bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Economic, Social, and Policy Determinants of EU-5 and American Apparel Imports
Authors: Au K.F.
Published: February 2011

Both EU and USA are dominant apparel importers in the world. In 2006, the value of world’s apparel exports to them amounted to US$ 212 billion, which represented 80% of the world’s total apperel exports. Specifically, the apparel imports of the top five members of EU; namely, Germany, United Kingdom, France, Italy, and Spain, amounted to US$ 91 billion, accounting for 71% of the regoin’s total apperel imports. Using data from 1990 to 2006, this article investigates the country-specific factors that have impact on the apparel imports of EU-5 as well as USA, and their top five apperel suppliers. Panel data estimation approach is utilized with an exploration at the aggregate level. The results indicate strong support for the model with determinants including GDP, population growth rates, female employment, value added factors, and common membership. All these have positive effects. In contrast, distance, real exchange rates, and wages have negative influence on the expenditure patterns of EU-5 and USA consumers.
A Supplementary Framework for Evaluation of Integrated Logistics Service Provider
Authors: Lau Kwok H. , Ma Wun L.
Published: February 2011

As a result of globalization, supply chains of many large business organizations nowadays tend to cover wider geographic areas spanning across different countries and continents. The growth in length and complexity gradually replaces the traditional linear supply chains with extended supply networks comprising not only suppliers, manufacturers, distributors, and end customers, but also service providers. With the increasing use of third-party logistics (3PL) providers by international firms seeking integrated logistics services, many global 3PL providers are forming partnerships with large corporations to take care of the latter’s logistics operations in different regions. The selection of the right 3PL provider for alliance is therefore paramount to the success of global supply chain management. This article investigates the significance of this subject and proposes a supplementary framework for evaluation of 3PL providers as global logistics partners for international firms. The framework focuses on the core competencies of 3PL providers and their abilities to attain economies of scale helping users achieve their outsourcing objectives.
The Construction of Green Supply Chain Management System
Authors: An Heekyung
Published: February 2011

Considering the implications of EU environmental laws such as REACH (registration, evaluation, authorization, and restriction of chemicals) and EuP (directive on eco-design of energy-using products) as well as RoHS (restrictions of the use of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment) Directive, they have been acquired to advance GSCM (green supply chain management) more and more. The aim of this article is to introduce the construction of GSCM system that improves collaborative relationships between an EEE manufacturer and its suppliers. The study is conducted in three steps. Firstly, the four elements, which are necessities to form collaborative relationships between an EEE manufacturer and its suppliers, are described. Secondly, the condition and construction of GSCM system including the four elements is proposed. Finally, we presented the method that the GSCM system is constructed as a practicable tool in the initial stage by a case study held in Shimadzu Corporation.
An Approach of Decision-Making Support Based on Collaborative Agents for Unexpected Rush Orders Management
Authors: Nfaoui El Habib , El Beqqali Omar , Ouzrout Yacine , Bouras Abdelaziz
Published: February 2011

Decisions at different levels of the supply chain can no longer be considered independently, since they may influence profitability throughout the supply chain. This paper focuses on the interest of multi-agent paradigm for the collaborative coordination in global distribution supply chain. Multi-agent computational environments are suitable for a broad class of coordination and negotiation issues involving multiple autonomous or semiautonomous problem solving contexts. An agent-based distributed architecture is proposed for better management of rush unexpected orders. This paper proposes a first architecture validated by a real and industrial case.
Optimal Solutions for a Multi-Product, Multi-Echelon Production and Replenishment System
Authors: Torres Fidel , Mejía Gonzalo
Published: February 2011

The effective coordination is a key element in the success of many cooperative supply chains. All production, distribution and supply must be adequately synchronized in order to satisfy the customer needs and at the same time optimizing the operational costs. This article presents a multi-product, multi-echelon inventory system which comprises one manufacturer, a number of distribution centers and a number of retailers which are dependent of such distribution centers. The coordination and collaboration is achieved through a carefully designed replenishment policy. The near-optimal order quantities for each of the supply chain agents are calculated with a mathematical model in which the integrality constraints are relaxed. A number of instances were generated and tested. The results show the validity of the proposed approach.
A Mathematical Model for Tactical Operations Planning for Response-Base Supply Chains
Authors: Chen Sheu Hua
Published: February 2011

