ICEIS 2008 Abstracts

Area 1 - Databases and Information Systems Integration

Full Papers

Paper Nr:	90
Title:	EMBEDDING XPATH QUERIES INTO SPARQL QUERIES
Authors:	Matthias Droop, Markus Flarer, Jinghua Groppe, Sven Groppe, Volker Linnemann, Jakob Pinggera, Florian Santner, Michael Schier, Felix Schöpf, Hannes Staffler and Stefan Zugal
Abstract:	While XPath is an established query language developed by the W3C for XML, SPARQL is a new query language developed by the W3C for RDF data. Comparisons between the data models of XML and RDF and between the query languages XPath and SPARQL are missing. Since XML and XPath are earlier recommendations of the W3C than RDF and SPARQL, currently more XML data and XPath queries are used in applications. However, recently available SPARQL query evaluators do not deal with XML data and XPath queries. We have developed a prototype for translating XML data into RDF data and embedding XPath queries into SPARQL queries for the following two reasons: 1) We want to compare the XPath and XQuery data model with the RDF data model and the XPath query language with the SPARQL query language in order to show similarities and differences. 2) We want to enable SPARQL query evaluators to deal with XML data and XPath queries in order to support XPath processing and SPARQL processing in parallel. We have developed a prototype for the source-to-source translations from XML data into RDF data and from XPath queries into SPARQL queries. We have run experiments to measure the execution times of the translations, of XPath queries and of their translated SPARQL queries.
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Paper Nr:	247
Title:	ODDI - A Framework for Semi-automatic Data Integration
Authors:	Paolo Ceravolo, Ernesto Damiani, Marcello Leida, Zhan Cui and Alex Gusmini
Abstract:	Recent works on Business Intelligence do highlight the need of on-time, trustable and sound data access systems. Moreover the application of these systems in a flexible and dynamic environment requires for an approach based on automatic procedures that can provide reliable results. A crucial factor for any automatic data integration system is the matching process. Different categories of matching operators carry different semantics. For this reason combining them in a single algorithm is a non trivial process that have to take into account a variety of options. This paper proposes a solution based on a categorization of matching operators that allow to group similar attributes on a semantic rich form. This way we define all the information need in order to create a mapping. Then Mapping Generation is activated only on those set of elements that can be queried without violating any integrity constraints on data.
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Paper Nr:	299
Title:	AN INTEGRATED MODEL FOR MANAGERIAL AND PRODUCTIVE ACTIVITIES IN SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
Authors:	Daniel A. Callegari, Maurício Covolan Rosito, Marcelo Blois Ribeiro and Ricardo M. Bastos
Abstract:	Software organizations are constantly looking for better solutions when designing and using well-defined software processes for the development of their products and services. However, many software development processes lack for more support on project management issues. This work proposes a model that integrates the concepts of PMBOK and RUP, helping process integration and assisting managers in the decision making process during project planning. We present the model and the results from a qualitative exploratory evaluation of a tool that implements the proposed model, conducted with project managers from nine companies.
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Paper Nr:	428
Title:	INTEROPERABILITY IN THE PETROLEUM INDUSTRY
Authors:	Jon A. Gulla
Abstract:	The petroleum industry is a technically challenging business with highly specialized companies and complex operational structures. Several terminological standards have been introduced over the last few years, though they address particular disciplines and cannot help people collaborate efficiently across disciplines and organizational borders. This paper discusses the results from the industrally driven Integrated Information Platform project, which has developed and formalized an extensive OWL ontology for the Norwegian petroleum business. The ontology is now used in production reports, and the ontology is considered vital to semantic interoperability and the concept of integrated operations on the Norwegian continental shelf.
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Paper Nr:	544
Title:	TOWARDS A SEMIOTIC QUALITY FRAMEWORK OF SOFTWARE MEASURES
Authors:	Erki Eessaar
Abstract:	Each software entity should have as high quality as possible in the context of limited resources. A software quality measure is a kind of software entity. Existing studies about the evaluation of software measures do not pay enough attention to the quality of specifications of measures. Semiotics has been used as a basis in order to evaluate the quality of different types of software entities. In this paper, we propose a multidimensional, semiotic quality framework of software quality measures. We apply this framework in order to evaluate the syntactic and semantic quality of two sets of database design measures. The evaluation shows that these measures have some quality problems.
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Paper Nr:	659
Title:	ADAPTATIVE MATCHING OF DATABASE WEB SERVICES EXPORT SCHEMAS
Authors:	Daniela F. Brauner, Alexandre Gazola, Marco A. Casanova and Karin Koogan Breitman
Abstract:	This paper proposes an approach and a mediator architecture for adaptively matching export schemas of database Web services. Differently from traditional mediator approaches, the mediated schema is constructed from the mappings adaptively elicited from user query responses. That is, query results are post-processed to identify reliable mappings and to build the mediated schema on the fly. The approach is illustrated with two case studies from rather different application domains.
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Paper Nr:	678
Title:	SIZE AND EFFORT-BASED COMPUTATIONAL MODELS FOR SOFTWARE COST PREDICTION
Authors:	Efi Papatheocharous and Andreas Andreou
Abstract:	Reliable and accurate software cost estimations have always been a challenge especially for people involved in project resource management. The challenge is amplified due to the high level of complexity and uniqueness of the software process. The majority of estimation methods proposed fail to produce successful cost forecasting and neither resolve to explicit, measurable and concise set of factors affecting productivity. Throughout the software cost estimation literature software size is usually proposed as one of the most important attributes affecting effort and is used to build cost models. This paper aspires to provide size and effort-based estimations for the required software effort of new projects based on data obtained from past completed projects. The modelling approach utilises Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) with a random sliding window input and output method using holdout samples and moreover, a Genetic Algorithm (GA) undertakes to evolve the inputs and internal hidden architectures and to reduce the Mean Relative Error (MRE). The obtained optimal ANN topologies and input and output methods for each dataset are presented, discussed and compared with a classic MLR model.
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Paper Nr:	709
Title:	A MAPPING-DRIVEN APPROACH FOR SQL/XML VIEW MAINTENANCE
Authors:	Vânia P. Vidal, Fernando Cordeiro de Lemos, Valdiana S. Araújo and Marco A. Casanova
Abstract:	In this work we study the problem of how to incrementally maintain materialized XML views of relational data, based on the semantic mappings that model the relationship between the source and view schemas. The semantic mappings are specified by a set of correspondence assertions, which are simple to understand. The paper focuses on an algorithm to incrementally maintain materialized XML views of relational data.
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Paper Nr:	754
Title:	LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS FOR THE AUTOMATION OF DATABASE SCHEMA EVOLUTION
Authors:	George Papastefanatos, Panos Vassiliadis, Alkis Simitsis, Konstantinos Aggistalis, Fotini Pechlivani and Yannis Vassiliou
Abstract:	The administrators and designers of modern Information Systems face the problem of maintaining their systems in the presence of frequently occurring changes in any counterpart of it. In other words, when a change occurs in any point of the system –e.g., source, schema, view, software construct– they should propagate the change in all the involved parts of the system. Hence, it is imperative that the whole process should be done correctly, i.e., the change should be propagated to all the appropriate points of the system, with a limited overhead imposed on both the system and the humans, who design and maintain it. In this paper, we are dealing with the problem of evolution in the context of databases. First, we present a coherent, graph-based framework for capturing the effect of potential changes in the database software of an Information System. Next, we describe a generic annotation policy for database evolution and we propose a feasible and powerful extension to the SQL language specifically tailored for the management of evolution. Finally, we demonstrate the efficiency and feasibility of our approach through a case study based on a real-world situation occurred in the Greek public sector.
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Short Papers

Paper Nr:	108
Title:	IMPLEMENTATION OF ALGEBRA FOR QUERYING WEB DATA SOURCES
Authors:	Iztok Savnik
Abstract:	The paper presents the implementation of query execution system Qios. It serves as a lightware system for the manipulation of XML data. Qios employs the relational technology for query processing. The main aim in the implementation is to provide a querying system that is easy to use and does not require any additional knowledge about the internal representation of data. The system provides robust and simple solutions for many design problems. We aimed to simplify the internal structures of query processors rooted in the de- sign of relational and object-relational query processors. We propose efficient internal data structures for the representation of queries during all phases of query execution. The query optimization is based on dynamic programming and uses beam search to reduce the time complexity. The data structure for storing queries pro- vides efficient representation of queries during the optimization process and the simple means to explore plan caching. Finally, main memory indices can be created on-the-fly to support the evaluation of queries.
