bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Assurance and Compliance Monitoring Support
Authors: Goldschmidt Peter
Published: May 2011

This chapter discusses generic concepts of compliance monitoring for anomaly detection systems [CMAD]1 in terms of the functionality of CMAD systems, the agents involved, the classes of CMAD environments, the problem solving and decision-making requirements. CMAD applied to the capital market (cm) is discussed as an example of compliance monitoring in highly complex environments. This includes a review of current literature, the problems reported and proposed solutions. Finally we introduce an additional dimension to the CMAD problem-solution construct and list potential applications.
Teleworking in Ireland
Authors: Adam Frederic , Crossan Gregory
Published: May 2011

Teleworking has been used since the early 1970s in some countries, but it is still relatively underdeveloped in Ireland. This study sought to establish why this is and concentrated on the implementation of teleworking arrangements from both management and teleworker perspectives in Irish organizations. This study indicates that, in the majority of cases where teleworking exists, it has been implemented in an ad hoc manner and is largely employee-driven. Teleworking is not actively encouraged and top management commitment does not exist. It seems Irish managers are not yet persuaded of the benefits inherent in the concept of telework or that they are uncertain whether the benefits are worth the risks resulting from the introduction of this new method of organizing work. This is unfortunate given the very positive experiences with teleworking reported in this study.
Public Communications Infrastructure Support for Telecommuting
Authors: Bumblis Joseph R.
Published: May 2011

As the number of telecommuters grows, so does the data traffic on the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) and its adjunct infrastructures. This chapter analyzes the impact of increased telecommuter-networking traffic on the PSTN and the adjunct infrastructures such as the Internet. This analysis will give readers the tools to understand the public network infrastructures and to gain insight into the networking requirements of virtual offices/work groups. By understanding the interconnection issues, decision-makers will be better able to analyze business needs related to telecommuter remote offices. In addition to understanding telecommunications technology, corporate management also will gain insight into the language of the service provider. This will help management and key decision-makers evaluate benefits of a telecommuting workforce, and negotiate with service providers for the necessary technology to support of their telecommuters.
Case Study of the St. Paul Companies' Virtual Office for the Risk Control Division
Authors: Johnson Nancy
Published: May 2011

The St. Paul Companies has successfully implemented a virtual office (VO) working environment for its construction risk control and commercial risk control employees over the past six years. The program goals of operating more cost-effectively, increasing contact of the risk control specialists with their customers, and reducing office space costs for The St. Paul Companies have been met. There are many good practices that have been developed over the six years of offering the program, and more refinements and changes planned. As the communications and computer technologies advance, facilitation of working from remote sites improves. While it is easier for employees to work from remote sites, maintaining the boundaries between work and personal lives is more challenging. Improving the VO employees’ and corporate employees’ understanding of the others’ working conditions is necessary to improve relationships and the acceptance of change. The concept of VO work is well established within the organization, and the demand for it is growing.
Reorganizing Information Technology Services in an Academic Environment
Authors: Kittner Marcy , Van Slyke Craig
Published: May 2011

Primarily due to ongoing changes in available technology and financial constraints at a four-year, private university, the Information Technology Department has gone through several iterations of organizational restructuring over the last ten years. The need for IT support for both the academic side of the University and the administrative side has been met by two different structures during this time. At times, the technology needs for the entire University have been supported by one common department that reports directly to the President. At other times, the support has been provided by two separate departments-the academic side reporting to the Chief Academic Officer (CAO) and the administrative side reporting to the CFO. Because of advantages and disadvantages of each of these structures and turnover of the President, CFO and CAO positions, the use of these two structures has alternated several times. The most recent president has emphasized a technology-friendly and up-to-date campus as one of his primary goals. This emphasis precipitated an analysis of the existing systems with recognition of the need to keep IS strategies in line whether supported by one department or two.
Evolution of an Executive Information System
Authors: Nemati Hamid , Smith Keith
Published: May 2011

This case highlights factors that provided the impetus for changing a successful EIS into a data warehouse at the VF Corporation. The data warehouse was developed to aid JeansWear, a division of VF, with its point-of-sale/replenishment activities. The data warehouse provides greater reporting and OLAP capabilities, giving replenishment analysts a detailed and synthetic view of the marketplace. It is estimated that about $100 million in 1998 alone might be attributed to the improved Replenishment decision making due to the data warehouse. The case discusses the basic concepts and architecture of this data warehouse and outlines the development process and the problems that the development team had to overcome. It also examines the essential role that this data warehouse is currently playing in the success of VF Corporation. Finally, the case outlines and discusses a number of factors that should be considered and questions that should be asked prior to initiation of a data warehouse project in order to assure a successful outcome.
Information Systems Strategy, Structure and Alignment
Authors: Chan Yolande E.
Published: May 2011

