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Enterprises and societies currently face crucial challenges, while Society 5.0 can contribute to a supersmart society, especially for manufacturing and healthcare, and Industry 4.0 becomes important in the global manufacturing industry. Smart energy digital platforms are architected to manage energy supply efficiently. Furthermore, the above digital platforms are expected to collect various kinds of data and analyze Big Data for the trends in the sharing economy in ecosystems. The adaptive integrated digital architecture framework (AIDAF) for Design Thinking Approach with Risk Management is expected to make an alignment with digital IT strategy. In this paper, we propose that various energy management systems and related digital platforms are designed and implemented in an alignment to digital IT strategy for sharing economy toward Society 5.0, with the AIDAF framework for Design Thinking Approach with Risk Management. The vision of AIDAF applications to enable sharing economy and digital platforms is explained and extended in the context of Society 5.0. In addition, challenges and future activities for this area are discussed that cover the directions of smart energy for Society 5.0.
Context: Organizations increasingly develop software in a distributed manner. The cloud provides an environment to create and maintain software-based products and services. Currently, it is unknown which software processes are suited for cloud-based development and what their effects in specific contexts are.
Objective: We aim at better understanding the software process applied to distributed software development using the cloud as development environment. We further aim at providing an instrument which helps project managers comparing different solution approaches and to adapt team processes to improve future project activities and outcomes.
Method: We provide a simulation model which helps analyzing different project parameters and their impact on projects performed in the cloud. To evaluate the simulation model, we conduct different analyses using a Scrumban process and data from a project executed in Finland and Spain. An extra adaptation of the simulation model for Scrum and Kanban was used to evaluate the suitability of the simulation model to cover further process models.
Results: A comparison of the real project data with the results obtaind from the different simulation runs shows the simulation producing results close to the real data, and we could successfully replicate a distributed software project. Furthermore, we could show that the simulation model is suitable to address further process models.
Conclusion: The simulator helps reproducing activities, developers, and events in the project, and it helps analyzing potential tradeoffs, e.g., regarding throughput, total time, project size, team size and work-in-progress limits. Furthermore, the simulation model supports project managers selecting the most suitable planning alternative thus supporting decision-making processes.
Turning complainers into fans : towards a framework for customer services in social media channels
(2012)
In recent years, marketing scholars have invested heavily in exploring the role of social media in marketing theory and practice. One valuable strategy for using social media in marketing communication is to provide customer services in applications like Facebook or Twitter. This paper evaluates a) the concept of perceived service quality in different service channels and b) the impact customer service strategies have on customer loyalty, word of mouth communication, and cross-sell preferences. The framework presented here is tested cross-channel against data collected from the customer service department of a large telecommunication provider. The results elucidate the effectiveness of customer service strategies in different channels.
Suppliers need to improve their relational capabilities if they are to enhance customer trust. Debate about such capabilities is dominated by an interpersonal approach. This paper provieds novel marketing options by expanding insights into alternative types of relational capabilities. Furthermore, the moderating role of customer preferences on the effectiveness of relational capabilities is evaluated.
Due to the consequential impact of technological breakdowns, companies have to be prepared to deal with breakdowns or even better prevent them. In today's information technology, several methods and tools exist to downscale this concern. Therefore, this paper deals with the initial determination of a resilient enterprise architecture supporting predictive maintenance in the information technology domain and furthermore, concerns several mechanisms on how to reactively and proactively secure the state of resiliency on several abstraction levels. The objective of this paper is to give an overview on existing mechanisms for resiliency and to describe the foundation of an optimized approach, combining infrastructure and process mining techniques.
Theoretical foundation, effectiveness, and design artefact for machine learning service repositories
(2022)
Machine learning (ML) has played an important role in research in recent years. For companies that want to use ML, finding the algorithms and models that fit for their business is tedious. A review of the available literature on this problem indicates only a few research papers. Given this gap, the aim of this paper is to design an effective and easy-to-use ML service repository. The corresponding research is based on a multi-vocal literature analysis combined with design science research, addressing three research questions: (1) How is current white and gray literature on ML services structured with respect to repositories? (2) Which features are relevant for an effective ML service repository? (3) How is a prototype for an effective ML service repository conceptualized? Findings are relevant for the explanation of user acceptance of ML repositories. This is essential for corporate practice in order to create and use ML repositories effectively.
The digital twin concept has been widely known for asset monitoring in the industry for a long time. A clear example is the automotive industry. Recently, there has also been significant interest in the application of digital twins in healthcare, especially in genomics in what is known as precision medicine. This work focuses on another medical speciality where digital twins can be applied, sleep medicine. However, there is still great controversy about the fundamentals that constitute digital twins, such as what this concept is based on and how it can be included in healthcare effectively and sustainably. This article reviews digital twins and their role so far in what is known as personalized medicine. In addition, a series of steps will be exposed for a possible implementation of a digital twin for a patient suffering from sleep disorders. For this, artificial intelligence techniques, clinical data management, and possible solutions for explaining the results derived from artificial intelligence models will be addressed.