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Paper Nr:	129
Title:	NETWORK EXTERNALITIES FOR ENTERPRISE RESOURCE PLANNING SOFTWARE - A Research Roadmap
Authors:	Georg Peters, Florian Thoma and Richard Weber
Abstract:	Presently the ERP software market is characterized by a fierce competition of some of the largest software producers of the world. While SAP tries to defend its position as the market leader, Oracle, founded as database vendor, has heavily invested into its ERP business by taking over large related software producers like Peoplesoft or Siebel. Microsoft also bought ERP vendors as a basis for its MBS (Microsoft Business Solution) division. IBM and Sage are further players in the multi-billion market of ERP software. Currently the market faces two big challenges. (1) The classic ERP market addressing large corporations has become mature and is characterized by growth through displacement today. However the ERP market for SME still promises big growth rates. (2) The classic monolithic ERP systems are presently replaced by new middleware based technologies that provide open platforms to easily integrate business applications of third party software producers. Network externalities will significantly influence which ERP vendor(s) will dominate the future market. Therefore we will qualitatively analyse the current strengths and weaknesses of the presently most promising ERP producer with respect to network externalities.
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Paper Nr:	137
Title:	A LOCKING PROTOCOL FOR DOM API ON XML DOCUMENTS
Authors:	Yin-Fu Huang and Mu-Liang Guo
Abstract:	In this paper, we developed a new DOM API locking protocol (DLP) that adopts the DOM structure for locking. In order to enhance the concurrency and system performance, we studied operation conflicts more detailedly. The proposed DLP supports more update operations than the others, and does not imply more locking costs. Finally, we conducted several experiments to compare with the others and to observe the DLP performance under different workload parameters.
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Paper Nr:	241
Title:	AN IMPLEMENTATION OF XML DATA INTEGRATION
Authors:	Weidong Pan, Jixue Liu and Jiashen Tian
Abstract:	Data integration is essential for building modern enterprise information systems. This paper investigates the implementation of XML data integration through transforming XML data from different data sources into a common global schema. Following the work our research group has done earlier, the paper is focused on the implementation of XML data transformation. First, the proposed methodology to realize XML data integration is sketched. Then, the representation of a DTD and document and other relevant concepts for transforming XML data are presented. The transforming operations defined by a set of operators are outlined focusing on the required functionality for data integration. Building upon these, the implementation of the data transformation operations is investigated. The current implementation is reported with a simplified example illustrating how the methodology can be applied for practical enterprise information integration.
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Paper Nr:	246
Title:	SOFTWARE MEASUREMENT BY USING QVT TRANSFORMATIONS IN AN MDA CONTEXT
Authors:	Beatriz Mora Rivas, Félix García Rubio, Francisco Ruiz, Mario Piattini, Artur Boronat, Abel Gómez, José Á. Carsí and Isidro Ramos
Abstract:	At present the objective of obtaining quality software products has led to the necessity of carrying out good software processes management in which measurement is a fundamental factor. Due to the great diversity of entities involved in software measurement, a consistent framework is necessary to integrate the different entities in the measurement process. In this work a Software Measurement Framework (SMF) is presented to measure any type of software entity. In this framework, any software entity in any domain could be measured with a common Software Measurement metamodel and QVT transformations. This work explains the three fundamental elements of the Software Measurement Framework (conceptual architecture, technological aspects and method). These elements have all been adapted to the MDE paradigm and to MDA technology, taking advantage of their benefits within the field of software measurement. Furthermore an example which illustrates the framework’s application to a concrete domain is furthermore shown.
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Paper Nr:	255
Title:	DYNAMIC SEMI-MARKOVIAN WORKLOAD MODELING
Authors:	Nima Sharifimehr and Samira Sadaoui
Abstract:	In this paper, we present a Markovian modeling approach which is based on a combination of existing Semi-Markov and Dynamic Markov models. The proposed approach is designed to be an efficient statistical modeling tool to capture both actions intervals patterns and sequential behavioral patterns. A formal definition of this model and detailed algorithms for its implementation are illustrated. We show the applicability of our approach to model workload of enterprise application servers. However, the given formal definition of our proposed approach prepares a firm ground for academic researchers to investigate many other possible applications. Finally, we prove the accuracy of our dynamic semi-Markovian approach for the most chaotic situations.
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Paper Nr:	260
Title:	MODEL-DRIVEN GENERATION AND OPTIMIZATION OF COMPLEX INTEGRATION PROCESSES
Authors:	Matthias Boehm, Uwe Wloka, Dirk Habich and Wolfgang Lehner
Abstract:	The integration of heterogeneous systems is still one of the main challenges in the area of data management. Its importance is based on the trend towards heterogeneous system environments, where the different levels of integration approaches result in a large number of different integration systems. Due to these proprietary solutions and the lack of a standard for data-intensive integration processes, the model-driven development— following the paradigm of the Model-Driven Architecture (MDA)—is advantageous. This paper contributes to the model-driven development of complex and data-intensive integration processes. In addition, we illustrate optimization possibilities offered by this model-driven approach and discuss first evaluation results.
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Paper Nr:	261
Title:	MESSAGE INDEXING FOR DOCUMENT-ORIENTED INTEGRATION PROCESSES
Authors:	Matthias Boehm, Uwe Wloka, Dirk Habich and Wolfgang Lehner
Abstract:	The integration of heterogeneous systems is still an evolving research area. Due to the complexity of integration processes, there are challenges for the optimization of integration processes. Message-based integration systems, like EAI servers and workflow process engines, are mostly document-oriented, using XML technologies to achieve suitable data independence from the different and particular proprietary data representations of the supported external systems. However, such an approach causes large costs for single-value evaluations within the integration processes. At this point, message indexing, adapting extended database technologies, can be applied in order to achieve better performance. In this paper, we introduce our message indexing structure MIX and discuss and evaluate immediate as well as deferred indexing concepts.
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Paper Nr:	303
Title:	EMPIRICAL STUDY OF ERP SYSTEMS IMPLEMENTATION COSTS IN SWISS SMES
Authors:	Catherine E. Balzli, Rob Kusters, Sacha Varone and Nicolas Montandon
Abstract:	Based on the sparse literature investigating the cost of ERP systems implementation, our research uses data from a survey of Swiss SMEs having implemented ERP in order to test cost drivers. The main innovation is the proposition of an additional classification of cost drivers that focuses on the enterprise itself, rather than on ERP. Particular attention is given to consulting fees as a major factor of implementation cost and a new major cost driver has come to light. “Consultant experience”, not previously mentioned as such in literature, appears as an important aspect of ERP implementation cost. Particular attention must be paid to this factor by the ERP implementation project manager.
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Paper Nr:	303
Title:	EMPIRICAL STUDY OF ERP SYSTEMS IMPLEMENTATION COSTS IN SWISS SMES
Authors:	Catherine E. Balzli, Rob Kusters, Sacha Varone and Nicolas Montandon
Abstract:	Based on the sparse literature investigating the cost of ERP systems implementation, our research uses data from a survey of Swiss SMEs having implemented ERP in order to test cost drivers. The main innovation is the proposition of an additional classification of cost drivers that focuses on the enterprise itself, rather than on ERP. Particular attention is given to consulting fees as a major factor of implementation cost and a new major cost driver has come to light. “Consultant experience”, not previously mentioned as such in literature, appears as an important aspect of ERP implementation cost. Particular attention must be paid to this factor by the ERP implementation project manager.
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Paper Nr:	310
Title:	DISCOVERING VEILED UNSATISFIABLE XPATH QUERIES
Authors:	Jinghua Groppe and Volker Linnemann
Abstract:	The satisfiability problem of queries is an important determinant in query optimization. The application of a satisfiability test can avoid the submission and the unnecessary evaluation of unsatisfiable queries, and thus save processing time and query costs. If an XPath query does not conform to constraints in a given schema, or constraints from the query itself are inconsistent with each other, the evaluation of the query will return an empty result for any valid XML document, and thus the query is unsatisfiable. Therefore, we propose a schema-based approach to filtering the XPath queries not conforming to the constraints in the schema and the XPath queries with conflicting constraints. We present a complexity analysis of our approach, which proves that our approach is efficient at typical cases. We present an experimental analysis of our prototype, which shows the optimization potential of avoiding the evaluation of unsatisfiable queries.