This article explores the issue of lead-time in response-based supply chains. From a tactical viewpoint of response-based supply chains, the processing time for each stage is assumed to be a random variable since different practices exist in the selection pool of each stage under a specific lead-time requirement. The decision-maker must select suitable practices of operations for each stage to ensure that the lead time meets a desired requirement. The relationship and the trade-off between the operating costs for the selected practices and the inventory holding cost of safety stock that is in turn affected by the lead-time are discussed. A mathematical model for planning the operations from a manufacturer viewpoint is proposed. The variation in practical situation for the proposed model is also addressed. A hypothetic example is provided to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed model. With reference to the computational results, the effect of several parameters on the model’s optimal solutions was discussed.
Old and New Paradigms for IT Services Offshoring
Authors: Popoli Paolo , Popoli Arturo
Published: February 2011

This article presents some new conceptual and interpretative paradigms concerning offshoring Information Technology services, in the light of the most recent market trends. In the current competitive scenario, IT structures are increasingly asked to “participate” in the development and innovation of business, rather than being merely a “support” for the value chain activities, managed merely on the basis of technical and economic efficiency. We start by confuting two traditional concepts: first, that only activities which are quite distinct from the core-business can be candidates for outsourcing, and secondly that the advantage to be derived from offshore outsourcing is above all a matter of costs. What is meant by “success” in this new perspective? We analyse the main critical factors in an offshoring contract enhancing value creation and business strategy. Particular attention is paid to the analysis of the main drivers of solution design and ongoing management in IT offshoring strategies.
Wireless Communications
Authors: Webb William
Published: February 2011

Much of the rationale for the launch of 3G networks from 2000 onwards was to promote the expected rise in wireless data usage. Consumers were predicted to make widespread use of mobile internet and mobile TV but it was felt that the data rates offered by 2G networks were insufficiently fast to give them the experience that they expected. But more recently success has been achieved with different types of phone such as the iPhone and with new applications rather than higher data rates. This article takes a look at predictions of the future, considers whether they need to be modified in the light of events and makes its own suggestions as to where things might go from here.
Hybrid Trust Structure in Self-Organizing Networks
Authors: Zhou Tong , Harn Lein
Published: February 2011

A traditional service provider of telecommunications is recognized as an authority which is trusted by the subscribers and the public. Ad hoc and Peer to Peer (P2P) networks have demonstrated advantages that service provider controlled networks lack, and they also exhibit self-organizing behaviors. A pure self-organizing network does not rely on any hierarchical management. Instead, it utilizes a web of trust for security. Its trust management is complicated and varies from node to node. In this article, we discuss a hybrid trust structure that leverages the involvement of an authority in a self-organizing network to increase trust levels between disconnected small-worlds. The new model will help service providers design more robust and innovative solutions for next generation networks and applications.
Next-Generation Strategic Business Model for the U.S. Internet Service Providers
Authors: Willow Charles C.
Published: February 2011

The (information digital) network bandwidth and its usage through Internet subscription, by far, is perhaps the only uni-modal commodity provided to today’s consumers at a flat rate. Regardless of his/her actual bandwidth usage, a consumer is charged a uniform subscription fee by the Internet Service Providers (ISP). Meanwhile, the ISPs have a considerable stake in the overall infrastructure which supports the local perimeters of the Internet. This article presents a rigorous statistical analysis with the objective of determining the optimal billing or pricing policy for the ISPs of the U.S. on the basis of the proposed ‘variable subscription-rate’ business model. Two leading global consumer profiles were selected for data comparison on a cardinal scale; NYC, NY, U.S.A. and Seoul, South Korea.
Application of Parametric Cost Estimation Model to Telecommunication Networks
Authors: Samanta Swadesh Kumar , Woods John , Ghanbari Mohammed
Published: February 2011

The parametric cost estimation approach has proved to be an efficient method for analyzing complex systems such as spacecraft, missiles, ships, buildings, etc where cost varies according to a number of parameters. The cost to provision a telecom network also depends on a number of parameters; but little research effort has been applied to estimate cost using this approach. In estimating the cost of a telecom network, most published research has considered two parameters; distance and bandwidth of a link and ignored the effects of other parameters. We have modeled the cost based on distance, bandwidth, geographical terrain and technology simultaneously using a parametric cost estimation methodology applied to real data obtained from the Indian Telecom Company, BSNL. Using the model, we show how a cost optimized network can be designed given the real world constraints. The applicability of our model to determine revenue sharing mechanism for an international call is also demonstrated.
A Data Gathering Algorithm Based on Energy-Aware Connected Dominating Sets to Minimize Energy Consumption and Maximize Node Lifetime in Wireless Sensor Networks
Authors: Meghanathan Natarajan
Published: February 2011

