bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Internet Technologies in Factory Automation
Authors: Blecker Thorsten
Published: May 2011

One of the most important changes in the technological and economic environment of industrial firms is the increasing diffusion and strongly increasing commercial use of Internet technologies in manufacturing. Both formal and empirical studies verified the significant increase in productivity through intraorganizational applications of modern information and communication technologies in manufacturing processes (Barua & Lee, 2001). Early industrial applications of Internet technologies were limited to single, unconnected solutions for distributed Computer-Aided Design (CAD) systems or telecooperation. Now Internet technologies may reach into the automation and control levels of every assembly line. Therefore, it is not surprising that applications of Internet technologies in production processes on the shop floor increase, and automation-technology suppliers combine Internet technologies more and more into their products. While production concepts, such as lean production, world-class manufacturing, and agile manufacturing, inevitably disregard this development, new production concepts arise that fundamentally consider the application of Internet technologies on the shop floor.
Knowledge Creation in Online Communities
Authors: Kang Kyung Woo , Rosen Deborah E.
Published: May 2011

The emergence of online communities has brought a profound impact on human interaction and methods of information exchange in society. More than one-third of all U.S. Internet users have turned to mass, large-scale communication systems such as e-mail, mailing lists, instant messaging, chat rooms, Web stores, customer service sites, and threaded discussion systems such as USENET (Preece, 2002). Reflecting this prominent phenomenon, there have been a considerable number of studies focused on online communities and communications. This article focuses on the factors and dynamics of the knowledge creation process in online communities, relying on Nonaka’s Socialization-Externalization-Combination-Internalization (SECI) Model (1994). Based on that framework, this article discusses the factors that affect knowledge creation and sharing in online communities. The rest of this article is organized as follows. The characteristics of online communities are discussed in the “Background” section. The section titled “Dynamics of Knowledge Creation and Sharing in Online Communities” reviews the existing concepts and the SECI model of knowledge creation, and extends that model to include the online community context. We further discuss the effects of important factors on knowledge creation and sharing in online communities. The section “Future Trends” suggests further research opportunities in the area. The final section summarizes and concludes the article.
Location-Based Services in Mobile Communications Industry
Authors: Ververidis Christopher , Polyzos George C.
Published: May 2011

Advances in wireless communications and information technology have made the mobile Web a reality. The mobile Web is the response to the need for anytime, anywhere access to information and services. Many wireless applications have already been deployed and are available to customers via their mobile phones and wirelessly connected PDAs (personal digital assistants). However, developing the “killer” wireless application is still a goal for the industry rather than a reality. One direction for developing such applications points to location-based services (LBSs). LBSs are services that are enhanced with and depend on information about a mobile station’s position. Location information by itself is not the ultimate service, but if location information is combined with content, useful services may be developed. These services offer the capability to users and machines to locate persons, vehicles, machines, and resources, as well as the possibility for users to track their own locations (GSM Association, 2003). The focus of this article is the analysis of the most critical success factors and challenges for LBS.
Mobile Agent Assisted E-Learning System
Authors: Quah Jon T.S. , Leow Winnie C.H. , Soh Y. K.
Published: May 2011

In the past decades, the Internet has evolved so rapidly that it makes the information-technology industry grow extremely fast. Internet-based applications such as e-commerce, e-payment, e-billing, e-learning, and so forth have tremendous influence on society: There is a trend that our society will be reshaped by the Internet. Among these applications, e-learning is one of the killer applications. Currently, the traditional education system faces some challenges that arose from the development of the knowledge-based economy. School enrollment increases with the population growth, education levels also increase for the new economy, and the cost of higher education escalates. On the other hand, in the workforce-training market, as the information economy develops, the demand for skilled workers increases. As the technology keeps changing, the workforce needs continuous training to maintain its productivity level. Hence, both formal school-based education and continuous workforce training have become big business now, and they will be even bigger in the future (Kerrey & Isakson, 2000). A more sophisticated education model is required to take this challenge, and so e-learning came into being. Compared to traditional classroom teaching, e-learning provides one major advantage: It makes the access of information much easier and more convenient. Hence, it makes learning of all kinds, at all levels, anytime, anyplace, at any pace a practical reality (Kolar, 2001). E-learning also gives tremendous cost savings for both instructors and learners; the learning model is shifted from instructor centered to learner centered, which focuses primarily on the needs of learners. The updating of online material is also much easier. Many e-learning systems can develop personalized and interactive applications that allow users to customize their e-learning models to their own pace, and they can truly engage the user in that they involve the simulation of real-world events and sophisticated collaboration with other learners and instructors (Quah & Chen, 2002). In our e-learning system, we incorporated mobile-agent technology to enhance the response time of information retrieval. The purpose of this incorporation is to overcome the bottleneck problem faced by many pure client-server-based systems. Since mobile agents are able to traverse from one information server to another autonomously to search for relevant documents for users, only relevant articles are sent back. This saves bandwidth and enhances the efficiency of the e-learning system. As a result, the turnaround time for user queries or information searches reduces, and the feedback from the user community is positive as the response time is shorter and users find it easier to maintain their trains of thought in their study.
Mobile Public Relations Strategies
Authors: Galloway Chris
Published: May 2011