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Paper Nr:	332
Title:	IMPROVING SOFTWARE TEST STRATEGY WITH A METHOD TO SPECIFY TEST CASES (MSTC)
Authors:	Edumilis M. Ortega, María A. Perez and Luis E. Mendoza
Abstract:	An interesting difference between tests and other disciplines of the software development process is that they constitute a task that essentially identifies and evidences the weaknesses of the software product. Four relevant elements are considered when defining tests namely, reliability, cost, time and quality. Time and cost shall increase to the extent reliable tests and quality software are desired, but what does it take to make actors understand that tests should be seen as a security network? If quality is not there before starting the tests, it will not be there upon their completion. Accordingly, how can we lay out a trace between tests and functional and non-functional requirements of the software system? This Article is aimed at proposing a method that allows for specifying test cases based on use cases, by incorporating elements to verify and validate traceability among requirements management, analysis & design, and tests. This initiative originated as a response to the request of a software developing company of the Venezuelan public sector.
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Paper Nr:	362
Title:	ARCHITECTURE FOR END USER-DRIVEN COMPOSITION OF UNDERSPECIFIED, HUMAN-CENTRIC BUSINESS PROCESSES
Authors:	Todor Stoitsev, Stefan Scheidl, Felix Flentge and Max Mühlhäuser
Abstract:	Enterprises are constantly struggling to optimize their business processes in order to gain competitive advantage and to survive in the fast evolving global market. Often, the only ones to understand the matter and complexity of these processes are the people, who actually execute them. This raises the need for novel business process management approaches, which can enable business users to proactively express process knowledge and to participate in the business process management and design according to their actual expertise and problem solving strategies. The presented paper describes an architecture, which supports a framework for end user-driven composition and management of underspecified, human-centric business processes. The solution builds up on email-integrated task management and enables dynamic generation of decentralized-emerging process structures through web service-based activity tracking. The captured process execution examples are shared in central enterprise repositories for further adaptation and reuse. This enables “seeding, evolutionary growth, and reseeding” of user-defined, weakly-structured process models towards global best-practice definitions.
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Paper Nr:	370
Title:	TREE EMBEDDING AND XML QUERY EVALUATION
Authors:	Yangjun Chen
Abstract:	Tree pattern matching is one of the most fundamental tasks for XML query processing. Prior work has typically decomposed the tree pattern into binary structural (parent-child and ancestor-descendent) relationships or paths, and then stitch together these basic matches by join operations. In this paper, we propose a new algorithm that explores both the document tree and the twig pattern in a bottom-up way and show that the join operation can be completely avoided. The new algorithm runs in O(\|T\|×\|Q\|) time and O(\|Q\|×leafT) space, where T and Q are the document tree and the tree pattern query, respectively; and leafT represents the number of leaf nodes in T.
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Paper Nr:	376
Title:	A FRAMEWORK TO SUPPORT INTEROPERABILITY AND MULTI-CHANNEL DELIVERY AMONG HETEROGENEOUS SYSTEMS: TRAME PROJECT
Authors:	Ugo Barchetti, Alberto Bucciero, Luca Mainetti and Stefano Santo Sabato
Abstract:	The e-commerce has become a point of strength for the companies that desire to increase their billing enlarging their clients park and reducing the management costs. Therefore the demand has been born to use platforms able to support the interoperability between heterogeneous systems and the multi-channelling with variegated devices to access different services in reliable manner and to allow, so, a spread of the market toward partner with particular needs. Furthermore, many available services have been typically designed for a single channel the web one. In a real world scenario, an ever-growing number of users take advantage of different kind of communication channel and devices. In this paper we propose a B2B oriented framework able to support the interoperability among heterogeneous systems developed according to the ebXML reference model for the business messages interchange suitable to any B2B marketplace that foresees the commercial interaction among partners with different roles and profiles (including channel and device). Such framework has been developed and experimented for the TRAME research project that has as objective to create a room of district compensation of the peaks of productive ability demands within the Textile/Clothing sector and to give the needed infrastructure for the business messages exchange among the partners of the productive spinneret.
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Paper Nr:	416
Title:	SEMANTIC DATA INTEGRATION FOR PROCESS ENGINEERING DESIGN DATA
Authors:	Andreas Wiesner, Jan Morbach and Wolfgang Marquardt
Abstract:	During the design phase of a chemical plant, information is typically created by various software tools and stored in different documents and databases. Unfortunately, the further processing of the data is often hindered by the structural, syntactic and semantic heterogeneities of the data sources. In fact the merging and consolidation of the data becomes virtually prohibitive when exclusively conventional database technologies are employed. Therefore, XML technologies as well as specific domain ontologies are increasingly applied in the context of data integration. Hence, this contribution gives an outline on an ongoing research project at the authors’ institute, which aims at the development of a prototypical software tool, which exploits the benefits of semantic as well as XML technologies, for the integration and consolidation of design data. Both, ontology and software development is performed in close cooperation with partners from the chemical and software industries to ensure their compliance with the requirements of industrial practice.
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Paper Nr:	417
Title:	ERP IMPACT ON NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES AND PERSONNEL COSTS IN SMALL AND MEDIUM SIZED ENTERPRISES - A Panel Data Approach
Authors:	Jose M. Esteves Sousa and Victor Wilfredo Bohorquez Lopez
Abstract:	Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) vendors have emphasized a positive impact of their ERP projects in company performance and in costs reduction. Recently, some researchers have started to analyze the impact on business performance of the organizational changes that complement IT investments. This study attempts to analyze the impact of ERP implementations in the SMEs’ number of employees and personnel costs. We have collected information of 168 Spanish SME during the period 1997-2005, concerning the type of purchased ERP, implementation period, number of employees, personnel costs and some financial indicators. We use two panel data models to compare and analyze the number of employees’ evolution and the related personnel costs, before and after ERP implementations. Our preliminary findings suggest that as bigger the SME as lower will be the decrease its number of employees. On the other hand, ERP impacts positively in personnel costs. This trend to increase personnel costs can be explained in the sense that SMEs using an ERP system need people not only with specific operative skills but also with a very holistic approach to understand and obtain maximum benefits to the ERP system.
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Paper Nr:	420
Title:	MEASURING CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS IN ERP PROJECTS - Results from a Case Study in a SME
Authors:	Joseph Trienekens and Pedro van Grinsven
Abstract:	Over the past decade many organizations are increasingly concerned with the implementation of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems. This counts for both large and small and medium sized companies. Implementation can be considered to be a process of change influenced by different so-called critical success factors (CSF) of type organizational, technological and human. This paper reports on the development of a measurement approach for managing CSF in an ERP implementation project in a small and medium sized company (SME). Critical success factors are being derived from project goals and subsequently measured in this project to monitor and control the implementation project.
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Paper Nr:	423
Title:	TOWARDS A CLOSED-LOOP BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE FRAMEWORK
Authors:	Oscar Mangisengi and Ngoc Thanh Huynh
Abstract:	An existing challenge is that organizations need to make business processes as the centrepiece of their strategy to enable the processes performing at higher level and to efficiently improve these processes in the global competition. Traditional Data Warehouse and OLAP tools, which have been used for data analysis in the Business Intelligence (BI) systems, are inadequate for delivering information faster to make decisions and to earlier identify failures of a business process. In this paper we propose a closed-loop BI framework that can be used for monitoring and analyzing a business process of an organization, optimizing the business process, and reporting cost based on activities. Business Activity Monitoring (BAM) as data resource of a control system is as the heart of this framework. Furthermore, to support such a BI system, we integrate an extracting, transforming, and loading tool that works based on rules and state of business process activities. We show that some functionalities of our prototype are working well. The tool can automatically transfer data into a data warehouse when conditions of rule and state have been satisfied.
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Paper Nr:	432
Title:	VALUE-BASED SOFTWARE PROJECT MANAGEMENT - A Business Perspective on Software Projects
Authors:	Anderson Itaborahy, Kathia Oliveira and Rildo Santos
Abstract:	When an organisation decides to invest in a software project it expects to get some value in return. Thus, decisions in software project management should be based on this expected value by trying to understand and influence its driver factors. However, despite the significant progress software engineering and project management has experienced in recent years, both disciplines work in a ‘value neutral’ context, by which is meant focusing on technical correctness and adherence to plans. This paper intends to contribute to a view of software project management based on business value by identifying value determinant factors in a software project and proposing some tools for recording and monitoring them. The proposed approach will be tested in a real project, in order to evaluate its applicability and usefulness in decision-making.
