic terms, it could be described as the accumulation of human capital and its effective investment in the development of an economy. In political terms, human resources development prepares people for adult participation in political processes, particularly as citizens in a democracy. From the social and cultural points of view, the development of human resources helps people to lead fuller and richer lives, less bound by tradition. In short, the processes of human resources development unlock the door to modernization. Education is essential for all and is fundamental to their all-round development, material and spiritual. Education has continued to evolve, diversify and extend its reach and coverage since the dawn of human history. Even Alfred Marshall emphasized the importance of education as a national investment and in his view the most valuable of all capital is that invested in human beings. Every country develops its system of education to express and promote its unique socio-cultural identity and also to meet the growing challenges with the changing times. In this regard, major initiatives/programmes taken by the Central as well as State governments. This paper deals with the changes in our education structure and system after independence of country like increment of literacy rate, growth of educational institution, enrolment ratio of girls, pupil teacher ratio in educational institutions, government's expenditure on education, structural change of education and vocationalisation of education.
Self Help Groups
Authors: Agrawal Shruti
Published: March 2016

The chapter is based on the Self Help Group-Bank linkage Programme in India. The objective of the chapter is to assess the SHGs access to credit under SHG-Bank Linkage Programme, to know the progress of SHG-Bank Linkage Programme in India and to evaluate the impact of SHG-Bank Linkage Programme in India. Finally the chapter ends with suggestions to improve self help group-bank linkage programme and concludes that SHG-Bank Linkage Programme has provided a more favorable environment for enhancing India's potential for greater equitable growth with empowerment while considering the positive signs in their performance.
Functionalization and the Real Virtual
Authors: Gehmann Ulrich , Reiche Martin
Published: March 2016

In this article the authors are going to explore a tendency in virtual world design towards the creation of non-functionalized virtual worlds, i.e. worlds which only exist to exist without resembling any function in their design. They are going to show how this tendency is grounded in the ongoing process of formatization in the real world by introducing a 4-step model of de-functionalization and show which chances exist for these non-functional virtual worlds to affect the real world through the mental world conception of the user.
Conversation China
Authors: Johansson Michael
Published: March 2016

This article will present and discuss the design thinking, methods, processes and some examples of work that demonstrates how, together with different co-creators, one sets up a work practice using digital 3d objects and images. That in different ways and formats helps us to explore how a database, a set of rules can be used in a dialogue with artistic work practice and how such a process can be used to create images and animation in a variety of design and art projects. The main example is a project called Conversation China that still is in its making, here one works with rather complex processes, involving several digital analogue techniques as the basis for creating the images for a 150 pieces porcelain dinner set. The author's interest in this work is how the intention of the artist or designer is transferred and later embedded in the procedural or algorithmic process and how this intent is organized and set up to secure an desired outcome, mixing the possibilities of the digital media object with manual editing and artistic craftsmanship. What this article tries to put forward is how we designed and set up environments for working with non linear and procedural media, their different expressions and forms by using explorable prototypes and design thinking?
Towards a Categorization of Scambaiting Strategies against Online Advance Fee Fraud
Authors: Zingerle Andreas
Published: March 2016

Scambaiters are individuals in online information communities specializing in identifying, documenting and reporting actions of so-called ‘419 scammers'. A qualitative research approach was applied to two active scambaiting communities - 419eater.com and thescambaiter.com. Content analysis of several discussions and the examination of interviews from the web radio ‘Area 419: Scambaiting Radio' resulted in the seven categories of scambaiting techniques that are presented in this article. The aim is to both give a wider understanding of the scope of existing Internet scams as well as answering questions of why and how individuals or communities of scambaiters take action against Internet scammers. The analysis on various scambaiting practices is intended as a base for future discussions, for instance, whether some scambaiting methods should be implemented in media competence training.
Accounting for Individual and Situation Characteristics to Understand the User Behaviour when Interacting with Systems during Critical Situations
Authors: Aguiar Yuska P. C. , Vieira Maria de Fátima Q. , Galy Edith , Santoni Charles
Published: March 2016

Human error studies tend to focus on identifying the relationship between human activity, errors and their consequences. Accidents and incidents report analysis has been the path followed by several authors in the human error studies field, as it will be discussed in this paper. However, error reports tend to detail technical aspects of the error occurrence but fail to explore the human-behaviour component that might have influenced it. In order to investigate the human behaviour and its relation with accidents and human errors the authors propose to observe individuals working during critical situations, while adopting a methodological approach supported by an experimental protocol, to ensure a rigorous systematization of the data gathering and analysis. This paper presents a cognitive model which accounts for the knowledge of the individual and situation characteristics when analysing the user behaviour during critical situations. It also presents the supporting experimental protocol, and discusses its application in the context of a decision making aid system, employed during maritime pollution crisis management.
Understanding Phatic Aspects of Narrative when Designing Assistive and Augmentative Communication Interfaces
Authors: Slotznick Benjamin
Published: March 2016