Public relations is about the “ethical and strategic management of communication and relationships” (Johnston & Zawawi, 2004, p. 6) with individuals and groups (“publics”) important to an organization. At one time such publics could safely be thought of in relatively static terms such as geographic location. This is, of course, still possible—but such fixed categories are of diminishing importance when it comes to building relationships with modern publics and communicating organizational messages to them. Even the motor vehicles that facilitate physical movement are becoming “smarter” and converging with technologies such as mobile telephony, personal entertainment systems and handheld computing (Sherry & Urry, 2000, as cited in Sheller, 2002). This article aims to explore the idea that mobile technologies mean PR practitioners must rethink both the notion of publics and also how to relate to them. A “mobile PR” will undermine taken-for-granted views about the nature of media, messages, and the kinds of relationships public relations people can expect to create on behalf of their clients. Many practitioners are still getting to grips with the online public relations they have known—through activities such as arranging the building of corporate Web sites, monitoring online discussions relevant to client interests and both disseminating company information online and responding to inquiries about it. The idea of an even more flexible communications environment enabled by mobile technologies may seem very daunting. No-one has so far worked out how to “do” PR in this new communications climate—there are no prescriptions or generally accepted approaches. Yet if practitioners do not confront the dilemma of how to reach mobile audiences they risk becoming irrelevant to many clients who must communicate in the mobile space or face unacceptable decay in their business.
Multimedia Proxy Servers
Authors: Tse Philip Kwok Chung
Published: May 2011

On the Internet, multimedia objects are stored in content servers. The clients behind some proxy servers are located over a wide area network (WAN) far from the content servers (Figure 1). When a client accesses multimedia objects from a content server, the content server must either allocate sufficient disk and network resources to multicast or unicast the objects to the client (Ma & Shin, 2002). Otherwise, it rejects the client. Thus, the popular content server becomes the bottleneck in delivering multimedia objects. Proxy servers have the disk cache space, network bandwidth, and availability to cache parts of the multimedia objects for clients, making them good candidates to solve the bottleneck problem. However, large multimedia objects are not cached or only partially cached in current proxy servers. When fast optical networks are widely deployed, this problem is becoming more severe. Therefore, proxy caches must be enhanced to alleviate the bottleneck in popular content servers with multimedia objects. Multimedia proxy servers perform several functions in accessing multimedia objects over the Internet. We first present the background in the next section. Next, the cache replacement policies being used in proxy servers are described. Then, the object partitioning methods are described. After that, the transcoding method that converts high-resolution objects into low-resolution objects is described. Afterward, we present the cooperative caching method that can be applied to cache objects on proxy servers. Lastly, we describe a method to distribute proxy-server load using a depot.
Payment Mechanism of Mobile Agent-Based Restaurant Ordering System
Authors: Quah Jon T.S. , Leow Winnie C.H. , Ong Chee Chye
Published: May 2011

The Internet, especially the World Wide Web, is moving from a free, academic domain to a profitable commercial world. This underscores the importance of a digitally secure means of electronic payment for an electronic commerce application. The payment is usually an important part of an electronic commerce transaction, and it deals with the transfer of trust, either as cryptographically signed promises, or as digital cash, between the customer, the merchant, and the payment service provider. Due to the explosive growth of e-commerce transactions, many electronic modes of payment are devised to address a diverse set of Internet user requirements (Guida, Stahl, Bunt et al., 2004; Tsiakis & Sthephanides, 2005; Garfinkel, 2003; Usher, 2003; Polk, Hastings, & Malpani, 2003; Evans & Yen, 2005; Marchesini, Smith, & Zhao, 2005; Lancaster, Yen, & Huang, 2003; Lekkas, 2003; Medvinsky & Neuman, 1995; Schoenmakers, 1997; Levi & Koc, 2001; Mahony, Peirce, & Tewari, 2001; DigiCash Press, 1994; Neuman & Tso, 1994; Vivtek, 2000). The background of this article is that we have developed a mobile agent-based restaurant reservation and ordering system whereby users are able to search for restaurants that fulfill a list of user-entered parameters (e.g., type of cuisines, ambiance, specialties such as steaks, etc.) (Quah & Leow, 2003). The system is built on the IBM Aglet mobile agent platform. (A mobile agent is a small executable code/program that can migrate itself to remote hosts and execute predefined instructions—e.g., information retrieval, and return the processed information to its originating host system) (Lanage & Oshima, 1998). Due to the uniqueness of our system, we find the existing e-commerce payment methods inadequate to fit our system’s need. As such, we studied several existing methods and adapted one into our system operation structure. The use of mobile agent to implement the payment system adds robustness and scalability to the system.
Virtual Marketplace for Agent-Based Electrnic Commerce
Authors: Guan Sheng-Uei
Published: May 2011