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Paper Nr:	433
Title:	INTRA-ORGANISATIONAL ERP LIFECYCLE KNOWLEDGE ISSUES
Authors:	Greg Timbrell
Abstract:	A study of 27 ERP systems in the Queensland Government revealed 41 issues clustered into seven major issue categories. Two of these categories described intra- and inter-organisational knowledge-related issues. This paper describes and discusses the intra-organisational knowledge issues arising from this research. These intra-organisational issues include insufficient knowledge in the user base, ineffective staff and knowledge retention strategies, inadequate training method and management, inadequate helpdesk knowledge resources, and finally, under-resourced helpdesk. When barriers arise in knowledge flows from sources such as implementation partner staff, training materials, trainers, and help desk staff, issues such as those reported in this paper arise in the ERP lifecycle.
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Paper Nr:	449
Title:	TOWARDS THE NEXT GENERATION OF SERVICE-ORIENTED FLEXIBLE COLLABORATIVE SYSTEMS - A Basic Framework Applied to Medical Research
Authors:	Jonas Schulte, Thorsten Hampel, Konrad Stark, Johann Eder and Erich Schikuta
Abstract:	Collaborative systems have to support specific functionalities in order to be useful for special fields of application and to fulfil those requirements. In this paper we introduce the Wasabi framework for collaborative systems, which is characterised by flexibility and adaptability. The framework implements a service oriented architecture and integrates different persistence layers. The requirement analysis for the Wasabi CSCW system is presented in the context of a collaborative environment for medical research which has strict requirements concerning data integrity. This paper shows the results of the requirement analysis and how these are implemented in the Wasabi architecture.
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Paper Nr:	484
Title:	MIGRATION BETWEEN CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS - Exploiting the JSR-170 Content Repository Standard
Authors:	Michael Nebeling, Grace Rumantir and Lindsay Smith
Abstract:	Content management systems (CMS) have evolved in diverse ways due to the lack of sufficient standards. Even amongst CMS supporting JSR-170, the recent Java standard to organise and access content repositories, incompatible content structures exist due to substantial differences in the implemented content models. This can be of primary concern when migration between CMS is required. This paper proposes a framework to enable automated migrations between CMS in the absence of consistency and uniformity in content structures. This framework serves as a starting point of a body of research to design a common content model which can be implemented in future CMS to facilitate migration between CMS based on JSR-170 and improve integration into existing information systems environments. This is illustrated via a simple website created using two of the most popular open-source CMS supporting JSR-170: Magnolia, and Alfresco. A model-based approach towards a generalised content structure is postulated to resolve the differences between the proprietary content structures as identified in the visualisation of the simple website created. The proposed model has been implemented in Jackrabbit, the JSR-170 reference implementation, and the proposed framework therefore contains simple methods to transform content structures between Magnolia and Alfresco using this Jackrabbit implementation as an intermediator.
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Paper Nr:	487
Title:	A VISUAL SPECIFICATION TOOL FOR EVENT-CONDITION-ACTION RULES SUPPORTING WEB-BASED DISTRIBUTED SYSTEM
Authors:	Wei Liu, Ying Qiao, Xiang Li, Kang Zhong, Hongan Wang and Guozhong Dai
Abstract:	Specifying Event-Condition-Action (ECA) rules is an important issue in the domain of active database. Current specification tools for ECA rules include visual specification tools and textual specification tools based on XML. Here, the visualization of ECA rules provides an easy-to-use interface in design/analysis tools for active database queries while the XML-based representation allows the exchange of ECA rules in a web-based distributed environment. Thus, a specification tool with advantages of both visual representation and XML-based representation is needed. In this paper we present and implement a new visual specification tool for ECA rules, called VSTE, to address this issue. We also use a web-based smart home system to evaluate our work.
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Paper Nr:	489
Title:	GATHERING PRODUCT DATA FROM SMART PRODUCTS
Authors:	Jan Nyman, Kary Främling and Vincent Michel
Abstract:	The enabling of data produced by product embedded sensor devices for use in product development could greatly benefit manufactures, while opening up new business opportunities. Currently products such as cars already have embedded sensor devices, but the data is usually not available for analysis in real-time. We propose that a world-wide, inter-organizational network for product data gathering should be created. The network should be based on open standards so that it can be widely adopted. It is important that a common, interoperable solution is accepted by all companies, big or small, to enable innovative new services to be developed. In this paper, the concept of the Internet of Things (IoT) is described. The PROMISE project is presented, and a distributed messaging system for product data gathering developed within the project is introduced. Practical experiences related to the implementation of the messaging system in a real application scenario are discussed.
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Paper Nr:	553
Title:	DATA MANAGEMENT AND INTEGRATION WITHIN COLLABORATIVE WORKING ENVIRONMENTS
Authors:	Matthias Assel and Alexander Kipp
Abstract:	With increasingly distributed and inhomogeneous resources, sharing knowledge, information, or data becomes more and more difficult and manageable for both, end-users and providers. To reduce administrative overheads and ease complicated and time-consuming integration tasks of widely dispersed (data) resources, quite a few solutions for collaborative data sharing and access have been designed and introduced in several European research projects for example in CoSpaces and ViroLab. These two projects basically concentrate on the development of collaborative working environments for different user communities such as engineering teams as well as health professionals with a particular focus on the integration of heterogeneous and large data resources into the system’s infrastructure. In this paper, we present the two approaches realised within CoSpaces and ViroLab to overcome the difficulties of integrating multiple data resources and making them accessible in a user-friendly but also secure way. We start with an analysis on systems’ specifications describing user and provider requirements for appropriate solutions. Finally, we conclude with an outlook and give some recommendations how those systems can be further enhanced in order to guarantee a certain level of dynamicity, scalability, reliability, and last but not least security and trustworthiness.
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Paper Nr:	555
Title:	A FRAMEWORK FOR PROTECTING EJB APPLICATIONS FROM MALICIOUS COMPONENTS
Authors:	Hieu Vo and Masato Suzuki
Abstract:	Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB) components in an EJB application can be obtained from various sources. These components may be in-house developed or bought from other vendors. In the latter case, the source code of the components is usually not available to application developers. The result is that the application may contain malicious components. We propose a framework called BFSec that protects EJB applications from vicious components. The framework examines bean methods invoked by each thread in applications and compares them with pre-defined business functions to check whether the latest calls of threads are proper. Unexpected calls, which are considered to be made by malicious components, will be blocked.
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Paper Nr:	556
Title:	CONFIGURATION FRAGMENTS AS THE DNA OF SYSTEM AND CHANGE PROPERTIES - Architectural Change of Component-based and Service-oriented Systems
Authors:	D'Arcy Walsh
Abstract:	The concept of a Configuration Fragment is adopted to help address the challenge of managing the different kinds of dependencies that exist during the evolution of component-based and service-oriented systems. Based upon a model of Architectural Change and an example of an application-specific context, Configuration Fragments are defined in order to express and reconcile change properties with respect to existing system properties. During system evolution, Configuration Fragments enable the configuration of Service and Service Protocol, Operation and Provided Service, Operation and Required Service, Operation and Operation, Operation and State Element, Operation and Composite Component, Component and Component, and Required Service and Provided Service dependencies. This occurs through configuration leading to association, disassociation, or refinement of these system elements.
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Paper Nr:	652
Title:	DeVisa - Concepts and Architecture of a Data Mining Models Scoring and Management Web System
Authors:	Diana Gorea
Abstract:	In this paper we describe DeVisa, a Web system for scoring and management of data mining models. The system has been designed to provide unified access to different prediction models using standard technologies based on XML. The prediction models are serialized in PMML format and managed using a native XML database system. The system provides functions such as scoring, model comparison, model selection or sequencing through a web service interface. DeVisa also defines a specialized PMML query language named PMQL used for specifying client requests and interaction with PMML repository. The paper analyzes the system’s architecture and functionality and discusses its use as a tool for researchers.
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Paper Nr:	654
Title:	HESITANCY IN COMMITTING TO LARGE-SCALE ENTERPRISE SYSTEMS SOLUTIONS - Experiences at a Multi-national Corporation
Authors:	Chris Barry and Wojtek Sikorski
Abstract:	While early cited benefits of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) or enterprise systems remain for the most part highly desirable, it is often the case that the promise of delivery differs from reality. Many now agree that achieving enterprise systems benefits is complex, cumbersome, risky and expensive. Furthermore many ERP projects do not fully achieve expectations. This paper takes a critical lens to the prospect of a firm achieving enterprise systems’ benefits and presents the findings of a case study that examines the underlying managerial and organizational reasons of one multi-national enterprise for, at least, postponing ERP implementation. It reveals a rich picture of implementation motivators, inhibitors and the perceived and real benefits of enterprise systems.