Users of Assistive and Augmentative Communications (AAC) systems sometimes have difficulty engaging in the quick and varied banter demanded of many social situations, or contributing to social conversations with their own previously developed narratives, opinions, experiences, or jokes. This chapter presents tools and approaches that have been developed to remedy these challenges. These include special interfaces that rely on “phatic” vocabularies or retrieve previously saved narratives that are used phatically. A phatic approach uses language to convey social participation through gesture, affirmation, or emotive support as much as or more than to convey wants, needs, or spontaneous and novel narrative. This chapter does not propose replacing standard AAC vocabularies, but instead suggests how a supplementary phatic approach can significantly enhance a user's participation in social interactions.
A ‘Step into the Abyss'?
Authors: Johnston Keith M. , Phillips Tom
Published: March 2016

This article uses a media industries studies perspective to investigate the current state of transmedia production in the United Kingdom. Analyzing the discursive statements of a range of industry participants from both U.K. television and games industries, the authors reveal a series of contradictions and misunderstandings that may be limiting the effectiveness of multi-platform projects. By comparing overlapping discursive patterns around attitudes to risk, measures of success, authorship between the two industries, and repeated concerns over the balance of creative and commercial imperatives, the authors argue that existing hierarchies of power between media industries threaten to derail future convergence.
Multi-Step Iterative Algorithm for Feature Selection on Dynamic Documents
Authors: Bafna Prafulla Bharat , Shirwaikar Shailaja , Pramod Dhanya
Published: March 2016

The authors propose clustering based multistep iterative algorithm. The important step is where terms are grouped by synonyms. It takes advantage of semantic relativity measure between the terms. Term frequency is computed of the group of synonyms by considering the relativity measure of the terms appearing in the document from the parent term in the group. This increases the importance of terms which though individually appear less frequently but together show their strong presence. The authors tried experiments on different real and artificial datasets such as NEWS 20, Reuters, emails, research papers on different topics. Resulted entropy shows that their algorithm gives improved result on certain set of documents which are well-articulated, such as research papers. The results are marginal on documents where the message is emphasized by repetitions of terms specifically the documents that are rapidly generated such as emails. The authors also observed that newly arrived documents get appropriately mapped based on proximity to the semantic group.
Dynamic Query Intent Prediction from a Search Log Stream
Authors: Hanna Wael K. , Asem Aziza Saad , Senousy M. B.
Published: March 2016

The users that used search engines are obligated to express their goals in few words (queries). Sometimes search queries are ambiguous. Moreover, the users' intents are dynamically evolving. This paper analyzes the user's query logs to classify the related queries, the related intent topic categories and the related intent types and use this classification to dynamically predict the users' future queries, its intent topic and its intent type. AOL Search Query Log is taken as an experimental data set. Then use evaluation metrics to evaluate the prediction results.
Analysis of the Optimal Threshold Policy of the E-Tailer with Mixture Strategy in E-Fulfillment
Authors: Cheng Yuepeng , Li Bo , Li Zhenhong
Published: March 2016

This study considers a supply chain consisting of a supplier and an e-tailer on the internet. The e-tailer replenishes products from the supplier for private inventory and sends drop shipping requests to him for delivering orders to customers when private inventory is insufficient or stock out, whereas the supplier provides drop shipping service with a limited ability for the e-tailer. This paper proposes an algorithm to simulate the scheduling sequences of the e-tailer with the optimal threshold policy and mixture strategy in every scheduling unit and obtains the optimal threshold of private inventory for the e-tailer to achieve average profit maximization. The impacts of mixture of demand and lead time uncertainty are examined. The influence of high priority demand variability on the optimal threshold policy in two complex scenarios are also considered in this study. These results have an important guiding significance for the e-tailer who adopts the mixture strategy in e-fulfillment under complex operating environments.
Interactive Data Visualization to Understand Data Better
Authors: Zhu Zhecheng , Heng Bee Hoon , Teow Kiok Liang
Published: March 2016