Information overload has become a real problem with the ever-increasing amount of available online resources. One possible solution is the application of software agents in e-commerce. Intelligent agents are already on the Web, freeing people from some of the drudgework of searching and automatically keeping them up to date. There are now many examples of software agents currently available on the Web. Shopping agents like BargainBot, Excite’s Jango and Andersen Consulting’s BargainFinder are but a few. They have their shortcomings, however, such as a lack of purchasing capability and a limited range of product selection. Furthermore, the current Web front-end to an online storefront is not conducive to autonomous browsing by search agents. A more comprehensive solution would therefore be to build a virtual marketplace whereby producers and consumers can come together, and with the help of software agents, actively participate in and conduct e-commerce. There are currently several agent-based marketplace systems that have been developed for the purpose of e-commerce, and these include Kasbah (Chavez & Maes, 1996), MAGMA (Tsvetovatyy & Gini, 1996) and MAGNET (Collins, Youngdahl, Jamison, Mobasher, & Gini, 1998). These systems have certain limitations, however, and shortcomings that make them questionable for e-commerce applications. An example is the Kasbah system architecture that did not include any form of payment mechanisms. Another is MAGMA, which is felt to be rather expensive on network bandwidth and the system performance is heavily reliant on network latencies as it communicates through socket connections. The objective of my research is to build a new virtual marketplace prototype whereby producers and consumers can meet and conduct e-commerce in the cyberspace with the help of software agents.
Web Services
Authors: Moser Louise E. , Meliar-Smith P. M.
Published: May 2011

Web services are changing the way in which the World Wide Web is currently being used. The Web was created originally to support human-to-computer interactions with textual and graphical data. Today, people use the Web to read the latest news, buy consumer goods, search for information, and obtain stock quotes. However, the Web does not yet support effective computer-to-computer interactions between software applications of different enterprises. Web services can enable Internet-based software applications of different enterprises to interact with each other directly by providing application programs with the ability to invoke operations that otherwise would be invoked manually by a human through a browser. Web services can run not only on mainframe computers and server computers, but also on desktop computers and client handsets. Web services allow individuals and organizations to publish links to their software applications, just as they publish links to their Web pages. Web services solve the enterprise application integration (EAI) problem by enabling interaction among different applications within the same organization. They can also enable computer-to-computer applications of different organizations to interact without human intervention. For example, Web services can be used for reservation systems, order-tracking systems, and business supply chains. In the example shown in Figure 1, Company A (a customer) orders goods from Company B (a distributor). Company B checks the availability of the goods from Company C (a supplier), and then arranges for payment and shipping of the goods to Company A without human intervention. Performance, security, and reliability are factors that will limit the use of Web services unless those issues can be properly addressed. Nonetheless, the potential widespread use and benefits of Web services are very compelling. Web services allow disparate computing systems and applications to be coupled together, and they enable enterprises to streamline and automate their business processes.
Web Traffic Aggregation
Authors: Owen Robert S.
Published: May 2011

One reason for registering domain names is for use in funneling Web traffic to a particular destination. Procter & Gamble (P&G) owns many domain names based on generic words that can be used to funnel visitors toward P&G brands. Cough.com, germs.com, and sinus.com all currently bring visitors to a page that takes United States visitors to the single Web site, vicks.com. Vicks.com in turn promotes P&G’s Vicks-branded line of products that are associated with cough, germ, and sinus remedies. Gooogle.com, gogle.com, goolge.com, googel.com, and foofle.com are all owned by Google, used to redirect, or automatically take, visitors to a single Web site, google.com. In this way, Google is aggregating Web traffic, generated from all people who type these misspellings, to a single Web site. Unfortunately, such traffic aggregation is sometimes used in ways that can create victims. A child who uses the URL (uniform resource locator) whitehouse.com with the intention to research a school assignment on the American White House (at http://whitehouse.gov) will be taken to a Web site with adult content. Someone who believes that he or she is using the URL of a Web site devoted to gun control could end up at a Web site with a threatening message by an opposing group (cf. “Hacker Intercepts,” 2000; Montgomery, 2000). Someone who types what is thought to be the name of a popular children’s Web site might be taken to a site that tricks people into downloading malicious software (cf. Happy Trails Computer Club, 2004; “IIS Exploit,” 2004; MIT IS&T, n.d.; Spector, 2002). People might click on an index link or a personal bookmark to visit a school or church Web site, not knowing that the organization is using a new Web address, and be taken to a Web site with adult content (Markovich, 2001; cf.Bryant, 2001; Hardy, 2001).
The Turf Conversation- Who Does What to Whom
Authors: Andriole Stephen J.
Published: May 2011