A study sponsored primarily by the Advanced Practices Council of the Society for Information Management (SIM) International is briefly described. The research involved a mail survey in which data were gathered from insurance companies and manufacturing firms in the US and Canada. Sixty-seven CEOs and 67 CIOs responded to questions on business and information systems strategy, structure, alignment, and performance without knowing what their business unit counterparts were saying. Their views were compared and used to 1) examine the importance of strategic and structural alignment, 2) highlight difficulties experienced in achieving this alignment, and 3) document approaches used to improve alignment.
Aligning IT Resources for E-Commerce
Authors: Nakayama Makoto
Published: May 2011

The era of e-commerce requires firms to have a more sophisticated IT alignment model. Now IT strategy and business strategy (r)evolve together while firms’ operating environments change more rapidly. In addition, the use of Web-based systems necessitates more frequent interaction both between IT management and IT users and between firms and their trading partners and customers. Consequently, firms must skillfully strike a balance between current and future business capabilities. They also must constantly readjust business and IT objectives considering their organizational needs and environmental needs. From the perspective of organizational learning loops, this chapter introduces a framework of IT resource alignment model to enable dynamic processes of IT alignment.
Competitive Force/Marketing Mix (CF/MM) Framework
Authors: Reithel Brian J. , Hwang Chi , Boswell Katherine
Published: May 2011

Information systems researchers continue to grapple with the development of frameworks to aid managers in the identification of opportunities for the strategic use of information technology. Many of the current frameworks have been proposed to guide the systems development process, but few have successfully dealt with the underlying business issues that drive the need to develop an information system in the first place. Because the difficulties that a particular business must cope with arise from the distinctive characteristics of the firm, its product and the particular niche in which the firm operates, this chapter presents a two-dimensional Competitive Force/Marketing Mix (CF/MM) framework that can be used to recognize opportunities for strategic information systems within the firm’s niche. The CF/MM framework is based on a combination of Porter’s view of strategy as a response to the unique mix of the five competitive forces faced by a firm, and the firm’s marketing strategy. By using the CF/MM framework, managers and researchers can identify opportunities to use emerging information technologies as part of front-line competitive strategy. After presentation of the CF/MM framework, the chapter presents a summary of the results of a CF/MM-based analysis of 150 articles related to the competitive use of information technology that have been published in both the popular press and scholarly press. Organizations that are successful in creatively focusing the use of the expanding array of modern information technologies on their particular business niche will increase their ability to survive in the dynamic business environment of the year 2000 and beyond. The CF/MM framework can also be used by IS managers to orchestrate the mix of applications held by a firm in order to maximize the strategic impact of IT investments.
Sustainable Competitive Advantage from Information Technology
Authors: Bahn David L.
Published: May 2011

The strategic benefit of IT (information technology) in supporting business functions is often seen as the basis for competitive advantage that is sustainable. The value chain concept has been a handy tool widely utilized in business strategy analysis to match firm competency in performing business activities with the achievement of sustainable marketplace advantage. When it comes to the assessment of the competitive value of information technology, the value chain concept seems to either categorize IT as a support activity or to overly narrow the scope of IT’s role in achieving sustainable competitive advantage. This chapter reviews the concepts of the value chain and sustainable competitive advantage. Short case studies from a number of industries are presented in order to illustrate the limitations of using the value chain to describe information technology’s role in achieving sustainable competitive advantage. These examples demonstrate the subtle and often complex relationship between information technology and competitive advantage.
Accommodating Hierarchies in Relational Databases
Authors: Millet Ido
Published: May 2011

Relational databases and the current SQL standard are poorly suited to retrieval of hierarchical data. After demonstrating the problem, this chapter describes how two approaches to data denormalization can facilitate hierarchical data retrieval. Both approaches solve the problem of data retrieval, but as expected, come at the cost of difficult and potentially inconsistent data updates. This chapter then describes how we can address these update-related shortcomings via back-end (triggers) logic. Using a proper combination of denormalized data structure and back-end logic, we can have the best of both worlds: easy data retrieval and simple, consistent data updates.
The Benefits Realization Approach to IT Investments
Authors: Thorp John
Published: May 2011

