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The tale of 1000 cores: an evaluation of concurrency control on real(ly) large multi-socket hardware
(2020)
In this paper, we set out the goal to revisit the results of “Starring into the Abyss [...] of Concurrency Control with [1000] Cores” and analyse in-memory DBMSs on today’s large hardware. Despite the original assumption of the authors, today we do not see single-socket CPUs with 1000 cores. Instead multi-socket hardware made its way into production data centres. Hence, we follow up on this prior work with an evaluation of the characteristics of concurrency control schemes on real production multi-socket hardware with 1568 cores. To our surprise, we made several interesting findings which we report on in this paper.
In this paper, we present a new approach for achieving robust performance of data structures making it easier to reuse the same design for different hardware generations but also for different workloads. To achieve robust performance, the main idea is to strictly separate the data structure design from the actual strategies to execute access operations and adjust the actual execution strategies by means of so-called configurations instead of hard-wiring the execution strategy into the data structure. In our evaluation we demonstrate the benefits of this configuration approach for individual data structures as well as complex OLTP workloads.
Additive Manufacturing is increasingly used in the industrial sector as a result of continuous development. In the Production Planning and Control (PPC) system, AM enables an agile response in the area of detailed and process planning, especially for a large number of plants. For this purpose, a concept for a PPC system for AM is presented, which takes into account the requirements for integration into the operational enterprise software system. The technical applicability will be demonstrated by individual implemented sections. The presented solution approach promises a more efficient utilization of the plants and a more elastic use.
While many maintainability metrics have been explicitly designed for service-based systems, tool-supported approaches to automatically collect these metrics are lacking. Especially in the context of microservices, decentralization and technological heterogeneity may pose challenges for static analysis. We therefore propose the modular and extensible RAMA approach (RESTful API Metric Analyzer) to calculate such metrics from machine-readable interface descriptions of RESTful services. We also provide prototypical tool support, the RAMA CLI, which currently parses the formats OpenAPI, RAML, and WADL and calculates 10 structural service-based metrics proposed in scientific literature. To make RAMA measurement results more actionable, we additionally designed a repeatable benchmark for quartile-based threshold ranges (green, yellow, orange, red). In an exemplary run, we derived thresholds for all RAMA CLI metrics from the interface descriptions of 1,737 publicly available RESTful APIs. Researchers and practitioners can use RAMA to evaluate the maintainability of RESTful services or to support the empirical evaluation of new service interface metrics.
Scenario-based analysis is a comprehensive technique to evaluate software quality and can provide more detailed insights than e.g. maintainability metrics. Since such methods typically require significant manual effort, we designed a lightweight scenario-based evolvability evaluation method. To increase efficiency and to limit assumptions, the method exclusively targets service- and microservice-based systems. Additionally, we implemented web-based tool support for each step. Method and tool were also evaluated with a survey (N=40) that focused on change effort estimation techniques and hands-on interviews (N=7) that focused on usability. Based on the evaluation results, we improved method and tool support further. To increase reuse and transparency, the web-based application as well as all survey and interview artifacts are publicly available on GitHub. In its current state, the tool-supported method is ready for first industry case studies.
The shift of populations to cities is creating challenges in many respects, thus leading to increasing demand for smart solutions of urbanization problems. Smart city applications range from technical and social to economic and ecological. The main focus of this work is to provide a systematic literature review of smart city research to answer two main questions: (1) How is current research on smart cities structured? And (2) What directions are relevant for future research on smart cities? To answer these research questions, a text-mining approach is applied to a large number of publications. This provides an overview and gives insights into relevant dimensions of smart city research. Although the main dimensions of research are already described in the literature, an evaluation of the relevance of such dimensions is missing. Findings suggest that the dimensions of environment and governance are popular, while the dimension of economy has received only limited attention.
In dieser Ausarbeitung wird auf Visualisierungsmöglichkeiten von neuronalen Netzen eingegangen. Ein neuronales Netz scheint zuerst nicht von außen einsehbar und ist somit für viele eine Blackbox. Häufig genutzte Python-Bibliotheken, zum Beispiel TensorFlow, werden vorgestellt und deren Stärken wie auch Schwächen präsentiert. Anhand dieser werden bereits bestehende Visualisierungen gezeigt und ihr derzeitiger Einsatz wird erläutert. Durch einen Vergleich soll ersichtlich werden, welche Bibliothek am meisten Daten während des Trainings liefert, damit diese Informationen weiter verarbeitet werden. Diese Daten sollen so visualisiert werden, dass sie bei der Entwicklung eines neuronalen Netzes unterstützend sind. Ziel ist es, auf die Möglichkeiten einzugehen, welche geboten werden können. Durch eine Vereinfachung des Debuggings neuronaler Netze sollen weiterführende Entwicklungen in diese Richtung unterstützt werden.