Not too many controversial topics here. Here are the turf topics we’ll discuss: • Figure out how to neutralize the politics around turf: I have no magic here … it’s been going on since people began to congregate … but take it seriously because it undermines effectiveness. • Forget titles: you have to organize your companies to collaborate, support collaboration and enable it with integrated technology … you may or may not need “chiefs,” or “directors.” • Forget about consensus-based decision-making in flat management structures … forget about big teams. • Command and control works … even in decentralized organizations – which, by the way, I’m not that crazy about. • Innovation is special: make sure your organizational structures encourage business and technology innovation.
Information Technology Investment Evaluation and Measurement Methodology
Authors: Nel Johan
Published: May 2011

The chapter reviews the present methodology and comes to the conclusion that there is a solution for the predicament of the managers. The author is convinced that the ITIEM methodology is the solution.
Strategic Assessment
Authors: LeClair Craig
Published: May 2011

Having a strategy and sticking to it is difficult for enterprise software companies. They can apply their skills and technology to many business problems and they are hunting in growing markets. Almost any pursuit can be declared “strategic” since it could lead to something big.
Organizational Issues of Emerging Companies
Authors: LeClair Craig
Published: May 2011

Your business is based on great ideas. You and a very talented team of engineers and business people are trying to figure out how to translate these ideas into products and a business. You know there’s a definite market for your product because you have already sold it. You’re starting to get some free press and more interest than you know what to do with. Now your company is on the brink of making the turn from emerging to mature.
Mobile Application Development I
Authors: Chen Lei-da , Skelton Gordon W.
Published: May 2011

Microsoft Embedded Visual Tools were designed to develop applications that run on Windows CE devices (e.g., Pocket PC and Handheld PC 2000). It is a free software product that can be downloaded at the www.microsoft.com Web site. Two programming languages are supported by Microsoft Embedded Visual Tools: Embedded Visual Basic (eVB) and Embedded Visual C++ (eVC). These two programming languages are versions of Visual Basic and Visual C++ with limited capabilities, respectively. Therefore, developers with Visual Basic or Visual C++ experience can easily leverage their existing expertise to develop mobile or wireless applications. Since many developers are familiar with Visual Basic, we will explore the techniques of using eVB to develop applications for wireless devices in this chapter.
Electric Government
Authors: Rocheleau Bruce
Published: May 2011

Electronic government (e-government) has become a primary focus of informationmanagement for governmental officials as well as IT staff. In this chapter, I review thebasic concepts of e-government and present information on its successes and limita-tions. I also outline key issues that need to be addressed in planning and implementingIT. Because governments are so active in the e-government area, the situation ischanging rapidly so assessments that I make now will undoubtedly need to be revisitedregularly.
Information Management and Ethical Issues in Government
Authors: Rocheleau Bruce
Published: May 2011

There are many ethical and legal issues raised by the growing of electronic informationmanagement and there is a growing literature on the development of “cyber-ethics.”There is consensus among experts that organizations need to be proactive in addressingcyber-ethics. A U.S. Treasury Department study showed that 60% of computer securityfailures come from within the organization (Stone & Henry, 2003). That fact suggests afailure of organizations to instill a sense of ethics in its employees. The turnover rate ofIT professionals has been relatively high compared to other professions and this maymake them more problematic when it comes to ethical issues (Oz, 2001). Oz’s comparativestudy of IT and other professionals found them somewhat less ethical with respect tosoftware piracy and hacking but comparable to other professionals in their attitudestoward privacy. One of the problems is that ethics is not a part of the standard ITcurriculum (Wilder & Soat, 2001), which is one reason that organizations may need toconduct active training about ethics. IT professional societies have codes of ethics suchas that of the Association for Computing Machinery that is available online. However,Linderman and Schiano (2001) argue that IT “is not a profession” because it lacksimportant characteristics of a professional, such as certification standards and “sanc-tions for unprofessional behavior.” They also point out that only 8% of IT professionalsbelong to the ACM.
Information Technology, Accountability, and Information Stewardship
Authors: Rocheleau Bruce
Published: May 2011