Information technology is today transforming all aspects of our lives — how we work, shop, play and learn. It is transforming our economic infrastructure — revolutionizing methods of supply, production, distribution, marketing, service, and management. This represents nothing less than a fundamental redesign of the entire supply chains of most industries and indeed a fundamental restructuring of many industries themselves. The potential long-term impact of information technology represents an economic and social transition as fundamental as the shift from rural agriculture to urban industry 200 years ago, during the first Industrial Revolution. Yet today we have a problem — a big problem! Chief information officers (CIOs) are finding themselves increasingly under fire for the perceived lack of value from ever-growing investments in information technology (IT) — investments that in the U.S. now represent close to 50% of companies’ new capital investment and a significant portion of their operating expense. Our investments in technology are not being consistently translated into business value. The link to business results is not clear. It is hard to demonstrate how investments in IT, or in producing information translate into economic value. A 1996 U.S. survey by the Standish Group found 73% of IT projects were cancelled, over budget or late, with 31% being cancelled. Project failures cost an estimated $145 billion. This figure does not include the loss of anticipated business benefits, likely amounting to trillions of dollars. More recent studies confirm that project failures are continuing to occur at a similar rate, and this applies to more recent ERP, e-Commerce, Supply Chain Management and Customer Relationship Management projects as well as more traditional projects.
Interface Design
Authors: Drommi Antonio
Published: May 2011

This chapter will address the issues of interface design and incorporation of human behavior factors into the design process. The traditional process engineering approach to software development embeds interface design as a task component. However, the interface design process has grown as a discipline and is beyond the single process within a larger scheme that may be lost on the priority list. The functionality and specifications for software developers tend to focus on the project and less on the product. In addition, bridging the gap of the design process to include global elements of the software is an issue for products that are internationally distributed. It is something that the computer industry must address and has been historically unsuccessful at doing. Incorporating human interactivity and screen design requires an understanding of the user and their behavior that is not part of the traditional tasks of most designers and programmers. This chapter presents the importance of human interactivity and interface design as an embedded process.
User Considerations in Electronic Commerce Transactions
Authors: Lazar Jonathan , Norcio A. F.
Published: May 2011

This chapter will provide a discussion of user considerations in electronic commerce transactions. A consumer in an electronic commerce transaction is essentially a user. There are a number of user considerations that must be addressed for an electronic commerce transaction task to be successful. This chapter will address the functionality and usability needs of a user in an electronic commerce transaction. Results of a study of over 150 users and the factors that influence their decision to purchase textbooks will be presented, analyzed, and discussed.
Computer Supported Social Networking Based on Email Exchange
Authors: Ogata H. , Yano Y. , Furugori N.
Published: May 2011

The exploration of social networks is essential to find capable cooperators who can help problem-solving and to augment cooperation between workers in an organization. This chapter describes PeCo-Mediator-II to seek for capable cooperators with the chain of personal connections (PeCo) in a networked organization. Moreover, this system helps gathering, exploring and visualizing social networks in an organization. The experimental results show that the system facilitates users encounter cooperators and develop a new helpful relationship with the cooperators.
Succeeding in the Virtual World
Authors: Gant Diana Burley
Published: May 2011

In this chapter, we explore why organizations create Web links to other organizations by looking at the set of relationships among a group of disaster response organizations. We discuss how these organizations add value to their Web sites by using use Web links to reinforce their interorganizational relationships – solidifying exchange relationships and promoting normative ones. Our observations deal primarily with the set of organizations responding to the 1996 flooding in western Pennsylvania. For these organizations, we compare the relationships displayed on the Web to those reported between the organizations during the actual disaster response. This comparison allows us to draw conclusions about why the organizations created Web links and how they use these links to manage their interorganizational relationships and add value to their Web sites
Online Poker and the Individuals Who Play It
Authors: Venkataraman Ramesh
Published: May 2011

In this chapter, we trace the evolution of the two types of online poker games, characterize the players who play them and examine the reasons for the success of both these online games. The data and observations presented in the chapter are based on: a) personal observations, b) comments from players in response to open-ended questions posed online, and c) a survey that examined the attitudes of players towards online poker. By examining factors such as the characteristics of the medium, the background of the players, and the players’ attitudes towards the game we hope to be able to draw some conclusions regarding how a game that inherently requires face-to-face contact is able to thrive in an online mode.
Computer Aided Method Engineering
Authors: Dahanayake Ajantha
Published: May 2011