In diesem Beitrag wird ein neuer Ansatz vorgestellt, welcher eine schwerkraftreduzierte Navigation innerhalb einer VR-Umgebung erlaubt, wie beispielsweise ein simulierter Mondspaziergang. Zur Navigation in der VR-Umgebung wird der Cyberith Virtualizer ein-gesetzt. Die Schwerkraftsimulation erfolgt mittels eines einstellbaren Gurtsystems, das anelastischen Seilen aufgehängt wird und abgestufte Schwerkraftkompensationen erlaubt. Als Umgebung wurde ein Raumschiffszenario sowie eine Mondoberfläche generiert. Hier sind in der aktuellen Anwendung einfache Interaktionen möglich. In Anlehnung an existierende Gravity Offload Systeme wird die Lösung ViRGOS bezeichnet. ViRGOS wurde bereits bei verschiedenen Besuchsterminen und Hochschulevents eingesetzt, so dass erste Rückmeldungen von Nutzern eingeholt werden konnten.
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.
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.
The ballistocardiography is a technique that measures the heart rate from the mechanical vibrations of the body due to the heart movement. In this work a novel noninvasive device placed under the mattress of a bed estimates the heart rate using the ballistocardiography. Different algorithms for heart rate estimation have been developed.
At DBKDA 2019, we demonstrated that StrongDBMS with simple but rigorous optimistic algorithms, provides better performance in situations of high concurrency than major commercial database management systems (DBMS). The demonstration was convincing but the reasons for its success were not fully analysed. There is a brief account of the results below. In this short contribution, we wish to discuss the reasons for the results. The analysis leads to a strong criticism of all DBMS algorithms based on locking, and based on these results, it is not fanciful to suggest that it is time to re-engineer existing DBMS.
3D assisted 2D face recognition involves the process of reconstructing 3D faces from 2D images and solving the problem of face recognition in 3D. To facilitate the use of deep neural networks, a 3D face, normally represented as a 3D mesh of vertices and its corresponding surface texture, is remapped to image-like square isomaps by a conformal mapping. Based on previous work, we assume that face recognition benefits more from texture. In this work, we focus on the surface texture and its discriminatory information content for recognition purposes. Our approach is to prepare a 3D mesh, the corresponding surface texture and the original 2D image as triple input for the recognition network, to show that 3D data is useful for face recognition. Texture enhancement methods to control the texture fusion process are introduced and we adapt data augmentation methods. Our results show that texture-map-based face recognition can not only compete with state-of-the-art systems under the same precon ditions but also outperforms standard 2D methods from recent years.
Detecting semantic similarities between sentences is still a challenge today due to the ambiguity of natural languages. In this work, we propose a simple approach to identifying semantically similar questions by combining the strengths of word embeddings and Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs). In addition, we demonstrate how the cosine similarity metric can be used to effectively compare feature vectors. Our network is trained on the Quora dataset, which contains over 400k question pairs. We experiment with different embedding approaches such as Word2Vec, Fasttext, and Doc2Vec and investigate the effects these approaches have on model performance. Our model achieves competitive results on the Quora dataset and complements the well-established evidence that CNNs can be utilized for paraphrase recognition tasks.
Medizinprodukte sind Gegenstände, Stoffe oder Software mit medizinischer Zweckbestimmung für die Anwendung am Menschen. Diese werden von Medizinprodukteherstellern entwickelt und auf den Markt eingeführt. Da die falsche Anwendung von Medizinprodukten bei Menschen zu Verletzbarkeit des menschlichen Körpers führen kann, ist eine angemessene Qualität der Medizinprodukte zu gewährtleisten. Um die Sicherstellung der Qualität einzuhalten, sind Medizinproduktehersteller verpflichtet, sich an die Medizinprodukteverordnung (MDR) zu halten. Für risikoreiche Produkte ist ergänzend die Nutzung eines Qualitätsmanagementsystems (QMS) verpflichtend. Dieses steuert die Struktur, Verantwortlichkeiten, Verfahren und Prozesse des Unternehmens, die für die Medizinprodukteentwicklung notwendig sind. In Zeiten der Digitalisierung werden Softwarelösungen eingesetzt, um die zeitaufwendigen Dokumentations- und Administrationstätigkeiten im QMS zu reduzieren und die Prozesse zu optimieren. Mit der Einführung einer Software wird ein QMS in der Praxis auch als elektronisches QMS (eQMS) bezeichnet. Weiterhin muss das gesamte QMS mit den Regularien konform sein. Deshalb ist das Ziel dieser Arbeit, mithilfe der regulatorischen Anforderungen herauszuarbeiten, welche Vorgaben bei der Einführung eines eQMS zu beachten sind und wie diese erfüllt werden können. Diese Arbeit bezieht sich auf die regulatorsichen Vorgaben aus der MDR und der ISO 13485. Die Norm beinhaltet Anforderungen an ein QMS von Medizinprodukten.