This paper develops an energy-aware connected dominating set based data gathering (ECDS-DG) algorithm for wireless sensor networks. The algorithm includes only nodes that have a relatively higher energy level in ECDS. For every round, a data gathering tree (ECDS-DG tree) rooted at the ECDS Leader, that is, the node with the largest available energy, which transmits the data packet to the sink, is formed by considering only the nodes in the ECDS as the intermediate nodes of the tree. The non-ECDS nodes are leaf nodes of the tree, and the upstream node of an intermediate ECDS node in the ECDS-DG tree is the closest ECDS node that is also relatively closer to the ECDS Leader. Performance comparison studies involving well-known LEACH and PEGASIS algorithms indicate that ECDS-DG incurs the lowest energy consumption per round and sustains the largest number of rounds before first node failure.
A New Technique for Estimating the Distribution of a Stochastic Project Makespan
Authors: Cohen Yuval , Zwikael Ofer
Published: February 2011

A critical success dimension in projects is the ability to complete a project within an estimated duration. In that regard, effective project scheduling techniques in an uncertain environment is of interest in many organizations. In this paper, the authors use an analytic approach to analyze the behavior of time duration distributions of projects in stochastic activity networks, and propose a simple computation scheme for approximating their distribution. The findings offer an understanding of the large gap between PERT and simulation results, and the deviation of projects from their intended schedules. In addition to providing theoretical framework, the proposed approach also recommends a simple practical pragmatic technique that computes the time distribution of project duration. This is a simple and handy tool for the project manager that may replace simulation. As a byproduct, the earliest start time distribution for each activity is also estimated.
Development of M-Government Projects in a Developing Country
Authors: Trimi Silvana , Sevrani Kozeta
Published: February 2011

This paper is a qualitative study regarding m-government in a developing country in Eastern Europe with a poor infrastructure and a democratic history—Albania. To understand why m-government is unavoidable and necessary for Albania, the authors provide an overall picture of the country’s current telecommunication infrastructure, which explains some of the current e-government initiatives, and their level of implementation success and barriers to progress. In addition, this paper presents possible benefits of m-government for Albanians, along with possible future applications, challenges, and issues in their implementation.
Changing Healthcare Institutions with Large Information Technology Projects
Authors: Guah Matthew W.
Published: February 2011

This article reviews the development of institutional theory in direct relations to historical changes within the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) with an eye to contributing to the theoretical specification of healthcare information processes. This is done partly by extending certain paradigms (see Meyer & Rowan, 1991; Powell & DiMaggio, 1991; Tolbert & Zucker, 1994) through a proposed model of causes and consequences of variations in levels of institutionalisation in the healthcare industry. It reports findings from a 5-year study on the NHS implementation of the largest civil ISs worldwide at an estimated cost of $10 billion over a 10-year period. The theoretical basis for analysis is developed, using concepts drawn from neo-institutionalism, realisation of business value, and organisational logic, as well as mixed empirical results about the lack of IT investments value in the NHS. The findings suggest that large scale, IT change imposed upon a highly institutionalised healthcare industry is fraught with difficulty mainly because culturally embedded norms, values, and behavioural patterns serve to impede centrally imposed initiatives to automate clinical working practices. It concludes with a discussion about the nature of evaluation procedures in relation to the process of institutionalising IS in healthcare.
Offshoring in the Pharmaceutical Industry
Authors: McCoy Jason , Sarx Johannes
Published: February 2011

Offshoring has been adopted as a tool for reducing costs and for gaining strategic advantages by financial services, software development, and other competitive industries. For a variety of reasons, the pharmaceutical industry has been slow to take advantage of the benefits that offshoring can provide. The purpose of this article is to explore the internal and exogenous factors motivating global pharmaceutical firms to increase and expand their sourcing activities. And, instead of discussing global sourcing in general, India has been analyzed as a unique and explanatory case study for this new, emerging trend. The reasons behind this decision include India’s position as a renowned global IT hub, the country’s “home grown” biotechnology and biopharmaceutical industries, the numerous strategic partnerships and offshoring relationships between global and Indian firms, as well as its significant advances in IT and information management.
Information Systems, Offshore Outsourcing, and Relevancy in the Business School Curriculum
Authors: Tastle William J. , White Bruce A. , Valfells Arsaell , Shackleton Peter
Published: February 2011

Offshore outsourcing has been a growing phenomenon in recent years. Rarely will an IT professional pick up a trade publication or journal without some article relating to outsourcing or offshore outsourcing. This in turn raises the question for IS educators—what should we be doing to better prepare our graduates for a future where offshore outsourcing is a reality? This article looks at the following topics as they relate to IS curriculum matters for outsourcing: Offshore outsourcing and success factors, the skills needed to effective manage offshore outsourcing, a look at offshore outsourcing and the IS2002 model curriculum, suggested changes to IS2002 to incorporate offshore outsourcing education, and what skills from IS2002 are vital in preparing students for the future.
Intelligent Biometric System
Authors: Shukla Anupam , Tiwari Ritu
Published: February 2011