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Paper Nr:	667
Title:	AN APPROACH FOR SCHEMA VERSIONING IN MULTI-TEMPORAL XML DATABASES
Authors:	Zouhaier Brahmia and Rafik Bouaziz
Abstract:	Schema evolution keeps only the current data and the schema version after applying schema changes. On the contrary, schema versioning creates new schema versions and preserves old schema versions and their corresponding data. These two techniques have been investigated widely, both in the context of static and temporal databases. With the growing interest in XML and temporal XML data as well as the mechanisms for holding such data, the XML context within which data items are formatted also becomes an issue. Whereas much research work has recently focused on the problem of schema evolution in XML databases, less attention has been devoted to schema versioning in such databases. In this paper, we propose an approach for schema versioning in multi-temporal XML databases. This approach is based on the XML Schema language for describing XML schema, and is database consistency-preserving.
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Paper Nr:	670
Title:	A METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH FOR MEASURING B2B INTEGRATION READINESS OF SMES
Authors:	Spiros Mouzakitis, Aikaterini M. Sourouni, Fenareti Lampathaki and John Psarras
Abstract:	In the dawn of 21st century, companies are seeking ways to perform transactions efficiently and effectively. Enterprises must tackle B2B integration and adoption challenges in the short term in order to survive in such a competitive business environment of nowadays. However, most enterprises, and especially SMEs, lack the necessary technical and non-technical infrastructure as well the economic potential in order to efficiently adopt a B2B integration framework. This paper presents a methodological approach towards measuring the B2B integration readiness of Enterprises and the development of the software system to support it.
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Paper Nr:	694
Title:	WWW++ - Adding Why to What, When and Where
Authors:	Paris Pennesi, Mark Harrison, Chaithanya Rao, Chien Y. Wong and Srilakshmi Sivala
Abstract:	RFID technology can be used to its fullest potential only with software to supplement the hardware with powerful capabilities for data capture, filtering, counting and storage. The EPCglobal Network architecture encourages minimizing the amount of business logic embedded in the tags, readers and middleware. This creates the need for a Business Logic Layer above the event filtering layer that enhances basic observation events with business context - i.e. in addition to the (what, when, where) information about an observation, it adds context information about why the object was there. The purpose of this project is to develop an implementation of the Business Logic Layer. This application accepts observation event data (e.g. from the Application Level Events (ALE) standard interface), enriches them with business context and provides these enriched events to a repository of business-level events (e.g. via the EPC Information Services (EPCIS) capture interface). The strength of the application lies in the automatic addition of business context. It is quick and easy to adapt any business process to the framework suggested and equally easy to reconfigure it if the business process is changed. A sample application has been developed for a business scenario in the retail sector.
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Paper Nr:	705
Title:	AN ONTOLOGY-BASED APPROACH FOR SEMANTIC INTEROPERABILITY IN P2P SYSTEMS
Authors:	Deise B. Saccol, Rodrigo P. Noll, Nina Edelweiss and Renata Galante
Abstract:	In peer-to-peer (P2P) systems, files from the same application domain are spread over the network. When the user poses a query, the processing relies mainly on the flooding technique, which is quite inefficient for optimization purposes. To solve this issue, our work proposes to cluster documents from the same application domain into super peers. Thus, files related to the same universe of discourse are grouped and the query processing is restricted to a subset of the network. The clustering task involves: ontology generation, document and ontology matching, and metadata management. In this paper, we focus on the matching step.
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Paper Nr:	714
Title:	MULTI-DIMENSIONAL MODELING - Formal Specification and Verification of the Hierarchy Concept
Authors:	Ali Salem, Faiza Ghozzi and hanen ben-abdallah
Abstract:	The quality of a data mart (DM) tightly depends on the quality of its multidimensional model. This quality dependence motivated several research efforts to define a set of constraints on the DM model/schema. Currently proposed constraints are either incomplete, or informally presented, which may lead to ambiguous interpretations. The work presented in this paper is a first step towards the definition of a formal framework for the specification and the verification of the quality of DM schemas. In this framework, the quality is expressed in terms of both the syntactic well-formedness of the DM schema as well as its semantic soundness with respect to the DM instances. More precisely, this paper first formalizes in Z the constraints pertinent to the hierarchy concept; the formalization is treated at the meta-model level. Secondly, the paper illustrates how the formalization can be instantiated and the constraints are verified for a particular sample model through the theorem prover Z\eves.
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Paper Nr:	720
Title:	SCHEMA EVOLUTION IN WIKIPEDIA - Toward a Web Information System Benchmark
Authors:	Carlo A. Curino, Hyun J. Moon , Letizia Tanca and Carlo Zaniolo
Abstract:	Evolving the database that is at the core of an Information System represents a difficult maintenance problem that has only been studied in the framework of traditional information systems. However, the problem is likely to be even more severe in web information systems, where open-source software is often developed through the contributions and collaboration of many groups and individuals. Therefore, in this paper, we present an in-depth analysis of the evolution history of the Wikipedia database and its schema; Wikipedia is the best-known example of a large family of web information systems built using the open-source software MediaWiki. Our study is based on: (i) a set of Schema Modification Operators that provide a simple conceptual representation for complex schema changes, and (ii) simple software tools to automate the analysis. This framework allowed us to dissect and analyze the 4.5 years of Wikipedia history, which was short in time, but intense in terms of growth and evolution. Beyond confirming the initial hunch about the severity of the problem, our analysis suggests the need for developing better methods and tools to support graceful schema evolution. Therefore, we briefly discuss documentation and automation support systems for database evolution, and suggest that the Wikipedia case study can provide the kernel of a benchmark for testing and improving such systems.
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Paper Nr:	739
Title:	TOWARDS A METHODOLOGY FOR MODELLING INTEROPERABILITY BETWEEN COLLABORATING ENTERPRISES
Authors:	Anders Carstensen, Kurt Sandkuhl and Lennart Holmberg
Abstract:	In this paper we have described a collaboration study between two companies in a networked organisation. The main contribution is the connector view by which it is possible to model the collaboration without major changes in existing enterprise models, although the collaboration actually may effect several elements in the original model. Supporting objects are used to connect elements in the connector view to the original model, thereby establishing correspondences between the connector view and the enterprise view.
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Paper Nr:	745
Title:	A STUDY OF THE SPATIAL REPRESENTATION IN MULTIDIMENSIONAL MODELS
Authors:	Concepción M. Gascueña and Rafael Guadalupe
Abstract:	In this work, we do an analysis on the different models proposed to model Multidimensional Databases MDB, and Spatial Databases SD. We analyze the basic and advanced rules that the conceptual multidimensional models should to support, according sort criterion exposed for some authors. As result of this study, we propose to add new rules to gather the spatial and temporal semantics. Are analyzed some of models more relevant, and a comparative table is presented, where the advantages of the model called FactEntity FE, with respect to the other examined modes, to collect multidimensional and spatial semantics, is obvious. We emphasizing on the novel contributions of FE model and shortcomings of the rest of seen models. We besides show a formalization of the FE model with a metamodel made up with the extended ER model, where the semantics of FE model is representing. Finally, an example of application clarifies our exposure.
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Paper Nr:	746
Title:	TOWARDS A METHOD FOR ENTERPRISE INFORMATION SYSTEMS INTEGRATION
Authors:	Rafael W. Silveira Delgado, Joan Pastor and Enric Mayol
Abstract:	Enterprise information systems integration is essential for organizations to fulfil interoperability requirements between applications and business processes. To carry out most typical integration requirements, traditional software development methodologies are not suitable. Neither are enterprise package implementation methodologies. Thus, specific ad-hoc methodologies are needed for information systems integration. This paper proposes the basis for a new method for enterprise information systems integration in order to facilitate continuous learning and centralized management during all the integration process. This method has been developed based on the ontology defined in ISO/IEC 24744.
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Paper Nr:	809
Title:	STUDY OF CHALLENGES AND TECHNIQUES IN LARGE SCALE MATCHING
Authors:	Sana Sellami, Aïcha-Nabila Benharkat, Youssef Amghar and Rami Rifaieh
Abstract:	Matching Techniques are becoming a very attractive research topic. With the development and the use of a large variety of data (e.g. DB schemas, ontologies, taxonomies), in many domains (e.g. libraries, life science, etc), Matching Techniques are called to overcome the challenge of aligning and reconciling these different interrelated representations. In this paper, we are interested in studying large scale matching approaches. We define a quality of Matching (QoM) that can be used to evaluate large scale Matching systems. We survey the techniques of large scale matching, when a large number of schemas/ontologies and attributes are involved. We attempt to cover a variety of techniques for schema matching called Pair-wise and Holistic, as well as a set of useful optimization techniques. One can acknowledge that this domain is on top of effervescence and large scale matching need much more advances. So, we propose a contribution that deals with the creation of a hybrid approach that combines these techniques.
