bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Global Knowledge Management Technology Strategies and Competitive Functionality
Authors: Schulte William , O'Sullivan Kevin J.
Published: May 2011

Information and knowledge management technologies and globalization have changed how firms in service industries formulate, implement and sustain competitive advantage. This research project contributes to our understanding of the relationships between Global Knowledge Management Technology Strategies and Competitive Functionality from Global IT. Based on field research this study found that Global Knowledge Management Technology strategies have a positive impact on Competitive Advantage from Information Technology Applications Functionality from Global IT. This study provides recommendations to International Engineering, Procurement and Construction Industry executives regarding the impact of knowledge management strategies and global information technology on competitive advantage of firms in their industry.
The Building of Intellectual Capital Statements in Multinationals
Authors: Lytras Miltiadis D. , Ordóñez de Pablos Patricia
Published: May 2011

Multinational companies (MCNs) are facing important challenges within the current economic context. Rapid technological changes, the globalization of the economy, the existence of increasingly demanding consumers are, among other factors, the origin of the difficulties involved in achieving and sustaining a competitive advantage in the long-term. One of the keys for overcoming these difficulties is to manage knowledge-based resources appropriately. However, in order to be able to manage these resources, the multinationals need to know, with complete transparency, just what these resources are, and this is achieved by quantifying them. The quantification of knowledge-based resources and the preparation of intellectual capital statements represent two strategic challenges for the MNCs.
Strategic Knowledge Management in Matrix Multinational Organizations
Authors: Thompson Alan M.
Published: May 2011

This chapter looks at managing knowledge workers within the business environment of a matrix-organized multinational organization, using oil and gas contractor Production Services Network (PSN) for illustration. It looks at the influence of business needs and human, organizational culture and strategic factors on KM; the importance of communicating business drivers; adverse demographics, and outlines some future trends that managers and KM staff in multinational matrix organizations should be preparing for. It is hoped that discussing examples of KM in practice, within the context of globalization, demographic changes, and rapid developments in technology, markets and business relationships will ground some familiar theory in some new and evolving territory, providing interest to both academics and practitioners.
Model-Driven Engineering (MDE) and Model-Driven Architecture (MDA) applied to the Modeling and Deployment of Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) Systems
Authors: Laforcade Pierre , Nodenot Thierry , Choquet Christophe , Caron Pierre-Andre
Published: May 2011

This chapter deals with the application of Model-Driven Engineering and Model-Driven Architecture approaches in a Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) context. Such Software Engineering approaches provide concrete benefits (productivity, interoperability, adaptability) by means of intensive uses of models, meta-models and transformations. Such benefits can also be met in a TEL context. Because computer scientists or engineers cannot currently find well-defined frameworks about this new trend, we have chosen to report recent results of our working group (initiated in 2003) in order to provide readers with a survival kit. Our results, illustrated in this chapter, argue that Model Driven Engineering can help designers to reduce the gap between specific instructional requirements (domain point of view) and the software architectures that practically support the implementation, the run-time and the regulation of this instruction.
An Adaptive e-learning Platform for Personalized Course Generation
Authors: Sangineto Enver
Published: May 2011

In this chapter we show the technical and methodological aspects of an e-learning platform for automatic course personalization built during the European funded project Diogene. The system we propose is composed of different knowledge modules and some inference tools. The knowledge modules represent the system’s information about both the domain-specific didactic material and the student model. By exploiting such information the system automatically builds courses whose didactic material is customized to meet the current student’s degree of knowledge and her/his learning preferences. Concerning the latter, we have adopted the Felder and Silverman’s pedagogical approach in order to match the student’s learning styles with the system Learning Objects’ types. Finally, we take care to describe the system’s didactic material by means of some present standards for e-learning in order to allow knowledge sharing with other e-learning platforms and knowledge searching by means of possible Semantic Web information retrieval facilities.
Competition and the Winner's Curse in B2B Reverse Auctions
Authors: Ghosh Indranil K. , Fizel John L. , Millet Ido , Parente Diane H.
Published: May 2011

The Winner’s Curse is a common phenomenon mostly in auctions, even though it has applications in a diverse range of fields. We define the idea of a Winner’s Curse and specify the types of auctions in which this could be prevalent. We look at the data provided by a major multinational corporation on online procurement auctions conducted by them. We specify the relationship that the prevalence of the Winner’s Curse would have on the success of such procurement auctions. Using this theoretical background, we analyze the given data and show that in some cases, the presence of the Winner’s Curse and the subsequent need for bidders to show caution in the presence of the Winner’s Curse could lead to lower auction success for the firm. We specify the particular cases where this is true. This leads to Managerial Implications for firms wishing to conduct procurement auctions online and we spell them out. We also provide some examples of how firms might try and lower the negative effects of the Winner’s Curse. Finally we provide some future research ideas that may be pursued and some additional readings for the curious reader.
Novel Business-Oriented Auctions
Authors: Mullen Tracy
Published: May 2011