Biometrics is the field of technology devoted to verification or authentication of individuals using biological traits. A biometric authentication system verifies the identity of a claimant based on the person’s physical attributes, such as voice, face, or fingerprints. Its application areas include security applications, forensic work, law enforcement applications, and so on. Here we have divided the work in four cases: person identification using speech features, using facial features, using fusion of speech and facial features, and finally identification using fusion of optimized speech and facial features. For all these four cases we have simulated an intelligent system using Artificial Neural Networks. The neural network model is trained by back-propagation algorithm.
The Use of Outsourcing as a Business Strategy
Authors: Misra Ram B.
Published: February 2011

In this chapter, we discuss how a leading telecommunications software development company went about outsourcing some phases of the system development life cycle (SDLC) of network management systems in order to achieve both the short-term tactical goals as well as the longterm strategic goals. We present a framework consisting of seven factors that should be used by companies using outsourcing as a business strategy. This framework was used to analyze the outsourcing practices used by this company. The framework includes the driving forces for offshore outsourcing, the selection process of outsourcing vendors and the infrastructure (communication links, hardware, software, and organizational structure) that was needed to insure that the outsourced work meets company’s internal quality requirements, which are derived from CMM5 and ISO9001 certifications. We also present the challenges of making these things happen, what worked well, and the lessons learned.
Economic Analysis of Airline Tickets and the Role of IT in Affecting the Aviation Industry
Authors: Abu-Taieh Evon M.O.
Published: February 2011

This article pinpoints the affects of information technology on the aviation industry, specifically on the Airline ticket prices. The article first introduces the different costs that comprise the airline ticket. Then the article introduces the different information technology systems that are used in the aviation industry which in turn reduces the price of the airline ticket.
Supplier Capabilities and eSourcing Relationships
Authors: Yadav Vanita , Jaiswal Mahadeo
Published: February 2011

The forces of globalization have influenced organizations to extend the concept of IT outsourcing to IT-intensive business process outsourcing (eSourcing). Most of the research on managing outsourcing relationships has focused either on legal contracts or on strategic partnerships. Advocating a different viewpoint, researchers like Rousseau (1995) found that in reality everyday working of contractual relationships was governed by individual’s subjective interpretation and was fundamentally psychological in nature. The objective of this paper is to posit a relationship step model which projects a vital relationship management capability plus psychological contract perspective for eSourcing. It incorporates the stance of relational contract, interorganizational relationship and psychological contract theories. Using the qualitative research paradigm, the research model is preliminarily explored with case studies of two eSourcing suppliers. The exploratory results of this research indicate that relationship management capability of suppliers is an important factor shaping the outsourcing value proposition.
Data Modeling for Tools and Technologies for the Analysis and Synthesis of NANOstructures (TASNANO) Project
Authors: Giacomini M. , Pastorino L. , Soumetz F. Caneva , Mielczarski J.A. , Mielczarski E. , Rangelow Ivo , Gotszalk Teodor
Published: February 2011

The main aim of TASNANO project is to focus on the development of a web-based system that allows cooperative work between partners. Even if some commercial tools become available, the specificities of nanotechnology applications suggest implementing an ad-hoc tool. This approach permits to update information every moment, so that not only the latest versions of the documents are always available, but also the raw experimental data are shared in a protected environment. Organizing big amount of data begins with modeling of conceptual schemes, which individualizes entities involved into the project and links between them. The rules’ application of logic modeling leads to the production of a logic scheme. The model allows the data base design, which can be enlarged and enriched preserving coherence and avoiding redundancy. Data and information can be directly treated on the web in accordance with latest modifications.
Business Technology Strategy for a Major Real Estate and Mortgage Brokerage Company
Authors: Monsanto Charlton , Andriole Stephen J.
Published: February 2011

RealProp1 is a large real estate and mortgage brokerage that’s at the forefront of the emerging digital real estate industry. For many years, the company maintained an in-house technology staff, but more recently it sought new leadership to accelerate its digital investments and to explore alternative sourcing models. In this regard, the company plans to respond to new challenges that the industry is presenting as it evolves from a relatively predictable transaction model to one increasingly defined by the Internet. A phased strategy was developed that first stabilized the existing technology environment and then more strategic technology investments were made.
Comparing the Effect of Use Case Format on End User Understanding of System Requirements
Authors: Mustafa Balsam A.
Published: February 2011