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Paper Nr:	827
Title:	CONCEPTUAL UNIVERSAL DATABASE LANGUAGE (CUDL) AND ENTERPRISE MEDICAL INFORMATION SYSTEMS
Authors:	Nikitas Karanikolas, Christos Skourlas, Maria Nitsiou and Emmanuel J. Yannakoudakis
Abstract:	Today, there is an increased trend for Electronic Patient Records (EPR) incorporating and correlating heterogeneous information imported from various sources and from different medical applications. New possibilities are also given by the rapid technological progress and the development of independent software applications and tools that handle multimedia medical data. Moreover, users (e.g. doctors, nurses) often prefer to use general purpose software (e.g. word processors) and specific applications and tools for organizing and accessing medical data and they only partially use Hospital Information Systems (HIS). Therefore, it is necessary for the HIS to provide the capability for encapsulating in their EPR externally created information. Dynamic evolution of the HIS must also be supported by flexible Database schemata. In this paper, we conclude that modern HIS should be designed and implemented using database management systems offering new enhanced database models and manipulation languages. Eventually, we describe and discuss how to use the Frame Database Model (FDB) and the new Conceptual Universal Database Language (CUDL) for supporting dynamic schema evolution and covering the needs of the users.
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Paper Nr:	832
Title:	TRANSACTIONAL SUPPORT IN NATIVE XML DATABASES
Authors:	Theo Härder, Sebastian Bächle and Christian Mathis
Abstract:	Apparently, everything that can be said about concurrency control and recovery is already said. None the less, the XML model poses new problems for the optimization of transaction processing. In this position paper, we report on our view concerning XML transaction optimization. We explore aspects of fine-grained transaction isolation using tailor-made lock protocols. Furthermore, we outline XML storage techniques where storage representation and logging can be minimized in specific application scenarios.
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Paper Nr:	839
Title:	A STORE OF JAVA OBJECTS ON A MULTICOMPUTER
Authors:	Mariusz Bedla and Krzysztof Sapiecha
Abstract:	The research deals with Object Oriented versions of Scalable Distributed Data Structures (OOSDDS) to store Java objects in serialized form. OOSDDS can be used as a part of distributed object store. In the paper an architecture for object version of RP* is introduced and its implementation for Java objects is given. Finally performance of the new architecture is evaluated.
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Paper Nr:	840
Title:	SUCCINCT ACCESS CONTROL POLICIES FOR PUBLISHED XML DATASETS
Authors:	Tomasz Müldner, Jan K. Miziolek and Gregory Leighton
Abstract:	We consider the setting of secure publishing of XML documents, in which read-only access control policies (ACPs) over static XML datasets are enforced using cryptographic keys. The role-based access control (RBAC) model provides a flexible method for specifying such policies. Extending the RBAC model to include role parameterization addresses the problem of role proliferation which can occur in large scale systems. In this paper, we describe the complete design of a parameterized RBAC (PRBAC) model for XML documents. We also describe algorithms for generating the minimum number of keys required to enforce an arbitrary PRBAC policy; for distributing to each user only keys needed for decrypting accessible nodes; and for applying the minimal number of encryption operations to an XML document required to satisfy the protection requirements of the policy. The time complexity of our approach is linear w.r.t. document size and the number of roles.
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Paper Nr:	21
Title:	DATA INTEGRATION IN BIOLOGICAL MODELS
Authors:	Perfecto Mariño, Fernando P. Fontán, Miguel Ángel Domínguez and Santiago Otero
Abstract:	Biological research in agriculture needs a lot of specialized electronic sensors in order to fulfill different goals, like as: climate monitoring, soil and fruit assessment, crop tracking, and so on. That research must be supported by consistent biological models able to simulate diverse environmental conditions, in order to predict the right human actions before risky biological damage could be irreversible. In this paper is described an experimental distributed network based on climatic an biological wireless sensors, for providing real measurements in order to validate different biological models used for viticulture applications.
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Paper Nr:	69
Title:	DEVELOPING THE SKILLS NEEDED FOR REQUIREMENT ELICITATION IN GLOBAL SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
Authors:	Miguel Romero, Aurora Vizcaino and Mario Piattini
Abstract:	The requirement elicitation stage is that which is most critical in the development of a software product. However, this stage is not covered on teaching courses with the required depth, nor is invested the necessary time in training students and practitioners in these tasks. There is currently a trend towards global software development (GSD) which complicates the process of elicitation requirements since, for instance, communication is more difficult because stakeholders are geographically distributed. Moreover, the elicitation in GSD involves a variety of characteristics that are not often taught in software engineering courses. This paper presents some of the most important factors which may affect elicitation in GSD. Furthermore, we propose techniques with which to help students and software engineers to develop some of the skills needed to carry out the elicitation process in GSD.
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Paper Nr:	131
Title:	A PROPOSAL OF SOFTWARE ARCHITECTURE FOR MULTIPLATFORM ENVIRONMENT APPLICATIONS DEVELOPMENT - A Quantitative Study
Authors:	André Luiz de Oliveira, André Luis Andrade Menolli and Ricardo Gonçalves Coelho
Abstract:	Due to the problems caused by the increase of the complexity and dimension of the software systems, becomes necessary the adoption of patterns and principles of software to deal with those problems. For this reason, the software architecture appears as new discipline in the Software Engineering field that is already being applied thoroughly in several areas. However there is a shortage of architectures proposals addressed for the multiplatform systems development. In this work it is proposed a software architecture for development of those systems. The project of that architecture model is based in the Data Access Object, Facade and Singleton patterns. The validation process of that architecture model used the three layer software architecture model as evaluation parameter, in which it was developed a quantitative assessment of two implementations of an application, one using the three layer architecture model and other using the proposed model. This study used strong software engineering attributes, such as separation of concerns, coupling, cohesion and size like evaluation criteria. As results, it was verified that the adoption of the architecture model presented in this work provides a better separation of concerns presents in the application components in relation to implementation using the three layer architecture model.
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Paper Nr:	136
Title:	RESOURCE AGGREGATION IN DIGITAL LIBRARIES - Static vs Dynamic Protocols
Authors:	Pedro Almeida, Marco Fernands, Joaquim Arnaldo Martins and Joaquim Sousa Pinto
Abstract:	This article analyses development of static and dynamic protocols to aggregate metadata and resources from heterogeneous systems. In particular, it compares the advantages and drawbacks of both types of protocols and presents a case study of the University of Aveiro Information System as an example of the possibilities of dynamic resource aggregation systems.
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Paper Nr:	240
Title:	SQS: A SECURE XML QUERYING SYSTEM
Authors:	Wei Li and Cindy Chen
Abstract:	Contemporary XML database querying systems have to deal with a rapidly growing amount of data and a large number of users. As a consequence, if access control is used to protect sensitive XML data at a fine-grained level, it is inefficient when it comes to query evaluation, since it is difficult to enforce access control on each node in an XML document when the user’s view needs to be computed. We design and develop a secure XML querying system, namely SQS, where caching is used to store query results and security information. Depending on whether there is a cache hit, user queries are rewritten into secure system queries that are executed either on the cached query results or on the original XML document. We propose a new cache replacement policy LSL, which updates the cache based on the security level of each entry. We also demonstrate the performance of the system.
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Paper Nr:	263
Title:	A MEDICAL INFORMATION SYSTEM BASED ON ORACLE TECHNOLOGIES
Authors:	Liana Stanescu, Dumitru D. Burdescu, Cosmin S. Spahiu, Anca Ion and Cristian Guran
Abstract:	The paper presents an information system based on Oracle technologies (Oracle Database, Oracle interMedia and Oracle JDeveloper) dedicated for managing and querying medical multimedia databases. The database contains images related to the internal medicine area. This on-line application allows creation of complex medical files of patients that can be viewed and updated both by internist and general practitioner. The main functions of the application are: managing patients contact information, examinations, imagery and content-based visual query using color, texture and shape characteristics. It can be used in individual offices, laboratories or in the hospital clinics and departments. The application provides security and confidentiality for patient’s data.