With the advent of the Internet, traditional auction forms have evolved to fit into a plethora business niches, either integrating into traditional approaches or simply creating new opportunities. This chapter examines two novel uses for auctions in a business context, namely sponsored search auctions and prediction markets. Understanding the potential auction benefits and limitations can hopefully provide practitioners with a more informed and successful approach when employing these auction-based tools in their business.
Multi-Agent Patterns for Deploying Online Auctions
Authors: Jureta Ivan , Kolp Manuel , Faulkner Stéphane
Published: May 2011

A high volume of goods and services is being traded using online auction systems. This growth requires a larger size and complexity in order to support the online auction systems. This chapter proposes that there be an analysis of the patterns to identify best practices in the development of online auction information systems. These patterns should help both IT managers and software engineers during the requirements specifications phase of developing an online auction system.
An Internet Trading Platform for Testing Auction and Exchange Mechanisms
Authors: Qiao Haiying , Jie Hui , Yao Dong-Qing
Published: May 2011

In this chapter we present a generic electronic market platform that is designed to run different kinds of auctions and exchanges. Researchers can use the platform to implement different electronic market mechanisms, simulate the market behavior of their interests, and experiment with it. A generic OR/XOR bidding language that can express different OR/XOR combinations is implemented for Web interfaces. Different auctions including combinatorial auctions, multiple-round reverse auctions and multiple homogeneous good auctions have been built and run successfully on the platform.
An Empirical Study of Collusion Potential Metrics and their Impact on Online Reverse Auction Success
Authors: Gupta Srabana , Ghosh Indranil , Millet Ido
Published: May 2011

This chapter studies the effect of bidder conduct on auction success by examining a business to business (B2B) online procurement auction market. In particular, it investigates if collaborative bidding is more likely when suppliers compete with each other on multiple auctions and/or over a longer period of time. Multiple regression analysis confirms that in online reverse auctions, winning bids are higher or auction success is lower when the same set of suppliers bid against each other regularly. In a supply chain framework, existence of such collaborative bidder behavior would reduce the cost savings for the buyer. It is therefore important for the practitioners to be alert to such activities and introduce measures that curtail the resulting costly outcomes.
Reverse Auctions
Authors: Sherman Barbara , Muscatello Joseph R
Published: May 2011

Online reverse auctions are a relatively new phenomenon in business, although the practice of traditional auctions is centuries old. The online aspect of auctions is an example of a disruptive technology and its impact on the business world. The use of the internet has changed the face of competition in supply and also changed the way buyers and suppliers interact. This chapter is a topological classification of the current literature on e-procurement auctions with the intent of organizing current and future research in online procurement auctions.. Over 200 articles have been abstracted and reviewed. The authors develop three classification frames: content, theory, and methodology. Nineteen content areas are populated, including significant reference to the impact of auctions on the supply chain. In summary, this chapter seeks to increase the topic clarity of current research. The quality of each individual reverse auction paper is not evaluated. However, the classification should stimulate academics to pursue current and new avenues of reverse auction research.
Security in Service-Oriented Architecture
Authors: Padmanabhuni Srinivas , Adarkar Hemant
Published: May 2011

This chapter covers the different facets of security as applicable to Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) implementations. First, it examines the security equirements in SOA implementations, highlighting the differences as compared to the requirements of generic online systems. Later, it discusses the different solution mechanisms to address these requirements in SOA implementations. In the context of Web services, the predominant SOA implementation standards have a crucial role to play. This chapter critically examines the crucial Web services security standards in different stages of adoption and standardization. Later, this chapter examines the present-day common nonstandard security mechanisms of SOA implementations. Towards the end, it discusses the future trends in security for SOA implementations with special bearing on the role of standards. The authors believe that the pragmatic analysis of the multiple facets of security in SOA implementations provided here will serve as a guide for SOA security practitioners.
Enhancing Web Service Discovery and Monitoring with Quality of Service Information
Authors: Platzer Christian , Rosenberg Florian , Dustdar Schahram
Published: May 2011