Over the past two decades, there has been an unabated demand for more accountabilityfrom public organizations. The term “accountability” is employed with a variety ofdifferent meanings. I view the purpose of these assessments as responsiveness to publicor external values. As Meijer (2001, p. 234) points out, accountability is a practice ratherthan an outcome. The essence of accountability is the idea that an individual ororganization “is held to answer for performance” and public organizations should beresponsive to the values of their customers (Meijer, 2001, p. 259). For example, we do notwant to allow professors to over-concentrate on research and ignore teaching, so nowmany states require that institutions prove that students are achieving their goals, suchas obtaining jobs and passing professional examinations. In other words, the purposeof accountability mechanisms is to achieve responsiveness to external values held bythe public and the constituencies served by public agencies. Although most account-ability reports tend to emphasize quantitative performance measures, qualitative assess-ments of the adequacy of performance may also be used to achieve responsiveness
Evaluation
Authors: Khan Badrul
Published: May 2011

The purpose of the E-Learning Quick Checklist book is to walk you through the various factors (encompassing these eight dimensions) important to developing, evaluating, and implementing open, flexible and distributed learning environments. This book is designed as a Quick Checklist for e-learning. It contains many practical items that you can use as review criteria to check if e-learning modules, courses and programs provide the level of services that learners (or consumers) should expect. Items in the checklist encompass the critical dimensions of an e-learning environment, including pedagogical, technological, interface design, evaluation, management, resource support, ethical, and institutional. Throughout this book, various critical e-learning and blended-learning factors are presented as questions or items that you can ask yourself when planning, designing, evaluating, and implementing e-learning and/or blended-learning modules, courses, and programs.
Analyzing Gender Segregation in Comuting
Authors: Ghoshal Leena , Passerini Katia
Published: May 2011

Gender appears to be a fundamental category for ordering and classifying social relations in the world (Evans, 1994). The first thing we are told about a newborn is whether it is a boy or a girl. Gender as defined by Acker, (1992, p. 250) is a “patterned, socially produced distinction between female and male, feminine and masculine” and is a key concept for understanding the degree of male and female participation in any field, including information systems. This review aims at developing an understanding of some of the reasons that underlie (a) the gender segregation that exists within the broad, interrelated fields of computing (information systems (IS), information technology (IT), and computer science (CS)) and (b) the declining levels of female participation in the computing industry across the continents. The three computing disciplines (IS, IT, CS) and the computing profession clearly appear gender segregated, with a male dominance at all levels. As Booth (1999) noted, while one of the first software ever written for a machine was produced by a woman—Ada Lovelace in 1840, it is a male, Charles Babbage—the inventor of the difference calculating machine—that is generally accepted as the founding father of computing. Booth concludes: “And that, in microcosm, has been how the IT industry developed over the next 160 years—a combination of rapid technical advances leading to skills crisis while half the nation’s workforce has been routinely overlooked” (p. 47).
Developing Country Perspective on Women's ICT Adoption
Authors: van Gorp Annemijn
Published: May 2011

The explosive growth of information and communication technologies has become a worldwide phenomenon. However, merely countries in the West as well as a growing number of countries in Southeast Asia have become largely connected, whereas the majority of people in the developing world have not yet been able to take advantage of the new opportunities ICTs provide. Especially in developing countries, Internet access remains a luxury of small groups of elites, and even the use of old-fashioned telephone lines remains a luxury for a minority of the people. While the lack of availability of technological infrastructure looms large, the basic lack of education and technical skills impedes further potential for the large-scale adoption of ICTs (e.g., Cawkell, 2001). The opportunities of ICTs are commonly discussed in terms of business opportunities—as a means to enhance economic competitive position at either the level of the firm, region, or nation. This entails a narrow scope. ICTs have the ability to enhance the quality of life in a broader sense as they have the potential to improve interpersonal communication, and moreover could allow for the social and political empowerment of ordinary people (e.g., Hafkin & Taggart, 2001). This implies a direct downside as well: Those people with significant access to ICTs and thus information resources are in a position to increase their control over social, political, and economic arenas, making nonusers further marginalized and excluded from not only economic life, but social and political life as well (e.g., Cawkell, 2001; Morales-Gomez & Melesse, 1998). In this regard, Forestier, Grace, and Kenny (2002) have found that, historically, telecommunications rollout has actually increased inequality because only the wealthy can afford implementation and use. Nevertheless, the authors also find that both telephony and Internet access could be a force for the convergence of incomes and widespread improvements in quality of life in the future, as costs of ICTs are decreasing and hence access becomes a possibility for the poor as well. Nevertheless, in the case of the Internet, the absence of policy initiatives with regard to access coverage, training, and content development aimed specifically at the poor make it likely that this new technology will also be a force for further income divergence like telecommunications rollout has traditionally been (Forestier et al., 2002).
Five Perspectives on Women and Men in the IT Workforce
Authors: Wardell Mark , Sawyer Steve , Mitory Jessica , Reagor Sara
Published: May 2011