Relationship Marketing (RM) presumes trust as an important antecedent for the performance of interfirm relationships. Current research is dominated by an interpersonal perspective. In this research tack, trust chiefly emerges as a result of interpersonal relationships. But multiple risks arise if customer trust rests solely on elements inextricably linked to single representatives. Hence, this paper evaluates the impact of organizational capabilities and the moderating role of customer preferences on the trust creation process. The framework presented here is tested cross-industry on 220 customers for IT solutions. The results offer significant insight into the effectiveness of individual and organizational RM strategies.
Entrepreneurship education is becoming increasingly important in higher education and also drives the development of innovative teaching formats, which can increase student engagement. It does, however, need greater international focus to become more attractive for both domestic and international students. This paper presents the examination and course design of two case studies, which promote entrepreneurship education for domestic and international students. These examples show that entrepreneurship courses are attractive due to their focus on interdisciplinarity, experience-based learning, and project-based work. Following a design-based research approach, this paper provides a practical contribution by offering a detailed overview of course design principles, classroom practice and presents reflections and learnings from an iterative development process.
Context
In a world of high dynamics and uncertainties, it is almost impossible to have a long-term prediction of which products, services, or features will satisfy the needs of the customer. To counter this situation, the conduction of Continuous Improvement or Design Thinking for product discovery are common approaches. A major constraint in conducting product discovery activities is the high effort to discover and validate features and requirements. In addition, companies struggle to integrate product discovery activities into their agile processes and iterations.
Objective
This paper aims at suggests a supportive tool, the “Discovery Effort Worthiness (DEW) Index”, for product owners and agile teams to determine a suitable amount of effort that should be spent on Design Thinking activities. To operationalize DEW, proposals for practitioners are presented that can be used to integrate product discovery into product development and delivery.
Method
A case study was conducted for the development of the DEW index. In addition, we conducted an expert workshop to develop proposals for the integration of product discovery activities into the product development and delivery process.
Results
First, we present the "Discovery Effort Worthiness Index" in form of a formula. Second, we identified requirements that must be fulfilled for systematic integration of product discovery activities into product development and delivery. Third, we derived from the requirements proposals for the integration of product discovery activities with a company's product development and delivery.
Conclusion
The developed "Discovery Effort Worthiness Index" provides a tool for companies and their product owners to determine how much effort they should spend on Design Thinking methods to discover and validate requirements. Integrating product discovery with product development and delivery should ensure that the results of product discovery are incorporated into product development. This aims to systematically analyze product risks to increase the chance of product success.
Study programs in higher education have to reflect important societal and industrial challenges to prepare the next generations of professionals for future tasks. The focus of this paper is the challenge of digitalization and digital transformation. The paper proposes the IS education profile of a Digital Business Architect (DBA). The study program emphasizes design thinking, model centricity, and capability thinking as a response to domain requirements from digital transformation and educational system and structure requirements. Experiences in implementing the DBA include the need for integrating deductive and inductive teaching, a strong basis in real-world cases, and collaborative learning approaches to develop adequate competences in business model management, enterprise modeling, enterprise architecture management, and capability management.
With significant advancements in digital technologies, firms find themselves competing in an increasingly dynamic business environment. Therefore, the logic of business decisions is based on the agility to respond to emerging trends in a proactive way. By contrast, traditional IT governance (ITG) frameworks rely on hierarchy and standardized mechanisms to ensure better business/IT alignment. This conflict leads to a call for an ambidextrous governance, in which firms alternate between stability and agility in their ITG mechanisms. Accordingly, this research aims to explore how agility might be integrated in ITG. A quantitative research strategy is implemented to explore the impact of agility on the causal relationship among ITG, business/IT alignment, and firm performance. The results show that the integration of agile ITG mechanisms contributes significantly to the explanation of business/IT alignment. As such, firms need to develop a dual governance model powered by traditional and agile ITG mechanisms.
Autism spectrum disorders (ASD) affect a large number of children both in the Russian Federation and in Germany. Early diagnosis is key for these children, because the sooner parents notice such disorders in a child and the rehabilitation and treatment program starts, the higher the likelihood of his social adaptation. The difficulties in raising such a child lie in the complexity of his learning outside of children's groups and the complexity of his medical care. In this regard, the development of digital applications that facilitate medical care and education of such children at home is important and relevant. The purpose of the project is to improve the availability and quality of healthcare and social adaptation at home of children with ASD through the use of digital technologies.
Personalized remote healthcare monitoring is in continuous development due to the technology improvements of sensors and wearable electronic systems. A state of the art of research works on wearable sensors for healthcare applications is presented in this work. Furthermore, a state of the art of wearable devices, chest and wrist band and smartwatches available on the market for health and sport monitoring is presented in this paper. Many activity trackers are commercially available. The prices are continuously reducing and the performances are improving, but commercial devices do not provide raw data and are therefore not useful for research purposes.
Power line communications (PLC) reuse the existing power-grid infrastructure for the transmission of data signals. As power line the communication technology does not require a dedicated network setup, it can be used to connect a multitude of sensors and Internet of Things (IoT) devices. Those IoT devices could be deployed in homes, streets, or industrial environments for sensing and to control related applications. The key challenge faced by future IoT-oriented narrowband PLC networks is to provide a high quality of service (QoS). In fact, the power line channel has been traditionally considered too hostile. Combined with the fact that spectrum is a scarce resource and interference from other users, this requirement calls for means to increase spectral efficiency radically and to improve link reliability. However, the research activities carried out in the last decade have shown that it is a suitable technology for a large number of applications. Motivated by the relevant impact of PLC on IoT, this paper proposed a cooperative spectrum allocation in IoT-oriented narrowband PLC networks using an iterative water-filling algorithm.