The relationship between information systems development methods, organizational information systems engineering requirements, and the advantage of flexible automated support environments is presented. CASE technology is presented as a possible solution to provide flexible automated support. In this chapter the major topic is a conceptual model to specify the functionality of a support environment. First a review of a number of basic concepts and approaches for deriving models for CASE environments are given. An informal description of service component concepts used to derive a generic framework is presented. Further, a configuration of service components, to support Computer Aided Method Engineering (CAME), is outlined.
Supporting Dynamic Essential Modeling of Organizations
Authors: Dahanayake Ajantha
Published: May 2011

Today’s information systems design and development activities demand flexibility from supporting arbitrary modeling approaches. Improvements to the business process as a result of the introduction of new technologies and applications requires the adaptation of modeling approaches to accommodate the changing demands of analysis and design. Therefore, this chapter focuses on supporting the new and changing demands in analysis and design of information systems. An understanding of the business process is important in order to design a proper information architecture for the problem at hand, therefore, the modeling of the business process of an organization is the focus of this chapter, to improve the understanding of the problem situation before designing and developing an information system. The problem of analyzing a hotel reservation and reception activities according to the DEMO modeling approach (Dietz, 1996) is presented in this chapter.
Organizational Intranets
Authors: Scheepers Rens , Rose Jeremy
Published: May 2011

This chapter highlights some key implementation challenges associated with the introduction of intranet technology. Based on the case we will argue for a different managerial mindset, given the nature of intranet technology itself and context-specific issues. In light of this mindset, we offer intranet managers a way forward and compare our advice against some recent intranet research findings. Finally we will examine some current trends and also discuss avenues that we believe warrant further research attention.
Web-based Instruction in Organizations
Authors: Passerini Katia , Granger Mary J. , Cakici Kemal
Published: May 2011

Many organizations are currently implementing Web-based instruction (WBI). Approaches to WBI vary according to the type of organization as well as the objectives to be accomplished. Companies interested in retraining the workforce and teaching employees new skills are mostly concerned with effective information-delivery approaches. Organizations focusing on the implementation of lifelong learning and education—such as educational institutions—are increasingly moving away from mere information-delivery approaches (posting on-line syllabi and lecture notes) to incorporating effective interaction-based approaches (utilizing discussions and virtual rooms). Both approaches to WBI are important to accomplish long-term versus short-term goals, as well as conceptualization versus task-oriented outcomes. This chapter provides an overview of teaching methods focusing primarily on strategies adopted by educational institutions implementing WBI.
From Web Log to Data Warehouse
Authors: Artz John M.
Published: May 2011

Data warehousing is an emerging technology that greatly extends the capabilities of relational databases specifically in the analysis of very large sets of time-oriented data. The emergence of data warehousing has been somewhat eclipsed by the simultaneous emergence of Web technologies. However, Web technologies and data warehousing have some natural synergies that are just now being recognized. First, Web technologies make data warehouse data more easily available to a much wider variety of users both internally and externally. Since the value of data is directly related to its availability for exploitation, Internets and intranets help increase the value of the data in the warehouse. Second, data warehouse technologies can be used to analyze traffic to a Web site in a wide variety of ways in order to make the Web site more effective. This chapter will focus on the latter of these synergies and show, through an evolving example, how a simple data set from the Web log can be enhanced, in a step-wise fashion, into a full-fledged market research data warehouse.
A New Business Dimension
Authors: Brandao Andre L.
Published: May 2011

Space division multiple access (SDMA) is a promising technique useful for increasing capacity, reducing interference and improving overall wireless communication link quality. With a large-scale penetration expected for wireless Internet, the radio link will require significant reduction in cost and increase in capacity, benefits that the proper exploitation of the spatial dimension can offer. Market opportunities with SDMA are significant, as a number of companies have been recently formed to bring products based on this new concept to the wireless marketplace. The approach to SDMA is broad, ranging from "switched-beam techniques" to "adaptive antennas." Basically the technique employs antenna arrays and digital signal processing to achieve the necessary increases incapacity and quality needed in the wireless world.
Global Competition and Cooperation in Standardization of Wireless Communications
Authors: Tan Zixiang (Alex)
Published: May 2011

One of the challenges as well as opportunities for the success of wireless communication in the 21st century is the standardization that, in a simplified term, defines how specific technologies are used in a particular wireless communication system. Standardization goes beyond a technical decision made by engineers. This chapter first examines the history and the status of standardization in wireless communications in the world. Global cooperation and competition among different standards are then examined. Finally, the chapter analyzes ITU’s efforts on the 3G standardization that aim to bring harmony among the world’s wireless communication developers and providers.
The Internet, the State Library, and the Implementation of Statewide Information Policy
Authors: Dawes Sharon S. , Oskam Sharon
Published: May 2011