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Paper Nr:	266
Title:	A GENERATIVE APPROACH TO IMPROVE THE ABSTRACTION LEVEL TO BUILD APPLICATIONS BASED ON THE NOTIFICATION OF CHANGES IN DATABASES
Authors:	Jose Ramon Coz, RUBEN HERADIO GIL, Cerrada Jose A. and JOSE CARLOS LOPEZ RUIZ
Abstract:	This paper highlights the benefits, in terms of quality, productivity and time-to-market, of applying a generative approach to increase the abstraction level to build applications based on the notification of changes in databases. Most of the databases maintain meta-tables with information about all stored tables; this information is used in an automatic process to define the software product line (SPL) variability. The remaining variability can be specified by means of domain specific languages. Code generators can automatically query the meta-tables, analyze the input specifications and configure the current product. The paper also introduces the Exemplar Driven Development process to incrementally develop code generators and the Exemplar Flexibilization Language that supports the process implementation.
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Paper Nr:	287
Title:	ERP TRENDS - Mobile Applications and Portal
Authors:	OCTAVIAN DOSPINESCU, Marin Fotache, Adrian B. Munteanu and Luminiţa Hurbean
Abstract:	Wireless applications provide new opportunities for organizations: in order to take advantage from the features of ubiquitous environment, ERP systems have to support the mobile behaviour of their users. The paper explores the mobile applications landscape and proposes an architecture model for the mobile services starting from the necessary unidentified functionalities for a portal of mobile services. Besides the general architecture of a portal of mobile applications for companies, a set of minimal functionalities for implementation is proposed in order to ensure the promotion and use of services.
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Paper Nr:	290
Title:	INTEGRATING LABOR SKILLS CERTIFICATION WITH TRADITIONAL TRAINING FOR ELECTRIC POWER OPERATORS
Authors:	Ricardo Molina-González, Israel Paredes, M. Domínguez, Liliana Argotte and N. Jácome
Abstract:	In this paper the integration of a traditional training system with a competence management model is conceptually described. The resulting e-system is accessed through powerful Web interfaces and contains a comprehensive database that maintains information of the two models. The traditional model emphasizes the contractual worker training rights and the skills model the alignment of the human talent with the mission and objectives of the company. The paper describes the specific traditional training model of CFE (Federal Electricity Commission), its competences model and the integration of the two models following a thematic contents approach.
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Paper Nr:	330
Title:	A SOFTWARE ARCHITECTURE FOR KNOWLEDGE DISCOVERY IN DATABASE
Authors:	Maria Dias, Lúcio G. Valentim and José Carvalho
Abstract:	Currently, most of the companies have computational systems to provide support to the operational routines. Technologies of data warehousing and data mining have appeared to solve the problem of search for necessary and trustworthy information for decision-making. However, the existing solutions do not enclose those two technologies; some of them are directed to the construction of a data warehouse and others to the application of data mining techniques. This paper presents a software architecture that defines the components necessary for implementation of knowledge discovery systems in database. Some standards of best practices in projects and in development were used since the definition until the implementation.
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Paper Nr:	343
Title:	DISTRIBUTED SYSTEM FOR DISCOVERING SIMILAR DOCUMENTS
Authors:	Jan Kasprzak, Michal Brandejs, Miroslav Křipač and Pavel Šmerk
Abstract:	One of the drawbacks of e-learning methods such as Web-based submission and evaluation of students’ papers and essays is that it has become easier for students to plagiarize the work of other people. In this paper we present a computer-based system for discovering similar documents, which has been in use at Masaryk University in Brno since August 2006, and which will also be used in the forthcoming Czech national archive of graduate theses. We also focus on practical aspects of this system: achieving near real-time response to newly imported documents, and computational feasibility of handling large sets of documents on commodity hardware. We also show the possibilities and problems with parallelization of this system for running on a distributed cluster of computers.
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Paper Nr:	366
Title:	A STUDY OF DATA QUALITY ISSUES IN MOBILE TELECOM OPERATORS
Authors:	Naiem K. yeganeh and Shazia Sadiq
Abstract:	Telecommunication operators currently servicing mobile users world-wide have dramatically increased in the last few years. Although most of the operators use similar technologies and equipment provided by world leaders in the field such as Ericsson, Nokia-Siemens, Motorola, etc, it can be observed that many vendors utilize propriety methods and processes for maintaining network status and collecting statistical data for detailed monitoring of network elements. This data forms their competitive differentiation and hence is extremely valuable for the organization. However, in this paper we will demonstrate through a case study based on a GSM operator in Iran, how this mission critical data can be fraught with serious data quality problems, leading to diminished capacity to take appropriate action and ultimately achieve customer satisfaction. We will further present a taxonomy of data quality problems derived from the case study. A breif survey of reported literature on data quality is presented in the context of the taxonomy, which can not only be utilized as a framework to classify and understand data quality problems in the telecommunication domain but can also be used for other domains with similar information systems landscapes.
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Paper Nr:	369
Title:	OUTLINING VALUE ASSESSMENT FOR SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS
Authors:	Pasi Ojala
Abstract:	Understanding software requirements and customer needs is vital for all SW companies around the world. Lately clearly more attention has been focused also on the costs, cost-effectiveness, productivity and value of software development and products. This study outlines concepts, principles and process of implementing a value assessment for SW requirements. The main purpose of this study is to collect experiences whether the value assessment for product requirements is useful for companies, works in practice, and what are the strengths and weaknesses of using it. This is done by implementing value assessment in a case company step by step to see which phases possibly work and which phases possibly do not work. The practical industrial case shows that proposed value assessment for product requirements is useful and supports companies trying to find value in their products.
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Paper Nr:	383
Title:	GUI GENERATION BASED ON LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS - A Model to Generate GUI, based on Source Code with Custom Attributes
Authors:	Marco Monteiro, Paula Oliveira and Ramiro Gonçalves
Abstract:	Due to data-driven application nature and its increasing complexity, developing its user interface can be a repetitive and time-consuming activity. Consequently, developers tend to focus more on the user interface aspects and less on business related code. In this paper, we’re presenting an alternative approach to graphical user interface development for data-driven applications, that allows developers to refocus on the source code and concentrate their efforts on application core logic. The key concept behind our approach is the generation of concrete graphical user interface from a source code based model, which includes the original source code metadata and non-intrusive declarative language extensions that describes the user interface structure. Concrete user interface implementation will be delegated to specialized software packages, developed by external entities, that provides complete graphical user interfaces services to the application. When applying our approach, we’re expecting faster graphical user interface development.
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Paper Nr:	387
Title:	A NOVEL APPROACH TO SUPPORT CHANGE IMPACT ANALYSIS IN THE MAINTENANCE OF SOFTWARE SYSTEMS
Authors:	Guenter Pirklbauer and Michael Rappl
Abstract:	The costs for enhancing and maintaining software systems are up to 75% of the total development costs. It is therefore important to provide appropriate methods, techniques and tools for supporting the maintenance phase of the software life cycle. One major maintenance task is the analysis and validation of change impacts. Existing approaches address change impact analysis, but using them in practice raises specific problems. Tools for change impact analysis must be able to deal with analysis- and design-models which are not compliant with the released software system. These models are not a good basis to perform change impact analysis. The proposed approach combines methods of dynamic dependency analysis and change coupling analysis to detect physical and logical dependencies between software components. The goal is to detect low-level artefacts and dependencies based on only up-to-date and system-conform data, including logfiles, the service repository, the versioning system database and the change management system database. The implementation of the approach supports both the management and developers.
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Paper Nr:	430
Title:	A GOAL METHOD FOR CONCEPTUAL DATA WAREHOUSE DESIGN
Authors:	Leopoldo Zepeda, Ramon Zatarain and Matilde Celma
Abstract:	In this paper, we present a goal-oriented method for DW analysis requirements. This paper shows how goal modelling contributes to a logical scoping and analysis of the application domain to elicit the information requirements, from which the conceptual multidimensional schema is derived.
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Paper Nr:	443
Title:	DESIGNING XML PIVOT MODELS FOR MASTER DATA INTEGRATION VIA UML PROFILE
Authors:	Ludovic Menet and Myriam Lamolle
Abstract:	The federation of data sources and the definition of pivot models are strongly interrelated topics. This paper explores the difficulties of a mediation solution based on XML architecture and the concept of Master Data Management. In this solution, pivot models use the standard XML Schema allowing the definition of complex data structures. To date, the graphical modeling of XML Schema models is not standardized. The introduction of a models definition formalism is a mean to make modeling more accessible. UML is a modeling object language which is more and more used and recognized as a standard in the software engineering field, which makes it an ideal candidate for the modeling of XML Schema models. In this purpose we introduce features of the UML formalism, through a profile, to facilitate the collaborative definition and the exchange of these models, and to introduce the capacity to express semantic constraints in XML models. These constraints will be used to perform data factorisation and to optimise data operations.