Information Systems in Distributed Environment (ISDE) is becoming a prominent standard in this globalization era due to advancement in information and communication technologies. The advent of the internet has supported Distributed Software Development (DSD) by introducing new concepts and opportunities, resulting in benefits such as scalability, flexibility, interdependence, reduced cost, resource pools, and usage tracking. The distributed development of information systems as well as their deployment and operation in distributed environments impose new challenges for software organizations and can lead to business advantages. In distributed environments, business units collaborate across time zones, organizational boundaries, work cultures and geographical distances, something that ultimately has led to an increasing diversification and growing complexity of cooperation among units. The real-world practice of developing, deployment and operation of information systems in globally distributed projects has been viewed from various perspectives, though technical and engineering in conjunction with managerial and organizational viewpoints have dominated the researcher’s attention so far. Successful participation in distributed environments, however, is ultimately a matter of the participants understanding and exploiting the particularities of their respective local contexts at specific points in time and exploring practical solutions through the local resources available.
This special issue of the Computer standards & interfaces journal therefore includes papers received from the public call for papers and extended and improved versions of those papers that were selected from the best of the International Workshop on Information Systems in Distributed Environment (ISDE 2014). It aims to serve as a forum to bring together academics, researchers, practitioners and students in the field of distributed information system, by presenting novel developments and lesson learned from real world cases, and to promote the exchange of ideas, discussion and advancement in these areas.
The very first International Workshop on Software-intensive Business: Start-ups, Ecosystems and Platforms (SiBW 2018) was held in Espoo (Greater Helsinki), Finland on December 3rd, 2018 – just a day before SLUSH 2018, the world’s biggest startup event. Thanks to the collaboration with the organizers of SLUSH, many of the software-intensive business researchers and practitioners took part also in this event.
The international workshop gathered together 35 registered attendees, from Sweden, Germany, Latvia, Finland, Italy and the Netherlands representing both academia as well as industry. The event itself was sponsored by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland and the workshop was organized by the newly founded Software-intensive Business research community together with Software Startup Research Network (SSRN).
Business process models provide a considerable number of benefits for enterprises and organizations, but the creation of such models is costly and time-consuming, which slows down the organizational adoption of business process modeling. Social paradigms pave new ways for business process modeling by integrating stakeholders and leveraging knowledge sources. However, empirical research about the impact of social paradigms on costs of business process modeling is sparse. A better understanding of their impact could help to reduce the cost of business process modeling and improve decision-making on BPM activities. The paper constributes to this field by reporting about an empirical investigation via survey research on the perceived influence of different cost factors among experts. Our results indicate that different cost components, as well as the use of social paradigms, influence cost.
Social media usage in business-to-business sales : conceptualization, antecedents, and outcomes
(2015)
In recent years, the rise of social media received significant importance in marketing research. Social media applications now provide executives with a raft of new options. Consequently, interfaces to social media platforms have also been integrated into Business to-Business (B2B) salesforce applications, although very little is as yet known about their usage and general impact on B2B sales performance. This paper evaluates 1) the conceptualization of social media usage in a dyadic B2B relationship; 2) the effects of a more differentiated usage construct on customer satisfaction; 3) antecedents of social media usage on multiple levels; and 4) the effectiveness of social media usage for different types of customers. The framework presented here is tested cross-industry against data collected from dyadic buyer seller relationships in the IT service industry. The results elucidate the preconditions and the impact of social media usage strategies in B2B sales relations.
In recent years, the rise of social media received significant importance in marketing research and practice. Consequently, interfaces to social media platforms have also been integrated into Business-to-Business (B2B) salesforce applications, although very little is as yet known about their usage and general impact on B2B sales performance. This paper evaluates 1) the conceptualization of social media usage in dyadic B2B relationships; 2) the effects of a more differentiated usage construct on customer satisfaction; 3) antecedents of social media usage on multiple levels; and 4) the effectiveness of social media usage for different types of cus-tomers. The framework presented here is tested cross-industry against data collected from dyadic buyer-seller relationships in the IT service industry. The results elucidate the precondi-tions and the impact of social media usage strategies in B2B sales relations.
The digital transformation is today’s dominant business transformation having a strong influence on how digital services and products are designed in a service-dominant way. A popular underlying theory of value creation and economic exchange that is known as the service-dominant (S-D) logic can be connected to many successful digital business models. However, S-D logic by itself is abstract. Companies cannot directly use it as an instrument for business model innovation and design in an easy way. To address this a comprehensive ideation method based on S-D logic is proposed, called service-dominant design (SDD). SDD is aimed at supporting firms in the transition to a service- and value-oriented perspective. The method provides a simplified way to structure the ideation process based on four model components. Each component consists of practical implications, auxiliary questions and visualization techniques that were derived from a literature review, a use case evaluation of digital mobility and a focus group discussion. SDD represents a first step of having a toolset that can support established companies in the process of service- and value-orientation as part of their digital transformation efforts.