This document presents a new complete standalone system for a recognition of sleep apnea using signals from the pressure sensors placed under the mattress. The developed hardware part of the system is tuned to filter and to amplify the signal. Its software part performs more accurate signal filtering and identification of apnea events. The overall achieved accuracy of the recognition of apnea occurrence is 91%, with the average measured recognition delay of about 15 seconds, which confirms the suitability of the proposed method for future employment. The main aim of the presented approach is the support of the healthcare system with the cost-efficient tool for recognition of sleep apnea in the home environment.
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.
Autonomous driving is becoming the next big digital disruption in the automotive industry. However, the possibility of integrating autonomous driving vehicles into current transportation systems not only involves technological issues but also requires the acceptance and adoption of users. Therefore, this paper develops a conceptual model for user acceptance of autonomous driving vehicles. The corresponding model is tested through a standardized survey of 470 respondents in Germany. Finally, the findings are discussed in relation to the current developments in the automotive industry, and recommendations for further research are given.
In recent years, the cloud has become an attractive execution environment for parallel applications, which introduces novel opportunities for versatile optimizations. Particularly promising in this context is the elasticity characteristic of cloud environments. While elasticity is well established for client-server applications, it is a fundamentally new concept for parallel applications. However, existing elasticity mechanisms for client-server applications can be applied to parallel applications only to a limited extent. Efficient exploitation of elasticity for parallel applications requires novel mechanisms that take into account the particular runtime characteristics and resource requirements of this application type. To tackle this issue, we propose an elasticity description language. This language facilitates users to define elasticity policies, which specify the elasticity behavior at both cloud infrastructure level and application level. Elasticity at the application level is supported by an adequate programming and execution model, as well as abstractions that comply with the dynamic availability of resources. We present the underlying concepts and mechanisms, as well as the architecture and a prototypical implementation. Furthermore, we illustrate the capabilities of our approach through real-world scenarios.
Vergleichende Analyse des YouTube-Auftritts von privat- und öffentlich-rechtlichen Sendegruppen
(2020)
Lange wurde das Internet als Antagonismus zum Fernsehen gesehen. Es wurde dementsprechend zur Zuschauerrück- bzw. -gewinnung genutzt, was sich allerdings als ineffizient erwies. Inzwischen haben die einzelnen Sendegruppen das Internet jedoch als mediale Erweiterung erkannt und genutzt. Durch diese späte Akzeptanz zeigen sich starke Unterschiede im Umfang und der Vorgehensweise hinsichtlich der Nutzung des Internets als zusätzliches Medium. Am besten lässt sich dies in einem Vergleich in Bezug auf die wichtigste videotechnische Social Media Plattform YouTube darstellen.
In diesem Vergleich sollen die einzelnen Sendegruppen hinsichtlich ihrer wahrgenommenen Vorteile, Nachteile und Attraktivität bezogen auf das Nutzerverhalten und die Nutzermeinung bewertet werden. Die zielgruppenorientierte Optimierung des YouTube-Auftrittes ist von außerordentlich hoher Bedeutung für die zukünftige Marktdurchdringung.
Cloud resources can be dynamically provisioned according to application-specific requirements and are payed on a per-use basis. This gives rise to a new concept for parallel processing: Elastic parallel computations. However, it is still an open research question to which extent parallel applications can benefit from elastic scaling, which requires resource adaptation at runtime and corresponding coordination mechanisms. In this work, we analyze how to address these system-level challenges in the context of developing and operating elastic parallel tree search applications. Based on our findings, we discuss the design and implementation of TASKWORK, a cloud-aware runtime system specifically designed for elastic parallel tree search, which enables the implementation of elastic applications by means of higher-level development frameworks. We show how to implement an elastic parallel branch-and-bound application based on an exemplary development framework and report on our experimental evaluation that also considers several benchmarks for parallel tree search.
Documentation of clinical processes, especially in the perioperative are, is a base requirement for quality of service. Nonetheless, the documentation is a burden for the medical staff since it distracts from the clinical core process. An intuitive and user-friendly documentation system could increase documentation quality and reduce documentation workload. The optimal system solution would know what happened and the person documenting the step would need a single “confirm” button. In many cases, such a linear flow of activities is given as long as only one profession (e.g. anaestesiology, scrub nurse) is considered, but even in such cases, there might be derivations from the linear process flow and further interaction is required.
JumpAR kombiniert die Welt der Augmented Reality (AR) mit dem weltbekannten Jump ’n’ Run Genre in einem Mobile Game. Der Spieler kreiert einen individuellen Spielparcours in seiner realen Umgebung und navigiert seine Spielfigur auf virtuellen Plattformen durch diesen. Der mit Unity entwickelte JumpAR Prototyp wurde nach Umsetzungen der Grundfunktionen und Mechaniken im Rahmen eines Nutzertests analysiert. Die Integration von echten Gegenständen aus dem Umfeld des Spielers führt im Spielfluss zu einer starken Verknüpfung der virtuellen und realen Welt, was eine neue AR-Interaktionsform für Handyspiele darstellt.