The effective analysis and specification of requirements is critical in software development. Faults in the requirements may have significant impact on the quality of the software system. Use cases describe and analyze requirements in many current Object Oriented (OO) development methodologies, and can serve as a means for developers to communicate with different stakeholders. However, issues concerning use case format and level of detail are unclear and debatable. This study uses theories from cognitive psychology on how humans understand text and diagrams to investigate the effect of use case model format on end user understanding. An experiment to assess the performance of novices when using different use case formats indicated that for tasks that required only surface understanding of the use case model, the provision of diagrams along with the textual use case descriptions significantly improved comprehension performance in both familiar and unfamiliar application domains. However, the author found no statistically significant difference in performance between simple and detailed diagrams, suggesting that the provision of simple diagrams along with textual use case descriptions might be sufficient to support the negotiation and communication on system requirements between novice end-users and system analysts.
The Consistency of the Medical Expert System CADIAG-2
Authors: Klinov Pavel Picado , Parsia Bijan , Muiño David
Published: February 2011

CADIAG-2 is a well known rule-based medical expert system aimed at providing support in medical diagnose in the field of internal medicine. Its knowledge base consists of a large collection of IF-THEN rules that represent uncertain relationships between distinct medical entities. Given this uncertainty and the size of the system, it has been challenging to validate its consistency. Recent attempts to partially formalize CADIAG-2’s knowledge base into decidable Gödel logics have shown that, on formalization, the system is inconsistent. In this paper, the authors use an alternative, more expressive formalization of CADIAG-2’s knowledge base as a set of probabilistic conditional statements and apply their probabilistic logic solver (Pronto) to confirm its inconsistency and compute its conflicting sets of rules under a slightly relaxed interpretation. Once this is achieved, the authors define a measure to evaluate inconsistency and discuss suitable repair strategies for CADIAG-2 and similar systems.
A Complex Adaptive Systems-Based Enterprise Knowledge Sharing Model
Authors: Small Cynthia T. , Sage Andrew P.
Published: February 2011

This paper describes a complex adaptive systems (CAS)-based enterprise knowledge-sharing (KnS) model. The CAS-based enterprise KnS model consists of a CAS-based KnS framework and a multi-agent simulation model. Enterprise knowledge sharing is modeled as the emergent behavior of knowledge workers interacting with the KnS environment and other knowledge workers. The CAS-based enterprise KnS model is developed to aid knowledge management (KM) leadership and other KnS researchers in gaining an enhanced understanding of KnS behavior and its influences. A premise of this research is that a better understanding of KnS influences can result in enhanced decision-making of KnS interventions that can result in improvements in KnS behavior.
Software Engineering and the Systems Approach
Authors: Lane Jo Ann , Petkov Doncho , Mora Manuel
Published: February 2011

IJITSA is honored by the fact that this issue presents an interview with probably the most significant figure in the field of software engineering since its inception and one of its founders, Professor Barry W. Boehm. He has published many seminal books and papers that have shaped the foundations of software engineering. We have included in the references just a small sample of his numerous publications addressing some of the fundamental issues in this field in recent years. They cover diverse topics ranging from a comparison of agile development methods and software engineering (Boehm & Turner, 2004) to reflections on enhancing software engineering education (Boehm, 2006c). A thought-provoking review of the evolution of software engineering and its current challenges is presented in Boehm (2006b), while his thoughts on the need to integrate more closely software and systems engineering are reflected in Boehm (2006a) and Boehm and Lane (2006). The questions we asked Professor Boehm relate to his significant contributions to software engineering and enhancing its links to the systems approach.
Diagnosing and Redesigning a Health(y) Organisation
Authors: Rosenkranz Christoph , Laumann Marcus , Holten Roland
Published: February 2011

The problem of linking and coordinating different subunits of an organisation is a central part of management. One prerequisite is to design the communication within the organisation in an effective way. Based on an action research study carried out at a site of a logistics service company, this paper sketches how organisations can be analysed and redesigned by using cybernetic thinking, and shows how organisational problems have been identified and solved for this company. By applying the concept of variety as a measure for complexity, the usefulness of the concept for the analysis of organisations and information systems is explored. We combine the Viable System Model with a conceptual modelling approach from Information Systems Research and show how the analysis and design of information and communication channels has successfully been carried out. Building on Language Critique, we propose theoretical implications of this approach.
Collaborative Design
Authors: Mirijamdotter Anita , Somerville Mary M.
Published: February 2011