What might the attendee be able to do after being in your session?
Our work shows how to connect intra-operative devices via IEEE 11073 Service-oriented Device Connectivity (SDC).
Description of the Problem or Gap
Standardized device communication is essential for interoperability, availability of device data, and therefore for the intelligent operating room (OR) and arising solutions. The SDC standard was developed to make information from medical devices available in a uniform manner and enable interoperability. Existing devices are rarely SDC-capable and need interfaces to be interoperable via SDC.
Methods: What did you do to address the problem or gap?
We conceived an SDC-based architecture consisting of a service provider and service consumer. In our concept, the service provider is connected to the medical device and capable to translate the proprietary protocol of the device into SDC and vice versa. The service consumer is used to request or send information via the SDC protocol to the service provider and can function as a uniform bidirectional interface (e.g. for displaying or controlling). This concept was exemplarily demonstrated with the patient monitor MX800 of Philips to retrieve the device data (e.g. vital parameters) via SDC and partly for the operating light marLED X of KLS Martin Group.
Results: What was the outcome(s) of what you did to address the problem or gap?
The patient monitor MX800 was connected to a Raspberry Pi (RPi) via LAN, on which the service provider is running. The python script on the RPi establishes a connection to the monitor and translates incoming and outgoing messages from the proprietary protocol to SDC and vice versa to/from the service consumer. The service consumer is running on a laptop and acts as a simulation for different kinds of systems that want to get vital parameters or other information from the patient monitor. The operating light marLED X was connected to an RPi via USB-to-RS232. A python script on the RPi establishes a connection to the light and makes it possible via proprietary commands to get information of the light (e.g. status) and to control it (e.g. toggle the light, increment the intensity). A translation to SDC is not integrated yet.
Discussion of Results
Our practical implementation shows that medical devices can be accessed via external connections to get device data and control the device via commands. The example SDC implementation of the patient monitor MX800 makes it possible to request its data via the standardized communication protocol SDC. This is also possible for the operating light marLED X if its proprietary protocol is analyzed to be translatable to/from SDC. This would allow to control the device from an external system, or automatically depending on the status of the ongoing procedure. The advantage is, that existing intra-operative devices can be extended by a service provider which is capable of translating the proprietary protocol of the device in SDC and vice versa. This enables interoperability and an intelligent OR that, for example, is aware of all devices, their status, and data and can use this information to optimally support the surgeons and their team (e.g. provision of information, automated documentation). This interoperability allows that future innovations merely need to understand the SDC protocol instead of all vendor-dependent communication protocols.
Conclusion
Standardized device communication is essential to reach interoperability, and therefore intelligent ORs. Our contribution addresses the possibility of subsequently making medical devices SDC-capable. This may eliminate the need of understanding all the different proprietary protocols when developing new innovative solutions for the OR.
Scheduled flexibility and individualization of knowledge transfer in foundations of computer science
(2017)
The opening of the German higher education system for new target groups involves a heterogeneous composition of students as never before and face up the universities to new challenges. Due to different educational biographies, the students don't show a homogeneous level of knowledge. Furthermore, their access to course content and their individual learning methods are very diverse. The existing lack of knowledge and the very unequal study speed have a significant influence on the learning behavior and learning motivation. During the first semesters, the dropout rate is appreciably higher. The reform project gives an overview of a didactic restructuring from a formerly conventional teaching and learning concept to a stronger combination of digital offers, combined with classical lectures in the basic modules of computer science. The teaching content is adjusted to the individual requirements and knowledge. Students with different previous knowledge get the possibility to increase their knowledge in different levels of abstraction. The aim of the reform project has to point out the possibilities, also the challenges of the digital process in higher education. At the same time the question has to be explored, how far does an accompanied and self-directed learning in own speed and in own individual depth of knowledge have a positive impact on the motivation and on the study success of a learner.
Rotating machinery occupies a predominant place in many industrial applications. However, rotating machines are often encountered with severe vibration problems. The measurement of these machines’ vibrations signal is of particular importance since it plays a crucial role in predictive maintenance. When the vibrations are too high, they often cause fatigue failure. They announce an unexpected stop or break and, consequently, a significant loss of productivity or an attack on the personnel’s safety. Therefore, fault identification at early stages will significantly enhance the machine’s health and significantly reduce maintenance costs. Although considerable efforts have been made to master the field of machine diagnostics, the usual signal processing methods still present several drawbacks. This paper examines the rotating machinery condition monitoring in the time and frequency domains. It also provides a framework for the diagnosis process based on machine learning by analyzing the vibratory signals.
Revenue management information systems are very important in the hospitality sector. Revenue decisions can be better prepared based on different information from different information systems and decision strategies. There is a lack of research about the usage of such systems in small and medium-sized hotels and architectural configurations. Our paper empirically shows the current development of revenue information systems. Furthermore, we define future developments and requirements to improve such systems and the architectural base.