Web services provide a fundamental technology for developing service-oriented systems by leveraging platform-independent interface descriptions (WSDL) and a flexible message encoding (SOAP). Beside the functional description, Quality of Service (QoS) issues are currently not part of the Web service standards stack, although they provide valuable metadata of a Web service such as performance, dependability, security or cost and payment. This additional information can be used to greatly enhance service discovery, selection and composition. As a result of the latest research that is dedicated to this area, this chapter deals with the various ways of describing, bootstrapping and evaluating QoS attributes. A strong focus is laid on client-side QoS assessment and the arising problems. Furthermore, a method to analyze Web service interactions by using our evaluation tool and extract important QoS information without any knowledge about the service implementation will be presented and thoroughly explained. Usually, taking performance measures for a specific Web service requires access to the service implementation or at least the server machine where it is hosted. This chapter will address a way to bootstrap the most important performance and dependability values form the client’s perspective and therefore overcoming these restrictions.
Why Fuzzy Set Theory is Useful in Data Mining
Authors: Hüllermeier Eyke
Published: May 2011

In recent years, several extensions of data mining and knowledge discovery methods have been developed on the basis of fuzzy set theory. Corresponding fuzzy data mining methods exhibit some potential advantages over standard methods, notably the following: Since many patterns of interest are inherently vague, fuzzy approaches allow for modeling them in a more adequate way and thus enable the discovery of patterns that would otherwise remain hidden. Related to this, fuzzy methods are often more robust toward a certain amount of variability or noise in the data, a point of critical importance in many practical application fields. This chapter highlights the aforementioned advantages of fuzzy approaches in the context of exemplary data mining methods, but also points out some additional complications that can be caused by fuzzy extensions.
Handling Local Patterns in Collaborative Structuring
Authors: Mierswa Ingo , Morik Katharina , Wurst Michael
Published: May 2011

Media collections in the internet have become a commercial success and the structuring of large media collections has thus become an issue. Personal media collections are locally structured in very different ways by different users. The level of detail, the chosen categories, and the extensions can differ completely from user to user. Can machine learning be of help also for structuring personal collections? Since users do not want to have their hand-made structures overwritten, one could deny the benefit of automatic structuring. We argue that what seems to exclude machine learning, actually poses a new learning task. We propose a notation which allows us to describe machine learning tasks in a uniform manner. Keeping the demands of structuring private collections in mind, we define the new learning task of localized alternative cluster ensembles. An algorithm solving the new task is presented together with its application to distributed media management.
Pattern Mining and Clustering on Image Databases
Authors: Bouet Marinette , Gançarski Pierre , Aufaure Marie-Aude , Boussaïd Omar
Published: May 2011

Analysing and mining image data to derive potentially useful information is a very challenging task. Image mining concerns the extraction of implicit knowledge, image data relationships, associations between image data and other data or patterns not explicitly stored in the images. Another crucial task is to organize the large image volumes to extract relevant information. In fact, decision support systems are evolving to store and analyse these complex data. This paper presents a survey of the relevant research related to image data processing. We present data warehouse advances that organize large volumes of data linked with images and then, we focus on two techniques largely used in image mining. We present clustering methods applied to image analysis and we introduce the new research direction concerning pattern mining from large collections of images. While considerable advances have been made in image clustering, there is little research dealing with image frequent pattern mining. We shall try to understand why.
Privacy Preserving Data Mining, Concepts, Techniques, and Evaluation Methodologies
Authors: Fovino Igor Nai
Published: May 2011

Intense work in the area of data mining technology and in its applications to several domains has resulted in the development of a large variety of techniques and tools able to automatically and intelligently transform large amounts of data in knowledge relevant to users. However, as with other kinds of useful technologies, the knowledge discovery process can be misused. It can be used, for example, by malicious subjects in order to reconstruct sensitive information for which they do not have an explicit access authorization. This type of “attack” cannot easily be detected, because, usually, the data used to guess the protected information, is freely accessible. For this reason, many research efforts have been recently devoted to addressing the problem of privacy preserving in data mining. The mission of this chapter is therefore to introduce the reader in this new research field and to provide the proper instruments (in term of concepts, techniques and example) in order to allow a critical comprehension of the advantages, the limitations and the open issues of the Privacy Preserving Data Mining Techniques.
Mining Data - Streams
Authors: Abdulsalam Hanady , Skillicorn David B. , Martin Pat
Published: May 2011

Data analysis or data mining have been applied to data produced by many kinds of systems. Some systems, for example road traffic monitoring, produce data continuously, and often at high rates. Analyzing such data creates new issues, because it is neither appropriate, nor perhaps possible, to accumulate it and process it using standard data-mining techniques. The information implicit in each data record must be extracted in a limited amount of time and, usually, without the possibility of going back to consider it again. Existing algorithms must be modified to apply in this new setting. This chapter outlines and analyzes the most recent research work in the area of data-stream mining. It gives some sample research ideas or algorithms in this field and concludes with a comparison that shows the main advantages and disadvantages of the algorithms. It also includes a discussion and possible future work in the area.
Provider-Payer Transactions
Authors: Rada Roy
Published: May 2011