Selecting a suitable development method for a specific project context is one of the most challenging activities in process design. Every project is unique and, thus, many context factors have to be considered. Recent research took some initial steps towards statistically constructing hybrid development methods, yet, paid little attention to the peculiarities of context factors influencing method and practice selection. In this paper, we utilize exploratory factor analysis and logistic regression analysis to learn such context factors and to identify methods that are correlated with these factors. Our analysis is based on 829 data points from the HELENA dataset. We provide five base clusters of methods consisting of up to 10 methods that lay the foundation for devising hybrid development methods. The analysis of the five clusters using trained models reveals only a few context factors, e.g., project/product size and target application domain, that seem to significantly influence the selection of methods. An extended descriptive analysis of these practices in the context of the identified method clusters also suggests a consolidation of the relevant practice sets used in specific project contexts.
In Zusammenarbeit mit dem Medizinproduktehersteller ulrich medical wird eine User Experience und Usability Studie an der Software der im Moment eingesetzten Kontrastmittelinjektoren durchgeführt. Das Unternehmen möchte eine neue Variante eines Kontrastmittelinjektors entwickeln, der als Basis eine verbesserte Version dieser Softwares enthält. Benutzerstudien können mit den unterschiedlichsten Methoden durchgeführt werden. Das geeignete Vorgehen muss definiert und die Testpersonen in Bezug zur eingesetzten Methode ermittelt werden. Bei Medizinprodukten muss zusätzlich auf strikte Auflagen in Normen und Gesetzen geachtet werden. Die Grundlage zur Methodenauswahl bildet eine Recherche zu Usability und User Experience Vorgaben für Medizinprodukte. Die Studie wird anhand quantitativer Daten eines Usability Tests im Labor, Fragebögen zur User Experience und qualitativen Post Test- Interviews evaluiert. In erster Linie dient diese Studie der Ermittlung von möglichen Verbesserungen, welche in der darauf folgenden Masterthesis vertieft und umgesetzt werden.
Hypermedia as the Engine of Application State (HATEOAS) is one of the core constraints of REST. It refers to the concept of embedding hyperlinks into the response of a queried or manipulated resource to show a client possible follow-up actions and transitions to related resources. Thus, this concept aims to provide a client with a navigational support when interacting with a Web-based application. Although HATEOAS should be implemented by any Web-based API claiming to be RESTful, API providers tend to offer service descriptions in place of embedding hyperlinks into responses. Instead of relying on a navigational support, a client developer has to read the service description and has to identify resources and their URIs that are relevant for the interaction with the API. In this paper, we introduce an approach that aims to identify transitions between resources of a Web-based API by systematically analyzing the service description only. We devise an algorithm that automatically derives a URI Model from the service description and then analyzes the payload schemas to identify feasible values for the substitution of path parameters in URI Templates. We implement this approach as a proxy application, which injects hyperlinks representing transitions into the response payload of a queried or manipulated resource. The result is a HATEOAS-like navigational support through an API. Our first prototype operates on service descriptions in the OpenAPI format. We evaluate our approach using ten real-world APIs from different domains. Furthermore, we discuss the results as well as the observations captured in these tests.
In der Kryochirurgie wird Kälte verwendet, um tumoröses Gewebe abzutöten. Dazu werden Kryosonden in den Tumor gestochen und stark abgekühlt. Hierbei gibt es verschiedene Herausforderungen, welchen computergestützt begegnet werden kann. Diese Arbeit gibt die Ergebnisse einer Literaturrecherche zu den Herausforderungen wieder. Die vorgestellten Arbeiten beschäftigten sich mit der Simulation des im Tumor entstehenden Eisballs, dem korrekten Positionieren der Kryosonden im Tumor, dem Überwachen des Eingriffs sowie dem Entwickeln von Simulationen für Trainingszwecke. Dabei zeigt sich, dass der Einsatz von computergestützten Lösungen die Kryochirurgie für Operateur und Patient verbessern kann.
In networked operating room environments, there is an emerging trend towards standardized non-proprietary communication protocols which allow to build new integration solutions and flexible human-machine interaction concepts. The most prominent endeavor is the IEEE 11073 SDC protocol. For some uses cases, it would be helpful if not just medical devices could be controlled based on SDC, but also building automation systems like light, shutters, air condition, etc. For those systems, the KNX protocol is widely used. We build an SDC-to-KNX gateway which allows to use the SDC protocol for sending commands to connected KNX devices. The first prototype system was successfully implemented at the demonstration operating room at Reutlingen University. This is a first step toward the integration of a broader variety of KNX devices.
The emergence of agile methods and practices has not only changed the development processes but might also have affected how companies conduct software process improvement (SPI). Through a set of complementary studies, we aim to understand how SPI has changed in times of agile software development. Specifically, we aim (1) to identify and characterize the set of publications that connect elements of agility to SPI, (2) to explore to which extent agile methods/practices have been used in the context of SPI, and (3) to understand whether the topics addressed in the literature are relevant and useful for industry professionals. To study these questions, we conducted an in-depth analysis of the literature identified in a previous mapping study, an interview study, and an analysis of the responses given by industry professionals to SPI-related questions stemming from an independently conducted survey study.