The recovery of our body and brain from fatigue directly depends on the quality of sleep, which can be determined from the results of a sleep study. The classification of sleep stages is the first step of this study and includes the measurement of vital data and their further processing. The non-invasive sleep analysis system is based on a hardware sensor network of 24 pressure sensors providing sleep phase detection. The pressure sensors are connected to an energy-efficient microcontroller via a system-wide bus. A significant difference between this system and other approaches is the innovative way in which the sensors are placed under the mattress. This feature facilitates the continuous use of the system without any noticeable influence on the sleeping person. The system was tested by conducting experiments that recorded the sleep of various healthy young people. Results indicate the potential to capture respiratory rate and body movement.
Context: Currently, most companies apply approaches for product roadmapping that are based on the assumption that the future is highly predicable. However, nowadays companies are facing the challenge of increasing market dynamics, rapidly evolving technologies, and shifting user expectations. Together with the adaption of lean and agile practices it makes it increasingly difficult to plan and predict upfront which products, services or features will satisfy the needs of the customers. Therefore, they are struggling with their ability to provide product roadmaps that fit into dynamic and uncertain market environments and that can be used together with lean and agile software development practices.
Objective: To gain a better understanding of modern product roadmapping processes, this paper aims to identify suitable processes for the creation and evolution of product roadmaps in dynamic and uncertain market environments.
Method: We performed a Grey Literature Review (GLR) according to the guidelines from Garousi et al.
Results: 32 approaches to product roadmapping were identified. Typical characteristics of these processes are the strong connection between the product roadmap and the product vision, an emphasis on stakeholder alignment, the definition of business and customer goals as part of the roadmapping process, a high degree of flexibility with respect to reaching these goals, and the inclusion of validation activities in the roadmapping process. An overall goal of nearly all approaches is to avoid waste by early reducing development and business risks. From the list of the 32 approaches found, four representative roadmapping processes are described in detail.
Predictive maintenance information systems: the underlying conditions and technological aspects
(2020)
Predictive maintenance has the potential to improve the reliability of production and service provisioning. However, there is little knowledge about the proper implementation of predictive maintenance in research and practice. Therefore, we conducted a multi-case study and investigated underlying conditions and technological aspects for implementing a predictive maintenance system and where it leads to. We found that predictive maintenance initiatives are triggered by severe impacts of failures on revenue and profit. Furthermore, successful predictive maintenance initiatives require that pre-conditions are fulfilled: Data must be available and accessible. Very important is also the support by the management. We identified four factors important for the implementation of predictive maintenance. The integration of data is highly facilitated by Cloud-based mechanisms. The detection of events is enabled by advanced analytics. The execution of predictive maintenance operations is supported by data-driven process automation and visualization.
Public transport maps are typically designed in a way to support route finding tasks for passengers while they also provide an overview about stations, metro lines, and city-specific attractions. Most of those maps are designed as a static representation, maybe placed in a metro station or printed in a travel guide. In this paper we describe a dynamic, interactive public transport map visualization enhanced by additional views for the dynamic passenger data on different levels of temporal granularity. Moreover, we also allow extra statistical information in form of density plots, calendar-based visualizations, and line graphs. All this information is linked to the contextual metro map to give a viewer insights into the relations between time points and typical routes taken by the passengers. We illustrate the usefulness of our interactive visualization by applying it to the railway system of Hamburg in Germany while also taking into account the extra passenger data. As another indication for the usefulness of the interactively enhanced metro maps we conducted a user experiment with 20 participants.
This thesis studies concurrency control and composition of transactions in computing environments with long living transactions where local data autonomy of transactions is indispensable. This kind of computing architecture is referred to as a Disconnected System where reads are segregated -disconnected- from writes enabling local data autonomy. Disconnecting reads from writes is inspired by Bertrand Meyer's "Command Query Separation" pattern. This thesis provides a simple yet precise definition for a Disconnected System with a focus on transaction management. Concerning concurrency control, transaction management frameworks implement a'one concurrency control mechanism fits all needs strategy'. This strategy, however, does not consider specific characteristics of data access. The thesis shows the limitations of this strategy if transaction load increases, transactions are long lived, local data autonomy is required, and serializability is aimed at isolation level. For example, in optimistic mechanisms the number of aborts suddenly increases if load increases. In pessimistic mechanisms locking causes long blocking times and is prone to deadlocks. These findings are not new and a common solution used by database vendors is to reduce the isolation. This thesis proposes the usage of a novel approach. It suggests choosing the concurrency control mechanism according to the semantics of data access of a certain data item. As a result a transaction may execute under several concurrency control mechanisms. The idea is to introduce lanes similar to a motorway where each lane is dedicated to a certain class of vehicle with the same characteristics. Whereas disconnecting reads and writes sets the traffic's direction, the semantics of data access defines the lanes. This thesis introduces four concurrency control classes capturing the semantics of data access and each of them has an associated tailored concurrency control mechanism. Class O (the optimistic class) implements a first-committer-wins strategy, class R (the reconciliation class) implements a first-n-committers-win strategy, class P (the pessimistic class) implements a first-reader-wins strategy, and class E (the escrow class) implements a first-n-readers-win strategy. In contrast to solutions that adapt the concurrency control mechanism during runtime, the idea is to classify data during the design phase of the application and adapt the classification only in certain cases at runtime. The result of the thesis is a transaction management framework called O|R|P|E. A performance study based on the TPC-C benchmark shows that O|R|P|E has a better performance and a considerably higher commit rate than other solutions. Moreover, the thesis shows that in O|R|P|E aborts are due to application specific limitations, i.e., constraint violations and not due to serialization conflicts. This is a result of considering the semantics.