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are used by government, researchers and businesses in a wide range of domains including economic development, environmental management, education, health, human services, infrastructure management, and disaster response. Most experts agree that the most expensive part of a GIS program is the creation of spatial data. Some estimate that as much as 80% of the cost of any application is attributable to the expenses of acquiring and geocoding information (Thapa & Bosler, 1992). Often the information needs of different GIS applications overlap and data created by one organization can be used by others. Data sharing can therefore help reduce costs of GIS application development and yield considerable benefits and efficiencies. To achieve this purpose, the State of New York has implemented a GIS Coordination Program which features an Internet-based GIS Clearinghouse operated by the New York State Library (Dawes & Eglene, 1998). In this program, the Library acts as a critical implementer and value-added facilitator of an important new state information policy that has influence over spatial data development, exchange, and use at all levels of government and in the private and not-for-profit sectors. The Clearinghouse provides the conceptual framework and operational platform for a fully functioning data cooperative which is the heart of the New York State GIS Data Sharing Policy. The library-based clearinghouse has become the essential portal to many newly identified information resources. It organizes the data descriptions, provides a publicly available and easy-to-use means of access, promotes sharing, points the way to education and other services, and generally makes possible the vision of a living data resource.
Pricing Strategies for Digital Books
Authors: Kannan P. K. , Guterres Eva , Pope Barbara Kline
Published: May 2011

While the World Wide Web has impacted many industries significantly, none of them have been affected as dramatically as the publishing industry. The ability to deliver electronic content online and to distribute it in various forms instantaneously using the Web have opened up technological possibilities and consumer expectations that have left the industry grappling for new business models. Most of those running publishing businesses have finally come to a consensus about the importance of the Web to the future of the industry and are embracing the new technologies but with little guidance on how to best use the medium. They are aware of the pressing need to adapt to the much speedier efficiencies, strategies, and requirements of the digital channel while balancing them with non-digital strategies that continue to work but are looking for some guidance on how to move forward. In this chapter, we first describe some of the key trends and challenges faced by book publishers with the emergence of the digital arena. We then focus on the issue of pricing electronic books distributed online, especially in conjunction with books distributed through traditional channels. We outline some of the possible strategies that book publishers could adopt and examine the pros and cons of the different strategies in light of the features of the product marketed and consumer segments targeted.
Lone River Winery Company
Authors: Tetteh Emmanuel O.
Published: May 2011

This chapter discusses a case example of Internet infrastructure and e-business strategy management in small and medium-sized firms (SMFs). The case focuses on the key features of electronic business strategy using a virtual organizing framework. Based in the Swan Valley region of Perth, W. Australia, Lone River Winery Co. Ltd., has over the past five years employed the Internet to extend its business scope beyond the Australian wine market. The company produces and markets some of the choicest brands of Australian wines in the UK and Japan using an integrated online ordering and inventory control system. This has saved the company a lot of money and generated sales increases without having to invest in more staff and warehousing facilities. For Lone River Winery (LRW) Co. success on the Net has depended on some critical factors such as in-house technical expertise, continuous search for tools and techniques for managing the firm’s core operations, and the continuous reorientation of the online business model in response to changes in the local and international markets.
A Framework for Supporting Reuse in Hypermedia
Authors: Bryan-Kinns Nick
Published: May 2011

This chapter presents a conceptual framework which supports reuse in hypermedia applications. Reuse is important in hypermedia, and especially hypervideo, as it is rich in content but often costly to capture, store and annotate. The framework’s use is illustrated through three different example hypervideo applications which exhibit several forms of reuse. This chapter goes beyond the notion of reuse of parts of hypermedia applications and considers the reuse of classes of structure of hypermedia applications, and the issues relating to such reuse. Future systems can be developed which utilise this approach to modeling video content as illustrated in Bryan-Kinns (1998; 2000). The key contribution of this chapter is the illustration of a novel approach to modeling video, rather than how this could be implemented as discussed in other chapters.
Virtual Sets
Authors: Pessoa Albuquerque Antonia Lucinelma , Gomes Jonas , Velho Luiz
Published: May 2011