The opportunities in a variety of information technology (IT) occupations, such as software engineer, systems analyst and consultant, combined with increased employer interest (and need) for workers whose essential skill is knowledge and not brawn, intimate that IT is a “level playing field.” That is, simply possessing IT-related skills might mean that a worker’s gender would not be a discriminating characteristic for job-related outcomes in IT work. The perception of high-paying and gender-neutral work should encourage women to enter IT fields. This should be magnified by the increases in resources (public and private) designed to enable women to acquire IT-related skills. For example, early introduction programs, such as the Girl Scout’s STEM program, encourage entry into IT work through newsletters, career information and mentoring opportunities for young girls in the subjects of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (Girl Scouts of America, 2004).
Gender and Diversity in E-Learning
Authors: Schmitz Sigrid , Mebmer Ruth , Schinzel Britta
Published: May 2011

Multimediality, interactivity, and inter-connection as well as independence of place and time are potentials of e-learning and can bring about an increase in quality and flexibility of learning. E-learning comprises a variety of scenarios, which differ in their didactic approach and application of media technology. Reinmann-Rothmeier (2002) refers to a model of Back, Seufert, and Kramhöller (1998) consisting of three scenarios according to the main function of new media in the learning process. In e-learning by interacting, the new media facilitate interactions between users and the system, in e-learning by distributing, the new media function as distributors of information, and in e-learning by collaborating, the new media are applied in order to support group work. This trisection traces roughly the history of e-learning. Up until the mid 1990s, e-learning mostly consisted of programs on CD-ROMs run by learners on single PC-units. With the spreading of the Internet, the search for and distribution of information via the Web has continuously grown in importance. Currently, efforts are being made to improve interactivity and collaboration between learners and teachers to overcome the isolation of e-learners using CBT. Blended learning concepts evolved and CSCL emerged as a research field to consider technical and didactic aspects of online collaboration. Influenced by the shift in didactics from an instructional to a constructivist paradigm, current research questions are, however preferences, skills, and demands of users can be integrated into e-learning technology. Along with this development, gender aspects have become a focus of research. In this article, we will first clarify how the co-construction between gender and technology can be understood without lapsing into dichotomous and self-reifying patterns. We will then outline the multifaceted network of gender aspects in e-learning. We aim to develop a list of demands for e-learning scenarios and will propose an approach for technical construction that takes gender and diversity demands into account.
Gender and National IT Policy in Nigeria
Authors: Olatokun Wole Michael
Published: May 2011

Information technology (IT) has become a potent force in transforming social, economic and political life globally (Hafkin & Taggart, 2001). Without its incorporation into the information age, there is little chance for countries or regions to develop. More and more concern is being shown about the impact of those left on the other side of the digital divide—the division between the information “haves” and “have nots.” Most women within developing countries are in the deepest part of the divide, further removed from the information age than the men whose poverty they share. If access to and use of these technologies is directly linked to social and economic development, then it is imperative to ensure that women in developing countries understand the significance of these technologies and use them. If not, they will become further marginalized from the mainstream of their countries and of the world. It is essential that gender issues be considered early in the process of the introduction of IT in developing countries so that gender concerns can be incorporated from the beginning and not as a corrective afterwards (Hafkin & Taggart, 2001). This article first gives a background to the Nigerian IT policy, followed by a gender analysis of the policy. It points out the gender issues to be incorporated in the policy and the strategies of ensuring women’s ability to take advantage of IT. It finally makes recommendations on the way forward for incorporating gender issues in the Nigerian IT policy document.
Gender and the Use of DSS in the Australian Cotton Industry
Authors: Mackrell Dale
Published: May 2011