Urban platforms are essential for smart and sustainable city planning and operation. Today they are mostly designed to handle and connect large urban data sets from very different domains. Modelling and optimisation functionalities are usually not part of the cities software infrastructure. However, they are considered crucial for transformation scenario development and optimised smart city operation. The work discusses software architecture concepts for such urban platforms and presents case study results on the building sector modelling, including urban data analysis and visualisation. Results from a case study in New York are presented to demonstrate the implementation status.
On the design of an urban data and modeling platform and its application to urban district analyses
(2020)
An integrated urban platform is the essential software infrastructure for smart, sustainable and resilitent city planning, operation and maintenance. Today such platforms are mostly designed to handle and analyze large and heterogeneous urban data sets from very different domains. Modeling and optimization functionalities are usually not part of the software concepts. However, such functionalities are considered crucial by the authors to develop transformation scenarios and to optimized smart city operation. An urban platform needs to handle multiple scales in the time and spatial domain, ranging from long term population and land use change to hourly or sub-hourly matching of renewable energy supply and urban energy demand.
The energy turnaround, digitalization and decreasing revenues forces enterprises in the energy domain to develop new business models. Business models for renewable energy are compound on different logic than business models for larger scale power plants. Following a design science research approach, we examined the business models of three enterprises in the energy domain in a first step. We identified that these business models result in complex ecosystems with multiple actors and difficult relationships between them. One cause is the fast changing and complicated state regulation in Germany. In order to solve the problem, we captured together with the partners of the enterprises the requirements in a second phase. Further we developed the prototype Business Model Configurator (BMConfig) based on the e3Value Ontology on the metamodelling platform ADOxx. We demonstrate the feasibility of our approach in business model of energy efficiency service based on smart meter data.
Companies are continuously changing their strategy, processes, and information systems to benefit from the digital transformation. Controlling the digital architecture and governance is the fundamental goal. Enterprise Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC) systems are vital for managing digital risks threatening in modern enterprises from many different angles. The most significant constituent to GRC systems is the definition of controls that is implemented on different layers of a digital Enterprise Architecture (EA). As part of the compliant aspect of GRC, the effectiveness of these controls is assessed and reported to relevant management bodies within the enterprise. In this paper, we present a metamodel which links controls to the affected elements of a digital EA and supplies a way of expressing associated assessment techniques and results. We complement a metamodel with an expository instantiation of a control compliance cockpit in an international insurance enterprise.
This book showcases new and innovative approaches to biometric data capture and analysis, focusing especially on those that are characterized by non-intrusiveness, reliable prediction algorithms, and high user acceptance. It comprises the peer-reviewed papers from the international workshop on the subject that was held in Ancona, Italy, in October 2014 and featured sessions on ICT for health care, biometric data in automotive and home applications, embedded systems for biometric data analysis, biometric data analysis: EMG and ECG, and ICT for gait analysis. The background to the book is the challenge posed by the prevention and treatment of common, widespread chronic diseases in modern, aging societies. Capture of biometric data is a cornerstone for any analysis and treatment strategy. The latest advances in sensor technology allow accurate data measurement in a non-intrusive way, and in many cases it is necessary to provide online monitoring and real-time data capturing to support a patient’s prevention plans or to allow medical professionals to access the patient’s current status. This book will be of value to all with an interest in this expanding field.
Managing software process evolution : traditional, agile and beyond - how to handle process change
(2016)
This book focuses on the design, development, management, governance and application of evolving software processes that are aligned with changing business objectives, such as expansion to new domains or shifting to global production. In the context of an evolving business world, it examines the complete software process lifecycle, from the initial definition of a product to its systematic improvement. In doing so, it addresses difficult problems, such as how to implement processes in highly regulated domains or where to find a suitable notation system for documenting processes, and provides essential insights and tips to help readers manage process evolutions. And last but not least, it provides a wealth of examples and cases on how to deal with software evolution in practice.
Reflecting these topics, the book is divided into three parts. Part 1 focuses on software business transformation and addresses the questions of which process(es) to use and adapt, and how to organize process improvement programs. Subsequently, Part 2 mainly addresses process modeling. Lastly, Part 3 collects concrete approaches, experiences, and recommendations that can help to improve software processes, with a particular focus on specific lifecycle phases.
This book is aimed at anyone interested in understanding and optimizing software development tasks at their organization. While the experiences and ideas presented will be useful for both those readers who are unfamiliar with software process improvement and want to get an overview of the different aspects of the topic, and for those who are experts with many years of experience, it particularly targets the needs of researchers and Ph.D. students in the area of software and systems engineering or information systems who study advanced topics concerning the organization and management of (software development) projects and process improvements projects.
Knowledge is an important resource, whose transfer is still not completely understood. The underlying belief of this thesis is that knowledge cannot be transferred directly from one person to another but must be converted for the transfer and therefore is subject to loss of knowledge and misunderstanding. This thesis proposes a new model for knowledge transfer and empirically evaluates this model. The model is based on the belief that knowledge must be encoded by the sender to transfer it to the receiver, who has to decode the message to obtain knowledge.