The key financial transactions in U.S. healthcare occur when the provider sends a claim to the payer and the payer adjudicates the claim. This chapter first explains the history of electronic data interchange (EDI) and then shows the powerful, costsaving impact that it can have on healthcare. One bottleneck to EDI in healthcare has been the lack of standardization. This problem was addressed with a law passed in 1996, with which the healthcare industry was still grappling a decade later. The standardization of these transactions will be explored in detail in this chapter. After that, a different aspect of provider-payer transactions is examined, namely, the temptation to cheat and the role of software in combating fraud.
Developing Strategies for Competitive Advantage
Authors: Shimizu Tamio
Published: May 2011

As in any game, the success of competitive strategies depends on knowing the rules as well as the other players. Nevertheless, in the real competitive environment, the rules are not always clear and can change very quickly, demanding quick responses and making it increasingly difficult to map the moves of the main players. Strong monitoring channels must be maintained to follow changes in the competitive environment and to discern new trends. Changes in the environment can result from emerging technologies or changes in society’s behavior, and thus in clients´ demands. They can also be the result of competitors´ moves in the market. Thus developing a good competitive strategy depends on mapping the environment and constantly monitoring it to be able to capitalize quickly on opportunities or neutralize threats. The focus of this chapter is on mapping the environment. It will show the main aspects of the model for industry analysis and explain the process of forming strategic groups and pressure maps.
Creating Competitive Advantage
Authors: Juntunen Arla
Published: May 2011

This chapter addresses collaborative business networks at the level of industry/cluster networks, which is important and relevant from the strategic management perspective in several industries. This chapter examines two current “hot topics”: the emergence of a new Internet driven business group, and its construction through a series of intentionally developed collaborative networks. Networks are seen to offer firms collective benefits beyond those of a single firm or market transaction. The author of this chapter aims to contribute to the development of the emerging theory of network management by inte-grating notions from the Industrial Network Approach and the Resource-Based View of the firm, in particular its extensions into dynamic capabilities and learning. The starting premise is that the charac-teristics of the task that organizations try to accomplish through forming a specific collaborative net-work influence, the management of that network, and thus, the capabilities developed and required. This chapter is based on a longitudinal case study in the ICT-sector.
Introduction to Data Mining Techniques via Multiple Criteria Optimization Approaches and Applications
Authors: Shi Yong , Peng Yi , Kou Gang , Chen Zhengxin
Published: May 2011

This chapter provides an overview of a series of multiple criteria optimization-based data mining methods, which utilize multiple criteria programming (MCP) to solve data mining problems, and outlines some research challenges and opportunities for the data mining community. To achieve these goals, this chapter first introduces the basic notions and mathematical formulations for multiple criteria optimization- based classification models, including the multiple criteria linear programming model, multiple criteria quadratic programming model, and multiple criteria fuzzy linear programming model. Then it presents the real-life applications of these models in credit card scoring management, HIV-1 associated dementia (HAD) neuronal damage and dropout, and network intrusion detection. Finally, the chapter discusses research challenges and opportunities.
Making Decisions with Data
Authors: Swingler Kevin , Cairns David
Published: May 2011

This chapter identifies important barriers to the successful application of computational intelligence (CI) techniques in a commercial environment and suggests a number of ways in which they may be overcome. It identifies key conceptual, cultural and technical barriers and describes the different ways in which they affect both the business user and the CI practitioner. The chapter does not provide technical detail on how to implement any given technique, rather it discusses the practical consequences for the business user of issues such as non-linearity and extrapolation. For the CI practitioner, we discuss several cultural issues that need to be addressed when seeking to find a commercial application for CI techniques. The authors aim to highlight to technical and business readers how their different expectations can affect the successful outcome of a CI project. The authors hope that by enabling both parties to understand each other’s perspective, the true potential of CI can be realized.
Data Mining Association Rules for Making Knowledgeable Decisions
Authors: Kumar A.V. Senthil , Wahidabanu R. S.D.
Published: May 2011

This chapter describes two techniques used to explore frequent large itemsets in the database. In the first technique called “closed directed graph approach,” the algorithm scans the database once making a count on possible 2-itemsets from which only the 2-itemsets with a minimum support are used to form the closed directed graph which explores possible frequent large itemsets in the database. In the second technique, dynamic hashing algorithm, large 3-itemsets are generated at an earlier stage which reduces the size of the transaction database after trimming and the cost of later iterations will be less. Furthermore the authors hope that these techniques help researchers not only to understand about generating frequent large itemsets, but also assist with the understanding of finding association rules among transactions within relational databases.
Application of Data Mining Algorithms for Measuring Performance Impact of Social Development Activities
Authors: Rahman Hakikur
Published: May 2011