The typed graph model
(2020)
In recent years, the Graph Model has become increasingly popular, especially in the application domain of social networks. The model has been semantically augmented with properties and labels attached to the graph elements. It is difficult to ensure data quality for the properties and the data structure because the model does not need a schema. In this paper, we propose a schema bound Typed Graph Model with properties and labels. These enhancements improve not only data quality but also the quality of graph analysis. The power of this model is provided by using hyper-nodes and hyper edges, which allows to present a data structure on different abstraction levels. We demonstrate by example the superiority of this model over the property graph data model of Hidders and other prevalent data models, namely the relational, object-oriented, and XML model.
Requirements Engineering (RE) umfasst sämtliche systematische Schritte zur Entwicklung eines Systems, um die Bedürfnisse der Nutzer und Vorgaben, die an dieses gestellt werden, zu erfüllen. Das RE eines ausgewählten Herstellers für klinische Informationssysteme (KIS) wurde untersucht und es stellt sich als intransparent als auch teilweise unzureichend dar. Das Ausmaß des Einsatzes von systematischen Vorgehensweisen und Methoden zum RE wurden beim ausgewählten KIS-Hersteller analysiert. Die Analyse zeigt, dass RE weit verbreitet ist, aber differenziert betrieben wird.
Das Ziel dieser Arbeit ist es, den Stand der Technik des RE für die KIS Entwicklung zu ermitteln. Es werden wichtige Faktoren des RE für die Entwicklung von KIS beschrieben. Die Ergebnisse dieser Arbeit werden als erster Schritt für die Optimierung des RE des ausgewählten KIS-Herstellers dienen.
Unter dem Begriff Innovation Enabling wird im Folgenden ein Konzept für die ganzheitliche Unterstützung interdisziplinärer Teams beim kreativen und innovativen Problemlösen vor-gestellt. Dieses Konzept unterstützt Moderatoren und Teilnehmergleichermaßen und ein damit realisiertes System bleibt durch die implizite Interaktion für den Nutzer im Hintergrund. Eine zentrale Rolle spielt das Konzept der Awareness Pipeline zur Implementation einer impliziten Interaktion auf Basis eines Sensor-Aktor-Systems, welches in diesem Artikel vorgestellt wird. Die Unterstützung der begleitenden Moderations- und Administrationsaufgaben, wie beispielsweise der automatisierten Dokumentation der Sitzung, sollen in Zukunft einen deutlichen Mehrwert gegenüber einer klassischen Brainstorming-Sitzung bieten.
Product roadmaps are an important tool in product development. They provide direction, enable consistent development in relation to a product vision and support communication with relevant stakeholders. There are many different formats for product roadmaps, but they are often based on the assumption that the future is highly predictable. However, especially software-intensive businesses are faced with increasing market dynamics, rapidly evolving technologies and changing user expectations. As a result, many organizations are wondering what roadmap format is appropriate for them and what components it should have to deal with an unpredictable future. Objectives: To gain a better understanding of the formats of product roadmaps and their components, this paper aims to identify suitable formats for the development and handling of product roadmaps in dynamic and uncertain markets. Method: We performed a grey literature review (GLR) according to the guidelines from Garousi. Results: A Google search identified 426 articles, 25 of which were included in this study. First, various components of the roadmap were identified, especially the product vision, themes, goals, outcomes and outputs. In addition, various product roadmap formats were discovered, such as feature-based, goal-oriented, outcome-driven and a theme-based roadmap. The roadmap components were then assigned to the various product roadmap formats. This overview aims at providing initial decision support for companies to select a suitable product roadmap format and adapt it to their own needs.
In recent years companies have faced challenges by high market dynamics, rapidly evolving technologies and shifting user expectations. Together with the adaption of lean and agile practices, it is increasingly difficult to predict upfront which products, features or services will satisfy the needs of the customers and the organization. Currently, many new products fail to produce a significant financial return. One reason is that companies are not doing enough product discovery activities. Product discovery aims at tackling the various risks before the implementation of a product starts. The academic literature only provides little guidance for conducting product discovery in practice. Objective: In order to gain a better understanding of product discovery activities in practice, this paper aims at identifying motivations, approaches, challenges, risks, and pitfalls of product discovery reported in the grey literature. Method: We performed a grey literature review (GLR) according to the guidelines to Garousi et al. Results: The study shows that the main motivation for conducting product discovery activities is to reduce the uncertainty to a level that makes it possible to start building a solution that provides value for the customers and the business. Several product discovery approaches are reported in the grey literature which include different phases such as alignment, problem exploration, ideation, and validation. Main challenges are, among others, the lack of clarity of the problem to be solved, the prescription of concrete solutions through management or experts, and the lack of cross-functional collaboration.