To prepare for the model this thesis provides an overview about models for knowledge transfer and factors that influence knowledge transfer. The proposed theoretical model for knowledge transfer is implemented in a prototype to demonstrate its applicability. The model describes the influence of the four layers, namely code, syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic layers, on the encoding and decoding of the message. The precise description of the influencing factors and the overlapping knowledge from sender and receiver facilitate its implementation.
The application area of the layered model for knowledge transfer was chosen to be business process modelling. Business processes incorporate an important knowledge resource of an organisation as they describe the procedures for the production of products and services. The implementation in a software prototype allows a precise description of the process by adding semantic to the simple business process modelling language used.
This thesis contributes to the body of knowledge by providing a new model for knowledge transfer, which shows the process of knowledge transfer in greater detail and highlights influencing factors. The implementation in the area of business process modelling reveals the support provided by the model. An expert evaluation indicates that the implementation of the proposed model supports knowledge transfer in business process modelling. The results of the qualitative evaluation are supported by the findings of a qualitative evaluation, performed as a quasi-experiment with a pre-test/post-test design and two experimental groups and one control group. Mann-Whitney U tests indicated that the group that used the tool that implemented the layered model performed significantly better in terms of completeness (the degree of completeness achieved in the transfer) in comparison with the group that used a standard BPM tool (Z = 3.057, p = 0.002, r = 0.59) and the control group that used pen and paper (Z = 3.859, p < 0.001, r = 0.72). The experiment indicates that the implementation of the layered model supports the creation of a business process and facilitates a more precise representation.
An autonomous vehicle is a robotic vehicle with decision and action capability capable of performing assigned tasks without or with minimal human intervention. Autonomous cars have been in development for many years. The Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE International) published in 2014 a classification in five levels of driving automation, with level 0 corresponding to completely manual driving, and level 5 to an ideal dream where the vehicle would be able to navigate entirely autonomously for all missions and in all environments. This work addressed the navigation of an autonomous vehicle in general. We focus on one of the most complex scenarios of the road network and crossing of road intersections. In this paper, the critical features of autonomous intelligent vehicles are reviewed. Furthermore, the associated problems are presented, and the most advanced solutions are derived. This article aims to allow a novice in this field to understand the different facets of localization and perception problems for autonomous vehicles.
In recent decades, it can be observed that a steady increase in the volume of tourism is a stable trend. To offer travel opportunities to all groups, it is also necessary to prepare offers for people in need of long-term care or people with disabilities. One of the ways to improve accessibility could be digital technologies, which could help in planning as well as in carrying out trips. In the work presented, a study of barriers was first conducted, which led to selecting technologies for a test setup after analysis. The main focus was on a mobile app with travel information and 360° tours. The evaluation results showed that both technologies could increase accessibility, but some essential aspects (such as usability, completeness, relevance, etc.) need to be considered when implementing them.
Internet of Things (IoT) provides a strong platform for computer users to connect objects, devices, and people to the Internet for exchanging or sharing of information with each other. IoT is growing rapidly and is expected to adapt to disciplines such as manufacturing, agriculture, healthcare, and robotics. Furthermore, the new concept of IoT is proposed and shown, especially for robotics areas as Internet of Robotics Things (IoRT). IoRT is a mixed structure of diverse technologies such as cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. However, to promote and realize IoRT, digitization and digital transformation should be proceeded and implemented in the robotics enterprise. In this paper, we propose and architecture framework for IoRT-based digital platforms an verify it using a planned case in a global robotics enterprise. The associated challenges and future research directions in this field are also presented.
The impact of stress of every human being has become a serious problem. Reported impact on persons are a higher rate or health disorders like heart problems, obesity, asthma, diabetes, depressions and many others. An individual in a stressful situation has to deal with altered cognition as well as an affected decision making skill and problem solving. This could lead to a higher risk for accidents in dynamic environments such as automotive. Different papers faced the estimation as well as prediction of drivers’ stress level during driving. Another important question is not only the stress level of the driver himself, but also the influence on and of a group of other drivers in the near area. This paper proposes a system, which determines a group of drivers in a near area as clusters and it derives or computes the individual stress level. This information will be analyzed to generate a stress map, which represents a graphical view about road section with a higher stress influence. Aggregated data can be used to generate navigation routes with a lower stress influence as well as recommend driving behavior to decrease stress influenced driving as well as improve road safety.
This book contains the proceedings of the KES International conferences on Innovation in Medicine and Healthcare (KES-InMed-19) and Intelligent Interactive Multimedia Systems and Services (KES-IIMSS-19), held on 17–19 June 2019 and co-located in St. Julians, on the island of Malta, as part of the KES Smart Digital Futures 2019 multi theme conference.
The major areas covered by KES-InMed-19 include: Digital IT Architecture in Healthcare; Advanced ICT for Medical and Healthcare; Biomedical Engineering, Trends, Research and Technologies and Healthcare Support System. The major areas covered by KES-IIMSS-19 were: Interactive Technologies; Artificial Intelligence and Data Analytics; Intelligent Services and Architectures and Applications.
This book is of use to researchers in these vibrant areas, managers, industrialists and anyone wishing to gain an overview of the latest research in these fields.