Within the context of a three year applied research project conducted from 2003-2006 in a North American university library, staff were encouraged to reconsider organizational assumptions and design processes. The project involved an organizational leader and an external consultant who introduced and collaboratively applied Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) practice. Project results suggest the efficacy of using ‘soft’ systems thinking to guide interaction (re)design of technology-enabled environments, systems, and tools. In addition, participants attained insights into their new roles and responsibilities within a dynamically changing higher education environment. Project participants also applied SSM to redesign ‘in house’ information systems. The process of employing systems thinking practices to activate and advance organizational (re)learning, and initiating and elaborating user-centered interaction (re)design practices, culminated in a collaborative design (co-design) approach that readied participants for nimble responsiveness to continuous changes in the dynamic external environment.
Integrated Digital Health Systems Design
Authors: Raghupathi Wullianallur , Umar Amjad
Published: February 2011

The application of information technology in healthcare has focused primarily on the implementation of specific systems such as electronic health records (EHRs) and clinical decision support systems (CDSSs), mainly for intra-enterprise use. However, for the integrated health system (IHS) to function effectively in a complex inter-enterprise healthcare delivery environment, designers must focus on approaches such as soft systems methodology (SSM) to enable the design of robust integrated digital health systems (IDHSs). A service-oriented architecture (SOA) offers a flexible framework for IDHSs to become de-centralized, fully functional and modular systems with interoperability. This article identifies the design issues in IDHS and explores the potential of an SSM methodology-based SOA for the development of interoperable IDHSs. In the process we compare and contrast the functionalist socio-technical approach to the interpretive SSM. We also describe a prototype SOA application for an IDHS setting and discuss challenges in the application of SOA to healthcare.
Network Effects and Diffusion Theory
Authors: Weitzel Tim , Wendt Oliver , von Westarp Falk G. , Konig Wolfgang
Published: February 2011

In this paper, some of the main results of an interdisciplinary research project on standards are presented and integrated into a single framework of technology diffusion. Based on network effect theory and diffusion theory, we present an agent-based simulation model that extends the traditional economical network perspective by incorporating structural determinants of networks (centrality, topology/density) from sociology and geography and individual decision making on the part of prospective technology users under realistic informational assumptions. Based upon these models, decision behavior in terms of the selection of standards and the diffusion of technological innovations in networks can be described. The model has so far served as both a tool for developing and evaluating network strategies in practical application like EDI networks or corporate directory service planning as well as for providing theoretical insights into standardization problems and possible solutions.
A View from Inside a CEN Working Group
Authors: Wehnert Jurgen
Published: February 2011

This paper looks at some of the aspects of standardisation primarily from the perspective of a Working Group. This practical view may be not too terribly scientific, but it highlights some important down-to-earth aspects of our work. The text considers the structural constraints under which Working Groups operate. It also discusses the restricting, and some of the enabling factors. Some of these are surprisingly mundane while others are deeply intertwined with the mechanics of standardisation organisations and those of the industry which demands standards. Thus remedies could be simple or difficult to achieve. This article is meant as food for thought to make standardisation faster and less troublesome. It relates to the work in official standardisation bodies in Europe in the IT sector. The subject of CEN’s ISSS workshops has been left aside because it deserves comprehensive analysis in a separate article.
Intellectual Property Protection and Standardization
Authors: Blind Knut , Thumm Nikolaus
Published: February 2011

This paper presents the first attempt at analyzing the relationship between strategies to protect intellectual property rights and their impact on the likelihood of joining formal standardization processes, based on a small sample of European companies. On the one hand, theory suggests that the stronger the protection of one’s own technological know-how, the higher the likelihood to join formal standardization processes in order to leverage the value of the technological portfolio. On the other hand, companies at the leading edge are often in such a strong position that they do not need the support of standards to market their products successfully. The results of the statistical analysis show that the higher the patent intensities of companies, the lower their tendency to join standardization processes, supporting the latter theoretical hypothesis.
Market Response to ISO 9000 Certification of Software Engineering Processes
Authors: Fuller G. Keith , Vertinsky Ilan
Published: February 2011

A very large proportion of software projects is deemed to be failures. In most business sectors, this situation would be dealt with by improving quality assurance processes, frequently including certification of the business processes to standards such as ISO 9000. However, in the field of software engineering, there is controversy over whether or not certification of software engineering processes is a cost-effective response to quality issues. The value of certification in software engineering is examined in the present research by applying event study methodology in order to examine the market response to announcements of certification of software engineering processes. The findings support the hypothesis that certification of software engineering processes leads to increased profits for companies that primarily are focused on developing products. Subsequent exploratory analysis suggests that the announcement of the certification may leak out to the marketplace before the announcement.
The Impacts of the Cascading Style Sheet Standard on Mobile Computing
Authors: Germonprez Matt , Avital Michel
Published: February 2011