Techniques of filming using special effects have existed since the 1920s, well before the advent of computers. Two of them are known as Back Projection—when an actor acts in front of a screen that reproduces other footage (very common in train scenes), and Blue Screen—when an actor acts in front of a blue wall for later composition with another scene (Fielding, 1985). However, it was computer graphics and the technological advance of the computers that made possible the great evolution in this area. Virtual Sets or Virtual Studios are denominations given to the integrated use of computer-generated elements with real actors and objects in a studio. Its main advantages are: more flexibility in changing the scene, risky scenes can be made safely, allowing the production of complex special effects and also providing economy in the production of sophisticated designs, along with flexibility in making quick changes. With the advent of high-speed networks, there is the possibility of remote operation. Real-time Virtual Sets is a very recent area for computer graphics with potential applications in the film and television industry. The literature about this topic is scarce although there are few commercial systems available, which will be described later. This work approaches Virtual Sets, describing its conceptualization and showing its correlation with other areas in computer graphics. The Virtual Sets’ pertinent technologies are identified in computer graphics and have their given solutions and unsolved problems argued.
Issues in Spatiotemporal Data Modeling
Authors: Price Rosanne , Srinivasan Bala
Published: May 2011

Recent interest in spatiotemporal data modeling comes from Multimedia Information Retrieval and Geographic Information System communities. Early reviews of spatiotemporal research were biased towards geographic and cartographic applications and representational concerns. In this paper, we move beyond implementability considerations to highlight a range of fundamental research issues relevant to spatiotemporal data modeling such as conceptual space, time, and data models. An evaluation of recent research with respect to these issues and comparison of work from different research communities provides a framework for understanding the current state of spatiotemporal research and indicating priorities for future work.
Deploying Internet Commerce in Lottery Businesses
Authors: Shi Nansi , Bennett David
Published: May 2011

Commerce is essentially the exchange of goods and services in various forms between sellers and buyers, together with associated financial transactions. Electronic Commerce (EC) is the process of conducing commerce through electronic means, including any electronic commercial activity supported by IT (information technology) (Adam and Yesha, 1996; Kambil, 1997; Yen, 1998). In this sense, EC is not totally new. Industries have used various EC platforms such as advertising on TV and ordering by telephone or fax. Internet Commerce (IC), or Web Commerce, is a specific type of EC (Maddox, 1998; Minoli D. and Minoli E., 1997). While some traditional EC platforms such as TV and telephone have been used to build “TV-gambling” and “telephone-betting” systems for conducting lottery business, Internet Lottery Commerce (ILC) has been assessed as the most promising type of EC in the foreseeable future. There are many social and moral issues relating to the conduct of lottery business on-line. However, this chapter does not debate these but deals only with business and technology issues. The purpose of this chapter is to provide a structured guide to senior executives and strategic planners who are planning on, or interested in, ILC deployment and operation. The guide consists of several stages: (1) an explanation of the industry segment’s traits, value chain, and current status; (2) an analysis of the competition and business issues in the Internet era and an evaluation of the strategic resources; (3) a planning framework that addresses major infrastructure issues; and (4) recommendations comprising the construction of an ILC model, suggested principles, and an approach to strategic deployment. The chapter demonstrates the case for applying the proposed guideline within the lottery business. Faced with a quickly changing technological context, it pays special attention to constructing a conceptual framework that addresses the key components of an ILC model. ILC fulfils the major activities in a lottery commerce value chain—advertising, selling and delivering products, collecting payments for tickets, and paying prizes. Although the guideline has been devised for lottery businesses, it can be applied to many other industry sectors.
Design Agents with Negotiation Capabilities
Authors: Dospisil Jana
Published: May 2011

Agents are viewed as the next significant software abstraction, and it is expected they will become as ubiquitous as graphical user interfaces are today. Multi-agent systems have a key capability to reallocate tasks among their members, and this may result in significant savings and improvements in many domains, such as resource allocation, scheduling, e-commerce, etc. In the near future, agents will roam the Internet, selling and buying information and services. These agents will evolve from their present-day form—simple carriers of transactions—to efficient decision makers. It is envisaged that the decision-making processes and interactions between agents will be very fast (Kephart, 1998). The importance of automated negotiation systems is increasing with the emergence of new technologies supporting faster reasoning engines and mobile code. A central part of agent systems is a sophisticated reasoning engine that enables the agents to reallocate their tasks, optimize outcomes, and negotiate with other agents. The negotiation strategy used by the reasoning engine also requires high-level interagent communication protocols and suitable collaboration strategies. Both of these subsystems—a reasoning engine and a collaboration strategy—typically result in complicated agent designs and implementations that are difficult to maintain.
Using Environmental Information Efficiently
Authors: Visser Ubbo , Stuckenschmidt Heiner , Wache Holger , Vogele Thomas
Published: May 2011