Social development activities are flourishing in diversified branches of society endeavor, despite numerous hurdles inflicting on their ways that are truly cross-sectoral. They vary from providing basic human services, as such education, health, and entrepreneurship to advance maneuvers depending on the demand at the outset. However, while talking about discovering true success cases around the globe, recapitulating their thoroughfares to accumulate knowledge; and foremost, utilizing newly emerged information technology methods to archive and disseminate model cases, not many stand on their own. This has happened due for many reasons, and a few of them are; improper program design, inaccurate site selection, incorrect breakeven analysis, insufficient supply of funding, unbalanced manpower selection, inappropriate budget allocation, inadequate feedback and monitoring. Apart from them, there are many hidden parameters that are not even visible. Furthermore, these visible parameters (including the invisible) are intricately intermingled to one another in such a way that lagging of one derailed the whole project and eventually the program fail. Not surprisingly, all of these parameters depend on data and information on implemented programs or projects of which they mostly lack. Thus, lack of data and information related to their appropriateness (or inappropriateness), made them failure projects, despite devoted efforts by the implementers, in most cases. This chapter has tried to focus on data mining applications and their utilizations in formulating performance-measuring tools for social development activities. In this context, this chapter has provided justifications to include data mining algorithm to establish monitoring and evaluation tools for various social development applications. Specifically, this chapter gave in-depth analytical observations to establish knowledge centers with various approaches and finally it put forward a few research issues and challenges to transform the contemporary human society into a knowledge society.
Grounding Business Interaction Models
Authors: Goldkuho Goran , Lind Mikael
Published: May 2011

In the information systems field there exist several theories for guiding the evaluation and design of information systems. These theories need to be transparent and harmonious. In this chapter, business action theory (BAT) as a domain ontology for business interaction and business processes is clarified by elaborating on socio-instrumental pragmatism (SIP) as a base ontology. SIP is an eclectic theory synthesizing several pragmatic theories from reference disciplines outside the IS area. One purpose of SIP is to enable seamless theorizing in the IS area. In this chapter we put forward the foundations of BAT and SIP which are then followed by grounding BAT in SIP. This grounding means that there will be an ontological clarification of BAT by specifying the social action and interaction character of business interaction.
KnowledgeEco
Authors: Weinberger Hadas , Te’eni Dov , Frank Ariel J.
Published: May 2011

This chapter presents KnowledgeEco, a domain ontology for organizational memory (OM). Based on extant theories of the domain, KnowledgeEco defines static and dynamic aspects of OM as a basis for formulating an evaluation framework, which can be used by organizations irrespective of their specific field. A key innovation in the KnowledgeEco ontology is the introduction of the concept of structural memory (SM). SM aggregates Type, which defines types of organizational memory, and Component, which aggregates Content (i.e., Knowledge Resource and Meta-Knowledge) and Means (i.e., Agent and Process) that manage the SM content. We demonstrate the considerations of ontology conceptualization in two stages of developing KnowledgeEco. The first is analysis and structuring of the ontology and the second is the assessment of its conceptual coverage. For researchers, KnowledgeEco provides a model that can be used in the evaluation of OM. For practitioners, the ontology offers a unified framework of objects and processes that need to be considered in the design of OM.
MARSYAS-0.2
Authors: Tzanetakis George
Published: May 2011

Marsyas, is an open source audio processing framework with specific emphasis on building Music Information Retrieval systems. It has been been under development since 1998 and has been used for a variety of projects in both academia and industry. In this chapter, the software architecture of Marsyas will be described. The goal is to highlight design challenges and solutions that are relevant to any MIR software. Keywords: Information Processing, Music, Information Retrieval, System Design, Evaluation, Fast Fourier Transfer (FFT), Feature Extraction, MFCC
Motivic Pattern Extraction in Symbolic Domain
Authors: Lartillot Olivier
Published: May 2011

This chapter offers an overview of computational research in motivic pattern extraction. The central questions underlying the topic, concerning the formalization of the motivic structures, the matching strategies and the filtering of the results, have been addressed in various ways. A detailed analysis of these problems leads to the proposal of a new methodology, which will be developed throughout the study. One main conclusion of this review is that the problems cannot be tackled using purely mathematic or geometric heuristics or classical engineering tools, but require also a detailed understanding of the multiple constraints derived by the underlying cognitive context.
Pen-Based Interaction for Intuitive Music Composition and Editing
Authors: Macé Sébastien , Anquetil Eric , Bossis Bruno
Published: May 2011