Context: Organizations are increasingly challenged by dynamic and technical market environments. Traditional product roadmapping practices such as detailed and fixed long-term planning typically fail in such environments. Therefore, companies are actively seeking ways to improve their product roadmapping approach.
Goal: This paper aims at identifying problems and challenges with respect to product roadmapping. In addition, it aims at understanding how companies succeed in improving their roadmapping practices in their respective company contexts.
Method: We conducted semi-structured expert interviews with 15 experts from 13 German companies and conducted athematic data analysis.
Results: The analysis showed that a significant number of companies is still struggling with traditional feature-based product-roadmapping and opinion-based prioritization of features. The most promising areas for improvement are stating the outcomes a company is trying to achieve and making them part of the roadmap, sharing or co-developing the roadmap with stakeholders, and establishing discovery activities.
In dieser Arbeit werden drei verschiedene Testumgebungen vorgestellt, welche in ein iteratives Vorgehen einfließen, um die Entwicklung von Augmented-Reality-Anwendungen zur Darstellung von autonomen Fahrfunktionen zu unterstützen.
Gestaltungsentwürfe und Softwareentwicklungen können in den Testumgebungen für unterschiedliche Zielsetzungen von Personenbefragungen vorgestellt und bewertet werden. Das entwicklungsbegleitende Testen ermöglicht eine frühzeitige Identifizierung von Änderungshinweisen, welche für einen gültigen Lösungsentwurf eingearbeitet werden können. Die entwickelten Testumgebungen sind ein verkleinertes Modell, ein Fahrsimulator und ein reales Fahrzeug. Eigenschaften, Funktionen und Aufbauten resultieren aus Erkenntnissen der Literatur und Erfahrungen aus ersten Entwicklungen. Diese und die Einsatzmöglichkeiten werden mit dieser Arbeit aufgezeigt.
Modern mixed (HTAP)workloads execute fast update-transactions and long running analytical queries on the same dataset and system. In multi-version (MVCC) systems, such workloads result in many short-lived versions and long version-chains as well as in increased and frequent maintenance overhead.
Consequently, the index pressure increases significantly. Firstly, the frequent modifications cause frequent creation of new versions, yielding a surge in index maintenance overhead. Secondly and more importantly, index-scans incur extra I/O overhead to determine, which of the resulting tuple versions are visible to the executing transaction (visibility-check) as current designs only store version/timestamp information in the base table – not in the index. Such index-only visibility-check is critical for HTAP workloads on large datasets.
In this paper we propose the Multi Version Partitioned B-Tree (MV-PBT) as a version-aware index structure, supporting index-only visibility checks and flash-friendly I/O patterns. The experimental evaluation indicates a 2x improvement for analytical queries and 15% higher transactional throughput under HTAP workloads. MV-PBT offers 40% higher tx. throughput compared to WiredTiger’s LSM-Tree implementation under YCSB.
The advent of chatbots in customer service solutions received increasing attention by research and practice throughout the last years. However, the relevant dimensions and features for service quality and service performance for chatbots remain quite unclear. Therefore, this research develops and tests a conceptual model for customer service quality and customer service performance in the context of chatbots. Additionally, the impact of the developed service dimensions on different customer relationship metrics is measured across different service channels (hotline versus chatbots). Findings of six independent studies indicate a strong main effect of the conceptualized service dimensions on customer satisfaction, service costs, intention to service reusage, word-of-mouth, and customer loyalty. However, different service dimensions are relevant for chatbots compared to a traditional service hotline.
Going forward with the requirements of missions to the Moon and further into deep space, the European Space Agency is investigating new methods of astronaut training that can help accelerate learning, increase availability and reduce complexity and cost in comparison to currently used methods. To achieve this, technologies such as virtual reality may be utilized. In this paper, an investigation into the benefits of using virtual reality as a means for extravehicular activity training in comparison to conventional training methods, such as neutral buoyancy pools is given. To help determine the requirements and current uses of virtual reality for extravehicular activity training first hand tests of currently available software as well as expert interviews are utilized. With this knowledge a concept is developed that may be used to further advance training methods in virtual reality. The resulting concept is used as a basis for development of a prototype to showcase user interactions and locomotion in microgravity simulations.
Digital technologies are main strategic drivers for digitalization and offer ubiquitous data availability, unlimited connectivity, and massive processing power for a fundamentally changing business. This leads to the development and application of intelligent digital systems. The current state of research and practice of architecting digital systems and services lacks a solid methodological foundation that fully accommodates all requirements linked to efficient and effective development of digital systems in organizations. Research presented in this paper addresses the question, how management of complexity in digital systems and architectures can be supported from a methodological perspective. In this context, the current focus is on a better understanding of the causes of increased complexity and requirements to methodological support. For this purpose, we take an enterprise architecture perspective, i.e. how the introduction of digital systems affects the complexity of EA. Two industrial case studies and a systematic literature analysis result in the proposal of an extended Digital Enterprise Architecture Cube as framework for future methodical support.