This article provides an overview of an ongoing study that explores farm management practices by Australian women cotton growers using farm management software, most particularly agricultural decision support systems (DSS). The research methodology is interpretive with multiple case studies of women cotton growers and industry professionals. Participants were selected on the basis of indicating an awareness of environmentally responsible and high technology farming practices. Data collection was principally by semi-structured in-depth interviews. The study is informed through a theoretical framework of structuration theory as a metatheory for probing the recursiveness of farm management and technology usage, and diffusion of innovations theory as a lower-level theory for analysing the characteristics of the software. Evidence from the study suggests that farm women intentionally select specific software modules for implementation depending on the attributes of the software. Further, while computer-based farm management systems, including agricultural DSS, are recognised media for technology transfer of industry research to farms, the study found the cooperation of farming partners to be essential in influencing effective reconstruction of farm management practices and software usage. The study also explores gender homophily, in particular the relationship between husband and wife as partners in a cotton farm business. It is apparent that gender differences and inequalities are still prevalent and indicative of “gender heterophily.” Nevertheless, in the main, communication between parties is harmonious, empathetic, and by definition homophilous, thus ensuring effective information exchange. A notable benefit of using decision support software is an enhanced critical awareness of existing farm management practices. Further, the women are empowered by increasing confidence to contribute in enterprising ways to a greater range of farm management tasks and to more innovative applications of computer-based farm management tools.
Gender Differences in Information Technology Acceptance
Authors: Ma Will Wai-Kit , Yuen Allan Hoi-Kau
Published: May 2011

Gender differences in computer use has been always a topic of research interest. The understanding of the patterns among gender, including beliefs, intention and use behavior of IT/IS would provide us a better picture to the process of design and implementation, which gives support to IT/IS success. However, published works explaining why and how beliefs and attitudes varied between different genders are still scarce, yet the topic was of widespread relevance. We direct our empirical work on user’s beliefs, intention and usage behavior. Gender differences in beliefs would likely make a corresponding impact on the intention to use or not to use computer in the future, and hence, the actual usage pattern. Assumed to be behavioral manifestations of users’ gender differences, we infer these gender differences in the beliefs of computer use from their self-reported intention and usage behavior. Therefore, we aim to explore the factors affecting the intention and usage behavior; and their corresponding strengths in affecting the intention and usage behavior; in order to suggest effective implementation strategies accordingly. The research questions of this empirical study are: 1. What are the emergent constructs that drive the intention and usage behavior of computer use? 2. Do users’ beliefs regarding IT/IS usage differ among genders? 3. To what extent do these effects differ? To address these research questions, we applied technology acceptance model (TAM) to a group of pre-service teachers, and measured their beliefs in using computer to explain the gender differences in their beliefs, intention, and usage of computer. The rest of the article proceeds as follows. The next section starts with a review on gender and technology. The third section explains the model framework TAM. The fourth section describes the instrument construction and validation. The fifth section reports the model testing results. The final section discusses the thrusts of the study and future trends.
Designing Secure Data Warehouses
Authors: Villarroel Rodolfo , Fernández-Medina Eduardo , Trujillo Juan , Piattini Mario
Published: May 2011

Organizations depend increasingly on information systems, which rely upon databases and data warehouses (DWs), which need increasingly more quality and security. Generally, we have to deal with sensitive information such as the diagnosis made on a patient or even personal beliefs or other sensitive data. Therefore, a final DW solution should consider the final users that can have access to certain specific information. Unfortunately, methodologies that incorporate security are based on an operational environment and not on an analytical one. Therefore, they do not include security into the multidimensional approaches to work with DWs. In this chapter, we present a comparison of six secure-systems design methodologies. Next, an extension of the UML that allows us to specify main security aspects in the multidimensional conceptual modeling is proposed, thereby allowing us to design secure DWs. Finally, we present how the conceptual model can be implemented with Oracle Label Security (OLS10g).
Gender, Education, and Video Games
Authors: Roig Anna Escofet , Hurtado Ma José Rubio
Published: May 2011

The scope of this article is to analyze educational multimedia games from a gender perspective. Our society is changing, moving toward information and communication technologies (Castells, 1997). Schools are not exempt of this change and computers in the classroom begin to be common. This new learning tool needs to be critically evaluated by teachers. The gender construction in the world representations offered by educational multimedia should also be evaluated.
Gender, Race, Social Class, and Information Technology
Authors: Klassen Myungsook , Stockard Jr. Russell
Published: May 2011

The issue of the underrepresentation of women in the information technology (IT) workforce has been the subject of a number of studies, and the gender gap was an issue when the digital divide dominated discourse about women’s and minority groups’ use of the Internet. However, a broader view is needed. That perspective would include the relation of women and IT in the communities in which they live as well as the larger society. The information society that has emerged includes the United States (U.S.) and the globalized economy of which it is an integral part. Women and minorities, such as African Americans and Latinos, are underrepresented in computer science (CS) and other IT positions in the U.S. In addition, while they are no longer numerically underrepresented in access to computers and the Internet, as of 2000 (Gorski, 2001), they continue to enjoy fewer benefits available through the medium than white boys and men. The following article explores the diversity within women from the perspectives of race, ethnicity and social class in North America, mainly the U.S. The technology gender and racial gap persists in education and in the IT workforce. A broader and deeper look at women’s positions in relation to the increasingly techno-centric society reveals that women may have reached equality in access, but not in academic study and job opportunities.
Historical Perspective of Australian Women in Computing
Authors: Craig Annemieke
Published: May 2011