Environmental information systems have gained more importance both in the public administration and industry since the beginning of 1990. For example, in public administration, every state in the Federal Republic of Germany has developed a type of environmental information system. National and European legislation demanding far reaching transparency in the state of the environment encouraged this development. In industry on the other hand, environmental information systems are used for cost- and product-specific recording of waste flows. These are used to point out weak points within the companies’ processes.
Explorative Data Analysis Support for Environmental Epidemiology
Authors: Kamp V.
Published: May 2011

Applications like environmental information systems define various scenarios of multidimensional data analysis, and they require special efforts concerning data representation, storage and processing. The project CARLOS (Cancer Registry Lower-Saxony) developed the Epidemiological and Statistical Data Exploration System (CARESS) to support multidimensional analysis of health data. The system is based on an architecture that focuses on extensive interoperability between a database management system and several analysis and visualisation tools. As spatial and statistical aspects of the data play an important role, CARESS provides special support for the integration of both.
Innovative Control Methods in Waste Management
Authors: Keller Hubert B. , Muller Bernd , Fick Andreas
Published: May 2011

Presently waste incineration is one of the most commonly used techniques for residual waste processing. It is an important step of making inert and compacting the waste before disposal. More strict legal regulations for the reduction of emissions requires the improvement of existing process control. This chapter presents several methods and approaches to improve the current status of process control systems, especially the application of machine intelligence methods. These methods comprise Neural Networks, Fuzzy Control and Machine Learning techniques.
Environmental Reporting in the Public Interest
Authors: Arndt Hans-Knud , Christ Mario , Gunther Oliver
Published: May 2011

Organizations of all kinds are increasingly forced to develop an environmental conflict strategy. Otherwise, in the case of environmental conflicts an organization may become subject to the rule "if you don’t manage issues, issues will manage you" (Health and Nelson, 1986). Organizations in this context may be a companies, corporations, firms, enterprises, authorities, or institutions, or part or combination thereof, whether incorporated or not, public or private, that have their own functions and administrations (ISO 14001, 1996). Environmental management is an integral part of an organization’s overall management. With the regard to the implementation of an environmental management system, according to the ISO standard 14001, organizations should establish and maintain procedures for internal and external communications. Environmental reporting is an essential contribution towards the proactive communication of an organization with their stakeholders.
Recycling and Disassembly Planning
Authors: Huber Alexander , Marx-Gomez Jorge , Rautenstrauch Claus
Published: May 2011

For some years, the massive spreading of technically complex products as well as the shortening of product life cycles have led to a constantly rising return flow of discarded technical devices. The removal of these devices today occurs mostly through disposal-oriented strategies, i.e. used products are shredded and finally stored in dumps or eliminated thermally in domestic refuse combustion plants. For a long time, the product flow was a one-way street. Public and legal pressure have led to an increase in the importance of environmentally-oriented aspects in both the industrial and private sector. This leads to a rising demand for the establishment of a cycle-oriented economy. The cycle-oriented economy aims to keep materials and products in economic circulation as long as possible. The objective of the cycle-oriented economy is motivated by the shortage of resources (energy and raw materials) and the shrinking of disposal areas (air, water, soil), as well as the realization that economically usable potentials are currently being thrown away (Gupta and Veerakamolmal, 1999). Disposal, as central component of the cycle-oriented economy, includes recycling. Recycling includes disassembly as a type of treatment. In contrast to other types of treatment, disassembly permits a higher maintenance of value of old products; however, it usually requires a higher expenditure as well. In contrast to alternative types of treatment (i.e. shredding), the recovery of functional components and assemblies for reuse (product recycling) and the possibility of the recovery of materials (material recycling) are possible advantages of conducting a disassembly process (Seliger and Kriwet, 1993). In general, disassembly follows the same objectives as production; thus remanufacturing is often spoken of (Rautenstrauch, 1999).
Essential Mining Approaches to Problem Solving
Authors: Kudyba Stephan , Hoptroff Richard
Published: May 2011