This paper focuses on interactive data visualization techniques and their applications in healthcare systems. Interactive data visualization is a collection of techniques translating data from its numeric format to graphic presentation dynamically for easy understanding and visual impact. Compared to conventional static data visualization techniques, interactive data visualization techniques allow users to self-explore the entire data set by instant slice and dice, quick switching among multiple data sources. Adjustable granularity of interactive data visualization allows for both detailed micro information and aggregated macro information displayed in a single chart. Animated transition adds extra visual impact that describes how system transits from one state to another. When applied to healthcare system, interactive visualization techniques are useful in areas such as information integration, flow or trajectory presentation and location related visualization, etc. In this paper, three case studies are shared to illustrate how interactive data visualization techniques are applied to various aspects of healthcare systems. The first case study shows a pathway visualization representing longitudinal disease progression of a patient cohort. The second case study shows a dashboard profiling different patient cohorts from multiple perspectives. The third case study shows an interactive map illustrating patient geographical distribution at adjustable granularity. All three case studies illustrate that interactive data visualization techniques help quick information access, fast knowledge sharing and better decision making in healthcare system.
Analysis of microRNA Regulated Seed Biology Networks in Arabidopsis
Authors: Basu Anamika , Sarkar Anasua , Basak Piyali
Published: March 2016

Seed maturation and embryogenesis in plants are crucial event for food production of all human beings. Delayed seed maturation and abnormal embryo formation of food crops degrade the quality and quantity of food grains. By performing comparative gene analysis of different microarray experiments in different stages of embryogenesis in Arabidopsis thaliana, using as model plant, here the authors identified a gene coexpression module in preglobular stage. In this module, different genes have been studied which are over-expressed during embryogenesis related with several KEGG metabolic pathways. Analysing the gene cluster evolved from network we concluded that microRNA regulates gene expression of two genes. One of them NRMP6, a metal ion transporter protein gene and second one SKS8, has copper ion binding activity, are regulated by miR167A/B. Since these two genes are also expressed during embryogenesis of other food crops e.g. rice tomato etc, so the microRNAs regulation on gene expression during embryogenesis can be extrapolated for other economically important seeds.
Product Design Applied to Formulated Products
Authors: Bodratti Andrew M. , He Zhiqi , Tsianou Marina , Cheng Chong , Alexandridis Paschalis
Published: March 2016

Product development is a multi-faceted role that a growing number of engineers are tasked with. This represents a significant shift in career paths for those employed in the chemical and materials engineering disciplines, who typically were concerned with bulk commodity manufacturing. This paradigm shift requires the undergraduate curriculum to be adapted to prepare students for these new responsibilities. The authors present here on a product design capstone course developed for chemical engineering seniors at the University at Buffalo (UB), The State University of New York (SUNY). The course encompasses the following themes: a general framework for product design and development (identify customer needs, convert needs to specifications, create ideas/concepts, select concept, formulate/test/manufacture product; and (nano)structure-property relations that guide the search for smart/tunable/functional materials for contemporary needs and challenges. These two main themes are enriched with case studies of successful products. Students put the course material into practice by working through formulated product design projects that are drawn from real-world problems. The authors begin by presenting the course organization, teaching techniques, and assessment strategy. They then discuss examples of student work to show how students apply the course material to solve problems. Finally, they present an analysis of historical student performance in the course. The analysis seeks to identify correlation between related student deliverables, and also between the Product Design course and a prerequisite materials science and engineering course.
Fluorescence hyper-spectral imaging to detecting faecal contamination on fresh tomatoes
Authors: Romaniello Roberto , Peri Giorgio , Leone Alessandro
Published: March 2016

Faecal contamination of fresh fruits represents a severe danger for human health. Thus some techniques based on microbiological testing were developed to individuate faecal contaminants but those tests do not results efficient because their non-applicability on overall vegetable unity. In this work a methodology based on hyper-spectral fluorescence imaging was developed and tested to detecting faecal contamination on fresh tomatoes. Two image-processing methods were performed to maximise the contrast between the faecal contaminant and tomatoes skin: principal component analysis and band image ratio (BRI). The BRI method allows classifying correctly 70% of contaminated area, with no false-positives in all examined cases. Thus, the developed methodology can be employed for a fast and effective detection of faecal contamination on fresh tomatoes.
Report on the 44th International Symposium: Actual Tasks on Agricultural Engineering, 23rd-26th February 2016, Opatija, Croatia
Authors: Kovačev Igor , De Wrachien Daniele
Published: March 2016

The 44th International Symposium Actual Tasks on Agricultural Engineering was held on 23rd-26th February 2016 in Grand Hotel Adriatic Opatija, Republic of Croatia. The principle Organiser, Agricultural Engineering Department, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Zagreb was supported by the following frameworks: Department of Agricultural Engineering, Faculty of Agriculture, University J.J. Strossmayer, Osijek, Department of Bio-systems Engineering, Faculty of Agriculture and Lifesciences, University of Maribor (Slovenia), Agricultural Institute of Slovenia, National institute for agricultural machinery - INMA Bucharest (Romania) and Croatian Agricultural Engineering Society. In addition, CIGR, EurAgEng and AAAE bestowed their support and endorsement on the Event.