This chapter deals with pen interaction and its use for musical notation composition and editing. The authors first present existing pen-based musical notation editors and argue that they are dedicated to classical musical notations and are often constraining for the user. They then focus on their generic method that is in particular based on a formalism that models how to interpret the strokes drawn in on-line structured documents. To analyze an element, it models a coupling of a global vision (its position relatively to the other elements of the document) with a local vision (its shape and that of its components). The authors also present the hand-drawn stroke analyzer associated to this formalism. Finally they demonstrate how the presented method can be used to design pen-based systems not only for classical musical score notations, but also for plainchant scores, drum tablatures and stringed-instrument tablatures.
Introduction to Banking Technology and Management
Authors: Ravi Vadlamani
Published: May 2011

This chapter introduces banking technology as a confluence of several disparate disciplines such as Finance (including risk management), Information technology, Computer Science, Communication technology and marketing science. It presents the evolution of banking, the tremendous influence of information and communication technologies on banking and its products, the quintessential role played by computer science in fulfilling banks’ marketing objective of servicing customers better at a less cost and thereby reap more profits. It also highlights the use of advanced statistics and computer science to measure, mitigate and manage various risks associated with banks’ business with its customers and other banks. The growing influence of customer relationship management and data mining in tackling various marketing related problems and fraud detection problems in banking industry is well documented. The chapter concludes by saying that the banking technology discipline is all set for rapid growth in future.
Service Quality in Banks
Authors: Porto Bellini Carlo Gabriel , de Cássia de Faria Pereira Rita
Published: May 2011

Quality in servicing customers is an important marketing construct for banks, but idiosyncrasies in the definition of service quality and customer satisfaction, as well as in adapting current instruments to measure them in the international banking industry, constitute major constraints to research and practice. This chapter conceptualizes the quality of banking services based on the perception of 11,936 customers of a major Brazilian bank. Five drivers of banking service quality are developed and argued to be a proxy for customer satisfaction: (1) business and financial transactions, (2) customer relationship, (3) information technology, (4) branch, and (5) image. The resultant framework is expected to serve bank executives when making strategic decisions on how to address the clientele.
Engineering Banking Applications
Authors: Patra Manas Ranjan
Published: May 2011

The banking industry has undergone a major change in recent years. Global competition has forced the industry to be more agile and customer focused in all its services. Banks can no more function in isolation but have to operate cutting across physical boundaries. Interoperability, scalability, maintainability, and security are the upcoming challenges for the banking industry. This has enthused software architects to develop suitable software development paradigms that can seamlessly integrate business functions across organizational boundaries. This chapter envisages a hybrid approach that uses the service-oriented paradigm along with the software agent technology as a possible solution to the growing issues of inter-and intra- bank operations.
Electronic Banking and Information Assurance Issues
Authors: Gupta Manish , Rao Raghav , Upadhyaya Shambhu
Published: May 2011

Information assurance is a key component in e-banking services. This article investigates the information assurance issues and tenets of e-banking security that would be needed for design, development, and assessment of an adequate electronic security infrastructure. The technology terminology and frameworks presented in the article are with the view to equip the reader with a glimpse of the state-of-art technologies that may help toward learning and better decisions regarding electronic security.
Data Warehousing and Analytics in Banking
Authors: Narayanan L. Venkat
Published: May 2011

In an increasingly competitive market, banks are constantly searching for sustainable competitive advantage to help them maintain their edge against competition. Over the years, banks have tried various drivers for competitive advantage, none of which were sufficient barriers for competitors. Understanding the behavior of their customers and using this knowledge to drive the interaction with customers is the most sustainable competitive advantage banks can obtain. Data Warehousing and Analytics provide banks with the ability to obtain customer knowledge and the same infrastructure can be used for multiple business applications.
ON THE NEW TRANSFORMATION-BASED APPROACH TO VALUE-AT-RISK
Authors: Samanta G. P.
Published: May 2011

This chapter deals with the measurement of Value-at-Risk parameter for a portfolio using historical returns. The main issue here is the estimation of suitable percentile of the underlying return distribution. If returns were normal variates, the task would have been very simple. But it is well documented in the literature that financial market returns seldom follow normal distribution. So, one has to identify suitable distribution, mostly other than normal, for the returns and find out the percentile of the identified distribution. The class of non-normal distribution, however, is extremely wide and heterogeneous, and one faces a decision-making problem of identifying the best distributional form from such a wide class of potential alternatives. In order to simplify the task of handling non-normality while estimating VaR, we adopt the transformation-based approach used in Samanta (2003). The performance of the transformation-based approach is compared with two widely used VaR models. Empirical results are quite encouraging and identify the transformation-based approach as a useful and sensible alternative.
Data Mining and the Banking Sector
Authors: Felsövályi Àkos , Couran Jennifer
Published: May 2011