Women’s participation in the Australian workforce has been increasing since the mid-1950s. In 1954, women made up 23% of the total labour force (Office for Women [OFW], 2004), but by 2004, they accounted for 44.5% (Australian Bureau of Statistics [ABS], 2004). Over the same period, there was growth in new employment opportunities in the emerging computer industry. However, this industry did not manage to attract equal numbers of women and men, and currently women account for about one fifth of the Australian ICT workforce (Maslog-Levis, 2005). Women are paid less than men in similar positions in this sector and are less likely to hold senior management positions (Byrne & Staehr, 2003). Gender imbalance in employment is not unique to computing. Australia’s workforce is more gender segregated than that of most other industrialised countries (Gray, 2003). Over half of all female employees are employed in the clerical, sales, and service groups of occupations, and these are areas where there are substantially less men (ABS, 2000). Men dominate the trades, production, and transport occupations. When does gender imbalance become a concern? Common sense would suggest that it has become a problem when gender imbalance has a detrimental effect on some sections of society. The computing profession is an area where gender imbalance is of concern. New technologies bring about changes that have the potential to affect all society, and we “would be most likely to achieve maximum benefit if each significant section of society was represented in the planning decisions” (Ryan, 1994, p. 548). Without diversity in the ICT workforce, “we limit the set of life experiences that are applied, and as a result, we pay an opportunity cost, a cost in products not built, in designs not considered, in constraints not understood, in processes not invented” (Wulf, 1998). Unless more women are employed in the areas of ICT design and development, these products and services are unlikely to meet the needs and desires of approximately half the population. Women need to be actively involved in all levels of these new technologies that have such immense potential for social change.
Mentoring Australian Girls in ICTs
Authors: Beekhuyzen Jenine , Clayton Kaylene , von Hellens Liisa
Published: May 2011

In Australia, the participation rate for females in information and communication technology (ICT) courses in secondary, vocational. and higher education is significantly lower than that of males, and is decreasing (Thorp, 2004). In Queensland, Australia, only 20% (at most) of ICT students and employees are female, with the IT first preferences for tertiary admission down 22% for 2004 enrolments (Thorp, 2003). This downturn is in line with the trend in other Western countries and reflects the general lack of interest in ICT education amongst adolescents. Recent Australian research confirms the importance of role models and mentors when adolescents are considering career options (Clayton, 2005). The importance of implementing sustainable strategies, such as mentoring programs, to rectify this imbalance cannot be understated. Jepson and Peri (2002) believe that mentoring programs should commence at middle and high school. Early mentoring programs are valuable as girls have fewer ICT role models and mentors in the classroom, industry and computer games (Carey, 2001). Mentors in these programs need to provide an accurate portrayal of the broad range of careers available in the ICT field (Klawe, 2002). To date, a number of mentoring programs and intervention activities have been and continue to be undertaken in Queensland. This article presents three different mentoring programs the authors have been involved in and discusses the challenges involved in implementing these strategies. The first two programs discussed are for high school students and the third is for university students in ICT degree programs (von Hellens, Beekhuyzen, & Nielsen, 2005). Adding to the complexity of this problem, funding to implement programs aimed at increasing female participation in ICTs may be difficult to justify due to the problems of measuring the effectiveness in achieving this goal. Australian researchers recognize this problem and are concerned about the absence of ongoing evaluation of programs to encourage girls into ICTs (Lang, 2003). While this chapter makes recommendations for implementing new strategies based on the experiences discussed, more work needs to be done on how to evaluate the efficacy of ongoing and future strategies.
UN World Summit on the Information Society
Authors: Jensen Heike
Published: May 2011

The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) is a United Nations (UN) conference led by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). It has unique structural features. First, WSIS is comprised of two summit events: one in Geneva, Switzerland, December 10 to 12, 2003, and the other in Tunis, Tunisia, November 16 to 18, 2005. Second, WSIS is characterized by the so-called multistakeholder approach (Association for Progressive Communications [APC] & Campaign for Communication Rights in the Information Society [CRIS], 2003; Hemmati, 2002; Raboy, 2004). In this approach, civil society and the private sector have an institutionalized basis in the summit process from which to engage with governments and inform the political deliberations. The goal set for WSIS is to develop a global consensus on the features that are to characterize the information society and on ways to bring this society about.