By design, mobile computing aims to support numerous expressions of varying interfaces, contexts, and automation. Thus, as mobile computing becomes more prevalent, it is important that designers build systems in support of as many as possible unique, in-use, and user-defined characteristics. We explore these requirements and propose to support them with two existing standardized technologies: Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) and cascading style sheets (CSS). Whereas we investigate the impact of the CSS standard in the context of computing in general and mobile computing in particular, we also focus on two emerging roles of this standard: device independence and usability. Our findings suggest that the application of the CSS standard can improve data delivery across independent devices with varied bandwidth and resource availability, thereby providing device independence and improved usability, respectively. We demonstrate that through their effect on device independence and usability, CSS plays an important role in the evolution, expansion, and openness of mobile computing.
Integrating Real Option and Dynamic Capability Theories of Firm Boundaries
Authors: Warner Alfred G. , Fairbank James F.
Published: February 2011

Firms often acquire other firms to source technology but it is unclear why they might assume such risk by buying before a product standard is established in their industry. We draw upon real options and dynamic capability theories of firm organization to develop an integrated framework that explains why firms might acquire early and which firms are more likely to do so. We develop propositions regarding certain firm attributes as predictors of acquisition timing relative to passage of a technology standard. We argue that from a real options perspective, the primary reason firms acquire early is related to the firm’s knowledge of the technology. However, attributes such as political influence in the standardization process, prior experience making acquisitions, and how the firm resolves uncertainty about the technical expertise of potential acquisition targets are capabilities that also enter the acquisition timing decision. We provide a model based on those propositions and address how it can be empirically tested.
Standardization and Business Models for Platform Competition
Authors: Ballon Pieter , Hawkins Richard
Published: February 2011

This article explores the relationship between standards and business models, illustrating the conceptual linkage with reference to developments in the mobile communications industry. A case study of the DVB-H standard for mobile television shows that regardless of institutional orientation or process, the most important standardization strategy for equipment and service providers is to create platforms that are open to the development of complementary products and services while at the same time preserving the proprietary edge necessary to ensure lock-in effects. The case yields strong reasons to consider that standards now play a significant role in establishing business models for electronic service environments and that business modelling considerations now influence many of the technical decisions.
IPR Policy of the DVB Project
Authors: Eltzroth Carter
Published: February 2011

The DVB Project is a European-based standards forum that for over 15 years has been developing specifications for digital video broadcasting, many now implemented worldwide. Its IPR policy has several novel elements. Part I of this article describes “negative disclosure,” the obligation of each member to license IPRs essential to DVB specifications unless it gives notice of the unavailability of the IPR. This approach contrasts with the more common rule (e.g., within ANSI accredited bodies) calling for IPR disclosure and confirmation of availability on FR&ND terms. Other notable features of the IPR policy of DVB are arbitration and, discussed in this Part II, fostering of patent pooling. This article provides a commentary on the DVB’s IPR policy and on its application. This Part II also describes the work of the DVB in resolving IPR “gateway” issues when the perceived dominance of technology contributors, notably through control over IPRs, risked, in the view of some members, distorting new digital markets. In two cases, DVB has created a licensing mechanism to dispel these concerns. In addition to the quality of its technical work, DVB’s success lies in its novel IPR policy and its ability to achieve consensus to resolve gateway issues.
The INTERNORM Project
Authors: Graz Jean-Christophe , Hauert Christophe
Published: February 2011

This paper presents a pilot project to reinforce participatory practices in standardization. The INTERNORM project creates an interactive knowledge center based on the sharing of academic skills and experiences accumulated by the civil society, especially consumer associations, environmental associations and trade unions to strengthen the participatory process of standardization. The first objective of the project is action-oriented: INTERNORM provides a common knowledge pool supporting the participation of civil society actors to international standard-setting activities by bringing them together with academic experts in working groups and providing logistic and financial support to their participation in meetings of national and international technical committees. The second objective is analytical: the standardization action provides a research field for a better understanding of the participatory dynamics underpinning international standardization. This paper presents three incentives that explain civil society (non-)involvement in standardization that overcome conventional resource-based hypotheses: an operational incentive related to the use of standards in the selective goods provided by associations to their membership; a thematic incentive provided by the setting of priorities by strategic committees created in some standardization organization; and a rhetorical incentive related to the discursive resource that civil society concerns offers to the different stakeholders.
Modeling Variant User Interfaces for Web-Based Software Product Lines
Authors: Lee Suet Chun
Published: February 2011