Methods based exclusively on heart rate hardly allow to differentiate between physical activity, stress, relaxation, and rest, that is why an additional sensor like activity/movement sensor added for detection and classification. The response of the heart to physical activity, stress, relaxation, and no activity can be very similar. In this study, we can observe the influence of induced stress and analyze which metrics could be considered for its detection. The changes in the Root Mean Square of the Successive Differences provide us with information about physiological changes. A set of measurements collecting the RR intervals was taken. The intervals are used as a parameter to distinguish four different stages. Parameters like skin conductivity or skin temperature were not used because the main aim is to maintain a minimum number of sensors and devices and thereby to increase the wearability in the future.
The automation of work by means of disruptive technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is currently intensely discussed in business practice and academia. Recent studies indicate that many tasks manually conducted by humans today will not in the future. In a similar vein, it is expected that new roles will emerge. The aim of this study is to analyze prospective employment opportunities in the context of RPA in order to foster our understanding of the pivotal qualifications, expertise and skills necessary to find an occupation in a completely changing world of work. This study is based on an explorative, content analysis of 119 job advertisements related to RPA in Germany. The data was collected from major German online job platforms, qualitatively coded, and subsequently analyzed quantitatively. The research indicates that there indeed are employment opportunities, especially in the consulting sector. The positions require different technological expertise such as specific programming languages and knowledge in statistics. The results of this study provide guidance for organizations and individuals on reskilling requirements for future employment. As many of the positions require profound IT expertise, the generally accepted perspective that existing employees affected by automation can be retrained to work in the emerging positions has to be seen extremely critical. This paper contributes to the body of knowledge by providing a novel perspective on the ongoing discussion of employment opportunities, and reskilling demands of the existing workforce in the context of recent technological developments and automation.
Haptisches Feedback ist nach zahlreichen Studien ein wichtiger Bestandteil in der medizinischen Robotik. Die meisten Systeme befinden sich jedoch noch im Forschungsstatus und verfolgen unterschiedliche Ansätze. In der Teleoperation wird mit sensorlosen und Sensor-Systemen geforscht. Sensoren bieten, im Gegensatz zu den Encodern in sensorlosen Systemen, genaue Messungen, sind allerdings teuer in der Anschaffung, schwer zu desinfizieren und müssen in OP-Besteck integriert werden. In Hands-On Systemen fühlt der Operateur im Gegensatz zu Teleoperationssystemen direkt die auftretenden Kräfte bei der Benutzung. Der Roboter bietet in diesen Systemen nur die benötigte Stabilität und Genauigkeit, gesteuert werden sie direkt durch den Menschen. Dagegen werden in Teleoperationssystemen gezielte Controller eingesetzt. Hier hat sich der für den OP entwickelte sigma.7 durchgesetzt. Gegenüber der für die Allgemeinheit entwickelten Konkurrenz bietet er haptisches Feedback in allen nötigen Freiheitsgraden und eine entsprechende Kraftrückkoppelung.
AI technologies such as deep learning provide promising advances in many areas. Using these technologies, enterprises and organizations implement new business models and capabilities. In the beginning, AI-technologies have been deployed in an experimental environment. AI-based applications have been created in an ad-hoc manner and without methodological guidance or engineering approach. Due to the increasing importance of AI-technologies, however, a more structured approach is necessary that enable the methodological engineering of AI-based applications. Therefore, we develop in this paper first steps towards methodological engineering of AI-based applications. First, we identify some important differences between the technological foundations of AI- technologies, in particular deep learning, and traditional information technologies. Then we create a framework that enables to engineer AI-applications using four steps: identification of an AI-application type, sub-type identification, lifecycle phase, and definition of details. The introduced framework considers that AI-applications use an inductive approach to infer knowledge from huge collections and streams of data. It not only enables the rapid development of AI-application but also the efficient sharing of knowledge on AI-applications.
Artificial Intelligence enables innovative applications, and applications based on Artificial Intelligence are increasingly important for all aspects of the Digital Economy. However, the question of how AI resources such as tools and data can be linked to provide an AI-capability and create business value is still open. Therefore, this paper identifies the value-creating mechanisms of connectionist artificial intelligence using a capability-oriented view and points out the connections to different kinds of business value. The analysis supports an agenda that identifies areas that need further research to understand the mechanism of value creation in connectionist artificial intelligence.