In this chapter, we will discuss a few areas of this vast and important phenomenon, following the outline below. We will be focusing on corporate lending, although data mining permeates all aspects of today’s banking. We will discuss corporate lending based on Citigroup’s own practices, and the rest of the subject will be based on practices generic to the industry.
Data Mining for Credit Scoring
Authors: Bose Indranil , Kan Cheng Pui , Tsz Chi King , Ki Lau Wai , Hung Wong Cho
Published: May 2011

Credit scoring is one of the most popular uses of data mining in the financial industry. Credit scoring can be defined as a technique that helps creditors decide whether to grant credit to customers. With the use of credit scoring decisions about granting of loans can be made in an automated and faster way in order to assist the creditors in managing credit risk. This chapter begins with an explanation of the need for credit scoring followed by the history of credit scoring. Then it discusses the relationship between credit scoring and data mining. The major applications of credit scoring in three areas, which include credit card, mortgage and small business lending, are introduced. This is followed by a discussion of the models used for credit scoring and evaluation of seven major data mining techniques for credit scoring. A study of default probability estimation is also presented. Finally the chapter investigates the benefits and limitations of credit scoring as well as the future developments in this area.
Information Technology in Primary Care Practice in the United States
Authors: Anderson James G. , Balas E. Andres
Published: May 2011

The objective of this study was to assess the current level of information technology used by primary care physicians in the U.S. Primary care physicians listed by the American Medical Association were contacted by e-mail and asked to complete a Web-based questionnaire. A total of 2,145 physicians responded. Overall between 20% and 25% of primary care physicians reported using electronic medical records, e-prescribing, point-of-care decision support tools and electronic communication with patients. This indicates a slow rate of adoption since 2000-2001. Differences in adoption rates suggest that future surveys need to differentiate primary care and office-based physicians by specialty. An important finding is that one-third of the physicians surveyed expressed no interest in the four IT applications. Overcoming this barrier may require efforts by medical specialty societies to educate their members as to the benefits of IT in practice. The majority of physicians perceived benefits of IT, but they cited costs, vendor inability to deliver acceptable products and concerns about privacy and confidentiality as major barriers to implementation of IT applications. Overcoming the cost barrier may require that payers and the federal government share the costs of implementing these IT applications.
Telehealth Organizational Implementation Guideline Issues
Authors: Yeo Maryann , Jennett Penny A.
Published: May 2011

The current status of policies, guidelines and standards related to the organizational context of clinical telehealth practice were investigated. The directions these should take to meet the healthcare needs of Canadians also were outlined. An environmental scan approach was employed, consisting of a literature review, stakeholder survey questionnaire, and 12 key informant interviews. The literature review resulted in 260 sources related to organizational leadership issues, of which 176 were abstracted. The stakeholder survey questionnaire response rate was 64% (156/245), with 55% (84/154) completing the organizational context section. All (100%) key informants who were selected for interviews participated. Findings were categorized into four key organizational themes: organizational readiness, quality assurance, accountability, and continuity. Organizations need to review existing policies, standards, and guidelines in order to determine whether telehealth is covered and, if not, revise them or develop new telehealth-specific policies. Telehealth policies and procedures should be integrated with those in existence for face-to-face services.
Computer Usage by U.S. Group Medical Practices 1994 vs. 2003 and Type of Usage Comparison to IT Practices in Taiwan
Authors: Sobol Marion , Prater Edmund
Published: May 2011

Research on the use of information technology in healthcare has focused on hospitals and health maintenance organizations (HMOs). However little has been done to study the use of IT in group medical practices. In 1994, we conducted a pilot study of group medical practices and then repeated this pilot study in 2003 to obtain a longitudinal picture of the IT services used by these private practices. Researchers can use this to form ideas of the important issues and changes involved in IT usage in group medical practices over the past decade, thus providing a needed benchmark to fill a gap in the existing literature and that can be used to compare domestic as well as international practices. For example, an expanded form of this study was conducted in Taiwan showing some differences in IT integration abroad. Brief analyses of some of these initial findings are presented at the end of the chapter.
A Case Study of Icon-Scenario Based Animated Menu's Concept Development
Authors: Koon Lim Chee , Duh Henry B.L.
Published: May 2011