The volume includes papers presented at the International KES Conference on Human Centred Intelligent Systems 2023 (KES HCIS 2023), held in Rome, Italy on June 14–16, 2023. This book highlights new trends and challenges in intelligent systems, which play an important part in the digital transformation of many areas of science and practice. It includes papers offering a deeper understanding of the human-centred perspective on artificial intelligence, of intelligent value co-creation, ethics, value-oriented digital models, transparency, and intelligent digital architectures and engineering to support digital services and intelligent systems, the transformation of structures in digital businesses and intelligent systems based on human practices, as well as the study of interaction and the co-adaptation of humans and systems.
The volume includes papers presented at the International KES Conference on Human Centred Intelligent Systems 2022 (KES HCIS 2022), held in Rhodes, Greece on June 20–22, 2022. This book highlights new trends and challenges in intelligent systems, which play an important part in the digital transformation of many areas of science and practice. It includes papers offering a deeper understanding of the human-centred perspective on artificial intelligence, of intelligent value co-creation, ethics, value-oriented digital models, transparency, and intelligent digital architectures and engineering to support digital services and intelligent systems, the transformation of structures in digital businesses and intelligent systems based on human practices, as well as the study of interaction and the co-adaptation of humans and systems.
This book highlights new trends and challenges in intelligent systems, which play an essential part in the digital transformation of many areas of science and practice. It includes papers offering a deeper understanding of the human-centred perspective on artificial intelligence, of intelligent value co-creation, ethics, value-oriented digital models, transparency, and intelligent digital architectures and engineering to support digital services and intelligent systems, the transformation of structures in digital business and intelligent systems based on human practices, as well as the study of interaction and co-adaptation of humans and systems. All papers were originally presented at the International KES Conference on Human Centred Intelligent Systems 2021 (KES HCIS 2021) held on June 14–16, 2021 in the KES Virtual Conference Centre.
his book highlights new trends and challenges in intelligent systems, which play an important part in the digital transformation of many areas of science and practice. It includes papers offering a deeper understanding of the human-centred perspective on artificial intelligence, of intelligent value co-creation, ethics, value-oriented digital models, transparency, and intelligent digital architectures and engineering to support digital services and intelligent systems, the transformation of structures in digital businesses and intelligent systems based on human practices, as well as the study of interaction and the co-adaptation of humans and systems. All papers were originally presented at the International KES Conference on Human Centred Intelligent Systems 2020 (KES HCIS 2020), held on June 17–19, 2020, in Split, Croatia.
The goal of the presented project is to develop the concept of home e-health centers for barrier-free and cross-border telemedicine. AAL technologies are already present on the market but there is still a gap to close until they can be used for ordinary patient needs. The general idea needs to be accompanied by new services, which should be brought together in order to provide a full coverage of service for the users. Sleep and stress were chosen as predominant influence in the population. The executed scientific study of available home devices analyzing sleep has provided the necessary to select appropriate devices. The first choice for the project implementation is the device EMFIT QS+. This equipment provides a part of a complete system that a home telemedical hospital can provide at a level of precision and communication with internal and/or external health services.
In many cases continuous monitoring of vital signals is required and low intrusiveness is an important requirement. Incorporating monitoring systems in the hospital or home bed could have benefits for patients and caregivers. The objective of this work is the definition of a measurement protocol and the creation of a data set of measurements using commercial and low-cost prototypes devices to estimate heart rate and breathing rate. The experimental data will be used to compare results achieved by the devices and to develop algorithms for feature extraction of vital signals.
Gamification is one of the recognized methods of motivating people in various life processes, and it has spread to many spheres of life, including healthcare. This article proposes a system design for long-term care patients using the method mentioned. The proposed system aims to increase patient engagement in the treatment and rehabilitation process via gamification. Literature research on available and earlier proposed systems was conducted to develop a suited system design. The primary target group includes bedridden patients and a sedentary lifestyle (predominantly lying in bed). One of the main criteria for selecting a suitable option was its contactless realization for the mentioned target groups in long-term care cases. As a result, we developed the system design for hardware and software that could prevent bedsores and other health problems from occurring because of low activity. The proposed design can be tested in hospitals, nursing homes, and rehabilitation centers.
This book discusses important topics for engineering and managing software startups, such as how technical and business aspects are related, which complications may arise and how they can be dealt with. It also addresses the use of scientific, engineering, and managerial approaches to successfully develop software products in startup companies.
The book covers a wide range of software startup phenomena, and includes the knowledge, skills, and capabilities required for startup product development; team capacity and team roles; technical debt; minimal viable products; startup metrics; common pitfalls and patterns observed; as well as lessons learned from startups in Finland, Norway, Brazil, Russia and USA. All results are based on empirical findings, and the claims are backed by evidence and concrete observations, measurements and experiments from qualitative and quantitative research, as is common in empirical software engineering.
The book helps entrepreneurs and practitioners to become aware of various phenomena, challenges, and practices that occur in real-world startups, and provides insights based on sound research methodologies presented in a simple and easy-to-read manner. It also allows students in business and engineering programs to learn about the important engineering concepts and technical building blocks of a software startup. It is also suitable for researchers at different levels in areas such as software and systems engineering, or information systems who are studying advanced topics related to software business.