Systemische Betrachtung des therapeutischen Roboters Paro im Vergleich zu dem Haustierroboter AIBO
(2020)
Roboter sind in der heutigen Zeit nicht nur in der Industrie zu finden, sondern werden immer häufiger in privaten Lebensbereichen eingesetzt. Ein Beispiel hierfür ist der soziale Therapie-Roboter Paro. Dieser ist dem Verhalten und Aussehen einer jungen Robbe nachempfunden, drückt Gefühle aus und wird besonders in Pflegeheimen eingesetzt. Dabei zeigt er positive Auswirkungen auf das Wohlbefinden pflegebedürftiger Menschen. Diese Arbeit stellt den Roboter Paro in einer systemischen Analyse dar: hierbei werden Systemkontext, Anwendungsfälle, Anforderungen und Struktur betrachtet. Anschließend erfolgt eine Analyse des Haustierroboters AIBO, welcher einem Welpen ähnelt und verstärkt der Unterhaltung von Privatpersonen dient. Es werden Gemeinsamkeiten und Unterschiede zwischen den Systemen herausgearbeitet. Dabei wird ersichtlich, dass beide Systeme dem Nutzer vorrangig Gesellschaft leisten, jedoch verschiedene Anforderungen besitzen und in unterschiedlichen Anwendungsdomänen eingesetzt werden. Zudem besitzt AIBO vielfältigere Fähigkeiten und einen höheren Bewegungsgrad als Paro. Dies spiegelt sich in einer komplexeren Struktur der Hardware wider.
Die Entwicklung eines Medizinproduktes benötigt in der Regel mehrere Jahre. Gesetzliche Vorgaben, wie zum Beispiel das Medizinprodukte Durchführungsgesetz, bestimmen, welche Schritte während der Entwicklung durchgeführt werden müssen. Deren Einhaltung muss in der technischen Dokumentation nachgewiesen werden. Die darin enthaltenen technischen Dokumente entstehen im Verlauf der Entwicklung. Diese bauen aufeinander auf und verweisen sich gegenseitig. Dadurch entstehen heterogene und unübersichtliche Strukturen. Eine Lösung für dieses Problem bietet Traceability. Traceability sorgt dafür, dass die Anforderungen an das Medizinprodukt mit Dokumenten, wie dem Anforderungskatalog, Lastenheft oder der Spezifikation verknüpft werden können. Somit ist jederzeit nachvollziehbar, welche Anforderungen mit welchem Test, welchen Änderungen oder welchen Ergebnissen zusammenhängen. Ein wichtiger Prozess bei der Entwicklung von Medizinprodukten ist zudem das Usability Engineering, wodurch die Sicherheit eines Medizinprodukts sichergestellt und Risiken bei der Anwendung minimiert werden sollen. In diesem Prozess entstehen viele Artefakte, wie zum Beispiel Usability-Berichte. Um den Überblick über alle Usability-Daten behalten zu können, können diese mithilfe von Traceability verknüpft werden. In diesem Artikel wird herausgestellt, welche Voraussetzungen für das Usability Engineering in der Medizintechnik an Traceability gestellt
werden.
Regardless of company size or industry sector, a majority of project teams and companies use customized processes that combine different development methods-so-called hybrid development methods. Even though such hybrid development methods are highly individualized, a common understanding of how to systematically construct synergetic practices is missing. Based on 1,467 data points from a large-scale online survey among practitioners, we study the current state of practice in process use to answer the question: What are hybrid development methods made of? Our findings reveal that only eight methods and few practices build the core of modern software development. This small set allows for statistically constructing hybrid development methods.
Facial expressions play a dominant role in facilitating social interactions. We endeavor to develop tactile displays to reinstate facial expression modulated communication. The high spatial and temporal dimensionality of facial movements poses a unique challenge when designing tactile encodings of them. A further challenge is developing encodings that are at-tuned to the perceptual characteristics of our skin. A caveat of using vibrotactile displays is that tactile stimuli have been shown to induce perceptual tactile aftereffects when used on the fingers, arm and face. However, at present, despite the prevalence of waist-worn tactile displays, no such investigations of tactile aftereffects at the waist region exist in the literature, though they are warranted by the unique sensory and perceptual signalling characteristics of this area. Using an adaptation paradigm we investigated the presence of perceptual tactile aftereffects induced by continuous and burst vibrotactile stimuli delivered at the navel, side and spinal regions of the waist. We report evidence that the tactile perception topology of the waist is non-uniform, and specifically that the navel and spine regions are resistant to adaptive aftereffects while side regions are more prone to perceptual adaptations to continuous but not burst stimulations. Results of our current investigations highlight the unique set of challenges posed by designing waist-worn tactile displays. These and future perceptual studies can directly inform more realistic and effective implementations of complex high-dimensional spatiotemporal social cues.
Context: A product roadmap is an important tool in product development. It sets the strategic direction in which the product is to be developed to achieve the company’s vision. However, for product roadmaps to be successful, it is essential that all stakeholders agree with the company’s vision and objectives and are aligned and committed to a common product plan.
Objective: In order to gain a better understanding of product roadmap alignment, this paper aims at identifying measures, activities and techniques in order to align the different stakeholders around the product roadmap.
Method: We conducted a grey literature review according the guidelines to Garousi et al.
Results: Several approaches to gain alignment were identified such as defining and communicating clear objectives based on the product vision, conducting cross-functional workshops, shuttle diplomacy, and mission briefing. In addition, our review identified the “Behavioural Change Stairway Model” that suggests five steps to gain alignment by building empathy and a trustful relationship.