This chapter will first describe the development workflow of graphical user interface (GUI) design and the implementation that is adopted across a 2G platform. It describes the development workflow of graphical user interface (GUI) design and the implementation that is adopted across a 2G platform. The authors then describe the implementation process of developing Icon-Scenario Based Animated Menu GUI. The same design process developed is implemented in the other models when the authors develop another set of GUIs for different customers using the same workflow. The chapter concludes by describing the concept development process of the phone’s menu enhanced by the use of a captivating Icon-Scenario Based Animated Menu, followed by demonstrating how it takes usability into consideration, bringing delight to users.
Service Orientation and Software-Intensive Systems
Authors: Král Jaroslav , Žemlicka Michal
Published: May 2011

Software intensive systems are systems strongly depending on supporting software. The software is typically large, complex, and it as a rule interacts with human users. The failure of the software implies failure of the system usually causing substantial losses. Such systems are critical. The prospective redevelopment all at once of the software is no feasible solution. It is shown that such software should usually be service-oriented. The interfaces of services should be user-oriented (well understood by users and the users can use it easily). The services should be of two basic types: application services and architecture (enabling to develop an architecture) services. We present the most important infrastructure services as basic service-oriented design patterns.
From Scenarios to Requirements in Mobile Client-Server Systems
Authors: Wang Alf Inge , Sørensen Carl-Fredrik , Le Hien Nam , Ramampiaro Heri , Nygård Mads , Conradi Reidar
Published: May 2011

This chapter describes a requirement analysis framework that may be used as a tool for developing client-server systems for mobile workers. The framework concerns the initial analysis process for the development of a mobile system starting by describing scenarios of the work of mobile workers and resulting in a description of priorities both nonfunctional and functional requirements of the end-system. The framework describes a three step requirement process that includes 1) Elicit scenarios, 2) Scenario analysis, and 3) Requirement analysis. These steps will produce outputs that will be used to assess the requirements of the system. The requirement analysis process is described in detail through templates used to produce output and illustrating examples from the analysis of the development of mobile ITsupport system.
Dynamic Analysis and Profiling of Multithreaded Systems
Authors: Waddington Daniel G. , Roy Nilabja , Schmidt Douglas C.
Published: May 2011

As software-intensive systems become larger, more parallel, and more unpredictable the ability to analyze their behavior is increasingly important. There are two basic approaches to behavioral analysis: static and dynamic. Although static analysis techniques, such as model checking, provide valuable information to software developers and testers, they cannot capture and predict a complete, precise, image of behavior for large-scale systems due to scalability limitations and the inability to model complex external stimuli. This chapter explores four approaches to analyzing the behavior of software systems via dynamic analysis: compiler-based instrumentation, operating system and middleware profiling, virtual machine profiling, and hardware-based profiling. We highlight the advantages and disadvantages of each approach with respect to measuring the performance of multithreaded systems and demonstrate how these approaches can be applied in practice.
A Domain-Specific Language for Describing Grid Applications
Authors: Afgan Enis , Bangalore Purushotham , Gray Jeff
Published: May 2011

Grid computing environments are dynamic and heterogeneous in nature. In order to realize applicationspecific Quality of Service agreements within a grid, specifications at the level of an application are required. This chapter introduces an XML-based schema language (called the Application Specification Language, ASL) and a corresponding modeling tool that can be used to describe applications in grid computing environments. Such application descriptions allow derivation of guided and autonomic service developments for installation and invocation routines throughout the grid. In order to promote the language and ease the application description process, a domain-specific tool is also introduced. Based on our experience, the ASL in combination with higher level models improves, simplifies and promotes the grid application deployment process while simultaneously minimizing tedious and error-prone tasks such as manual application description composition.
System Integration Using Model-Driven Engineering
Authors: Balasubramanian Krishnakumar , Schmidt Douglas C. , Molnár Zoltán , Lédeczi Ákos
Published: May 2011

With the emergence of commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) component middleware technologies software system integrators are increasing faced with the task of integrating heterogeneous enterprise distributed systems built using different COTS technologies. Although there are well-documented patterns and techniques for system integration using various middleware technologies, system integration is still largely a tedious and error-prone manual process. This chapter provides three contributions to the study of functional integration of distributed enterprise systems. First, we describe the challenges associated with functionally integrating software for these types of systems. Second, we describe how the composition of domain-specific modeling languages (DSMLs) can simplify the functional integration of enterprise distributed systems. Third, we demonstrate how composing DSMLs can solve functional integration problems in an enterprise distributed system case study by reverse engineering an existing CCM system and exposing it as Web service(s) to Web clients who use these services.