Forecasting and “what if” mining generally incorporates the application of regression and neural network methodologies. In certain cases, for more simple applications, univariate forecasting methods can be used. Forecasting procedures are more affiliated with time series data or historic data that extend back in time (e.g., monthly periods over several years). Other mining applications involve examining a section of data over a specified time period, (e.g., looking at a number of customers, employees or processes over a given time period, let’s say a six-month period). This approach is referred to as a cross-sectional analysis mentioned briefly in the last chapter. The following section will describe these mining approaches in a bit more detail to give you an idea of not only how to effectively implement them, but also when and in what situation you may need to apply them.
Extension of the Unified Modeling Language for Mobile Agents
Authors: Klein Cornel , Rausch Andreas , Sihling Marc , Wen Zhaojun
Published: May 2011

Mobile agents gained immense attraction as a new programming concept for implementing distributed applications. However, up to now mobile agent programming has been mainly technology driven, with a focus on the implementation of mobile agent platforms and only small programming applications. In this chapter, we present an extension of the standard UML that provides language concepts for modeling mobility both in analysis and design phases. This extended version of UML is applied to the modeling of an advanced telecommunication system.
Rendering Distributed Systems in UML
Authors: Lago Patricia
Published: May 2011

This chapter is about the use of UML in the design of distributed systems. We have been using UML in the context of both international and local projects, and we continuously face the need for additional constructs that are especially conceived for distributed software components in general, and specifically for software running on middleware such as CORBA. In particular, it is our opinion that various UML diagrams would need some extensions (or customizations). Also we defined a development methodology supporting UML and a set of conventions that help us in overcoming such needs. Nevertheless, they contribute just to software documentation and communication, and do not provide any help in the low-level design phase as well as in the generation of code for the subsequent implementation phase. The chapter is intended to discuss our requirements and possible solutions.
Temporal OCL
Authors: Conrad Stefan , Turowski Klaus
Published: May 2011

Compositional plug-and-play-like reuse of black box components requires sophisticated techniques to specify components, especially if we combine third-party components, which are traded on component markets, to customer-individual business application systems. As in established engineering disciplines like mechanical engineering or electrical engineering, we need a formal documentation of business components that becomes part of contractual agreements. Taking this problem as a starting point, we explain the general layered structure of software contracts for business components and show shortcomings of common specification approaches. Furthermore, we introduce a formal notation for the specification of business components that extends the Object Constraint Language (OCL) and that allows a broader use of the Unified Modeling Language (UML) with respect to the layered structure of software contracts for business components. The remainder of the chapter is as follows. After providing background information in the next section, we discuss the necessity of a multi-level notation standard. Thereafter, we explain how the OCL can be used to specify business components. Taking this as a basis, we proceed to the main thrust of our chapter the temporal extension of OCL. Finally, we present our conclusions and give an outlook.
Supplementing UML with Concepts from ORM
Authors: Halpin Terry
Published: May 2011

The Unified Modeling Language (UML) is useful for designing object-oriented code, but is less suitable for conceptual data analysis. Its process-centric use-cases provide an inadequate basis for specifying data-centric class diagrams, and the UML graphical language suffers from incompleteness, inconsistency and unnecessary complexity. For example, multiplicity constraints can lead to unexpected problems when extended to n-ary associations, the constraint primitives are not optimized for orthogonality or expressibility, and the graphical language does not lend itself readily to verbalization and multiple instantiation for validating models with domain experts. This chapter examines some of these defects, and shows how to compensate for them by augmenting UML with concepts and techniques from the Object Role Modeling (ORM) approach. It highlights the potential of “data use cases” for seeding the data model, using verbalization of facts and rules with positive and negative examples to facilitate validation of business rules. The following approaches are suggested as possible ways to exploit the benefits of fact-orientation: use ORM for the conceptual analysis then map the ORM model to UML; use UML supplemented by informal population diagrams and user-defined constraints; enhance the UML metamodel to better support business rules.
Seamless Formalizing the UML Semantics through Metamodels
Authors: Fernandez Aleman Jose Luis , Alvarez Ambrosio Toval
Published: May 2011

Despite the fact that the Unified Modeling Language (UML) has been adopted by the Object Management Group (OMG2 ) as the standard notation for use in Object-Oriented (OO) Systems Development, it still does not have a truly formal semantics. There is currently much effort directed towards formalizing particular aspects or models of UML. However, the literature gives little insight into the appropriate strategy for tackling this problem within an integrated basis including the language evolution. This chapter identifies and discusses three feasible strategies which can be applied to formalize UML. One of these strategies is selected to underpin the four-layer architecture on which UML is based. The approach is based on the soundness of algebraic specification theory, which, in addition, provides suitable theorem-proving capabilities for exploiting the UML formal model obtained. The formal models proposed are specified using an executable algebraic specification language called Maude.