Software product line (SPL) is a software engineering paradigm for software development. SPL is important in promoting software reuse, leading to higher productivity and quality. A software product within a product line often has specific functionalities that are not common to all other products within the product line. Those specific functionalities are termed “variant features” in a product line. SPL paradigm involves the modeling of variant features. However, little work in SPL investigates and addresses the modeling of variant features specific to UI. UML is the de facto modeling language for object-oriented software systems. It is known that UML needs better support in modeling UIs. Thus, much research developed UML extensions to improve UML support in modeling UIs. Yet little of this work is related to developing such extensions for modeling UIs for SPLs in which variant features specific to user interfaces (UI) modeling must be addressed. This research develops a UML extension, WUIML, to address these problems. WUIML defines elements for modeling variant features specific to UIs for Web-based SPLs. The model elements in WUIML extend from the metaclass and of the UML2.0 metamodel. WUIML integrates the modeling of variant features specific to UIs to UML. For example, in a Web-based patient registration SPL, member products targeting British users may use British date format in the user interface, while member products targeting United States users may use United States date format in the user interface. Thus, this is a variant feature for this product line. WUIML defines a model element, XOR, to represent such exclusive or conditions in a product line user interface model. WUIML would reduce SPL engineers’ efforts needed in UI development. To validate the WUIML research outcome, a case study was conducted. The results of this empirical study indicate that modeling UIs for Web-based SPLs using WUIML is more effective and efficient than using standard UML.
Object Grouping and Replication on a Distributed Web Server System
Authors: Mahmood Amjad , Homeed Taher S.K.
Published: February 2011

Object replication is a well-known technique to improve performance of a distributed Web-server system. This article first presents an algorithm to group correlated Web objects that are most likely to be requested by a given client in a single session so that they can be replicated together, preferably, on the same server. A centralized object replication algorithm is then proposed to replicate the object groups to a cluster of Web-server systems in order to minimize the user’s perceived latency, which is subject to certain constraints. Due to the dynamic nature of Web content and users’ access patterns, a distributed object replication algorithm also is proposed where each site locally replicates the object groups based on the local access patterns. The performance of the proposed algorithms is compared with three well-known algorithms, and the results are reported. The results demonstrate the superiority of the proposed algorithms.
Impact of Internet Usage in Saudi Arabia
Authors: Sait Sadiq M , Al-Tawil Khalid M
Published: February 2011

Internet in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was introduced in the late 1990s. Being relatively new, its effects and impact on Saudi society are still in their infancy. A survey-based study was conducted to measure these effects, monitor their influence, project possible long-term develop-ments, and define early measures that would best harness this new technology. Covering a span of two years, this study also identifies and documents any noticeable shifts in perspectives. This work presents the findings and observations drawn from this study and is based on the direct interpretation and cross-analysis of survey responses.
An Approach Based on Market Economy for Consistency Management in Data Grids with OptorSim Simulator
Authors: Belalem Ghalem , Yagoubi Belabbes , Bouamama Samah
Published: February 2011

Data grids are currently solutions suggested to meet the needs for the scale large systems. They provide highly varied and geographically distributed resources of which the goal is to ensure a fast access and effective data access. This is to improve the availability and tolerate the breakdowns. In such systems, these advantages are not possible without the use of replication. Use of the technique of replication poses the problem as regards maintenance of the consistency of the same replicas; the strategies of replication of the data and scheduling of the jobs were tested by simulation. Several grid simulators were born. One of the most interesting simulators for our study is the OptorSim tool. In this article, we present an extension of OptorSim by a consistency management module of the replicas in data grids; we propose a hybrid step which combines the economic models conceived for a hierarchical model with two levels.
A New Framework for Intelligent Semantic Web Services Based on GAIVAs
Authors: Iglesias Andrés
Published: February 2011

The Semantic Web has been recently developed to provide end users with suitable tools and strategies to process information from their Web pages. The Intelligent Semantic Web Services is a new approach aimed at extending Semantic Web capabilities for Services by applying Artificial Intelligence techniques while maintaining the good properties of the standard Semantic Web schemes. However, many current Web services neither consider this approach nor include a powerful user-interface and, consequently, are very limited and difficult to use. This paper introduces a new framework for Intelligent Semantic Web Services that overcomes these drawbacks. Our approach is based on the Graphical Autonomous Intelligent Virtual Agents (GAIVAs), virtual agents that exhibit a human-like appearance and behaviour and are able to take intelligent decisions and perform actions without human intervention. To this purpose, the framework comprises a collection of powerful Artificial Intelligence techniques along with a natural and intuitive Graphical User Interface.