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Paper Nr:	510
Title:	A METADATA MODEL FOR KNOWLEDGE DISCOVERY IN DATABASE
Authors:	José Carvalho and Maria Dias
Abstract:	Metadata are deeply necessary in an environment of Knowledge Discovery in Database (KDD), once they are the responsible for the whole documentation of information on data that integrate a data warehouse (DW), being the latter used to store the data about the organization business. Such data usually come from several data sources, thus the metadata format should be independent on the platform. The system inter-operability can be solved, by using XML (Extensible Markup Language). Therefore, in the present paper a metadata model for KDD, in XML format, and a manager of metadata are presented. The manager was implemented in Java, which provides support to the model presently proposed.
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Paper Nr:	511
Title:	SEMANTIC INTEROPERABILITY - Information Integration by using Ontology Mapping in Industrial Environment
Authors:	Irina Peltomaa, Heli Helaakoski and Juha Tuikkanen
Abstract:	Interoperability requires two components technical and information integration. Most of the enterprises have solved the problem of technical integration but at the moment they are struggling with information integration. The challenge in information integration is to preserve the meaning of information in different context. Semantic technologies can provide means for information integration by representing the meaning of information. This paper introduces how to use semantics by developing ontology models based on enterprise information. Different ontology models from diverse sources and applications can be mapped together in order to provide integrated view for different information sources. The domain area of this case study is heavy industrial environment with multiple applications and data sources.
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Paper Nr:	650
Title:	A FRAMEWORK FOR DATA CLEANING IN DATA WAREHOUSES
Authors:	Taoxin Peng
Abstract:	It is a persistent challenge to achieve a high quality of data in data warehouses. Data cleaning is a crucial task for such a challenge. To deal with this challenge, a set of methods and tools has been developed. However, there are still at least two questions needed to be answered: How to improve the efficiency while performing data cleaning? How to improve the degree of automation when performing data cleaning? This paper challenges these two questions by presenting a novel framework, which provides an approach to managing data cleaning in data warehouses by focusing on the use of data quality dimensions, and decoupling a cleaning process into several sub-processes. Initial test run of the processes in the framework demonstrates that the approach presented is efficient and scalable for data cleaning in data warehouses.
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Paper Nr:	655
Title:	ITERATIVE XML SEARCH BASED ON DATA AND ASSOCIATED SEMANTICS
Authors:	Alda L. Gancarski, Pedro Rangel Henriques and Flavio Xavier Ferreira
Abstract:	In a previous work in the context of information retrieval, XQuery was extended with an iterative paradigm. This extension helps the user getting the desired results from queries. In a related work, XQuery was also extended to allow the inclusion of SPARQL queries; this is useful when XML documents are associated with semantic RDF descriptions. However integrating SPARQL in XQuery queries makes the construction of queries more complex (although more powerful). To leverage this integration, we propose to apply the iterative paradigm to the ‘SPARQL extension to XQuery’. In the paper this proposal is introduced and justified and a case study is presented.
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Paper Nr:	660
Title:	COMPLEX EVENT PROCESSING FOR SENSOR BASED DATA AUDITING
Authors:	Christian Lettner, Christian Hawel, Thomas Steinmaurer and Dirk Draheim
Abstract:	Current legislation demands organizations to responsibly manage sensitive data. To achieve compliance, data auditing must be implemented in information systems. In this paper we propose a data auditing architecture that creates data audit reports out of simple audit events at the technical level. We use complex event processing (CEP) technology to obtain composed audit events out of simple audit events. In two scenarios we show how complex audit events can be built for business processes and application users, when one database user is shared between many application users, as found in multi-tier architectures.
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Paper Nr:	672
Title:	KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT IN INFORMATION SYSTEM DESIGN AND DELIVERY PROCESS - An Application to the Design of a Legal Information System
Authors:	Ovidiu VASUTIU, Youssef Amghar, David JOUVE and Jean-Marie PINON
Abstract:	Nowadays information systems are more and more important for all types of organizations. To deal with the complex technologies available, IT specialists use proven best practices inspired from more comprehensive process frameworks for software and systems delivery or implementation and for effective project management. Methods developed to support theses processes produce many different heterogeneous resources (design documents and models, planning, project prototypes, etc...). Due to the continuously changing reality, designers will always have to consider new user and stakeholders requirements and go back to the starting design case for an update. In this paper we present an organizational and technical infrastructure for a collaborative design process management system which automates mechanisms to assure the coherence and consistency of these heterogeneous and continuously updated resources.
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Paper Nr:	699
Title:	USING ONTOLOGY META DATA FOR DATA WAREHOUSING
Authors:	Alberto Salguero, Francisco Araque and Cecilia Delgado Negrete
Abstract:	One of the most complex issues of the integration and transformation interface is the case where there are multiple sources for a single data element in the enterprise Data Warehouse (DW). There are many facets due to the number of variables that are needed in the integration phase. However we are interested in the integration of temporal and spatial problem due to the nature of DWs. This paper presents our ontology based DW architecture for temporal integration on the basis of the temporal and spatial properties of the data and temporal characteristics of the data sources. The proposal shows the steps for the transformation of the native schemes of the data sources into the DW scheme and end user scheme and the use of an ontology model as the common data model.
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Paper Nr:	718
Title:	A PROTOCOL TO CONTROL REPLICATION IN DISTRIBUTED REAL-TIME DATABASE SYSTEMS
Authors:	Anis H. Said, Bruno Sadeg, Laurent Amanton and Bechir Ayeb
Abstract:	Data replication is often used in distributed database systems to improve both fault tolerance and performance purposes. However, such systems must ensure replicas consistency. In this paper, we discuss the contributions of data replication in distributed real-time database systems (DRTDBS) and we then present RT-RCP, a replication control protocol we designed for DRTDBS. We introduce a new entity called List of available copies (LAC) which is a list related to each data item in the database. A LAC of a data item contains all or a part of references of its updated replicas. This allows the database to have a dynamic level of replication.
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Paper Nr:	736
Title:	ERP IMPLEMENTATION CHALLENGES - Vendors’ Perspective
Authors:	Jim Otieno
Abstract:	Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems have transformed the way organizations go about the process of providing information systems. They promise to provide an off-the-shelf solution to the information needs of organizations. Despite that promise, implementation projects are plagued with much publicized failures and abandoned projects. Efforts to make ERP systems successful in organizations are facing challenges. The purpose of the study reported in this paper was to investigate the challenges faced by organisations implementing ERP systems in Kenya based on consultant point of view. Based on the factors identified from the interview, a survey was administered to ERP consultants from five Kenyan organisations that were identified as having a key role in ERP systems implementation in their firms in order to assess the criticality of the identified challenges. A factor analysis of these items identified six underlying dimensions. The findings of this study should provide to management of firms implementing ERP systems a better understanding of the likely challenges they may face and put in place appropriate measure to help in mitigating the risk of implementation failures.
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Paper Nr:	738
Title:	IMPLEMENTING THE DATA ACCESS OBJECT PATTERN USING ASPECTJ
Authors:	André Luiz de Oliveira, André Luis Andrade Menolli and Ricardo Gonçalves Coelho
Abstract:	Due to the constant need of access and information storage, there is a constant concern for implementing those functionalities in large part of the currently developed applications. The most of those applications use the Data Access Object pattern to implement those functionalities, once that this pattern makes possible the separation of the data access code of the application code. However your implementation exposes the data access object to others application objects, causing situations in that a business object access the data access object. With the objective of solving this problem, this paper proposes an aspect oriented implementation of this pattern, followed by a quantitative evaluation of both, object oriented (OO) and aspect oriented (AO), implementations of this pattern. This study used strong software engineering attributes such as, separation of interests, coupling and cohesion, as evaluation criteria.
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Paper Nr:	743
Title:	THE MOTION PICTURE PARADIGM FOR MANAGING INFORMATION - A Framework and Approach to Supporting the Play and Replay of Information in Computerised Information Systems
Authors:	Bing Wu, Kudakwashe Dube and Essam Mansour
Abstract:	The ability of Information Systems to provide a continuous, on-the-fly and playable information scene for any specified review period of arbitrary time granularity would help to enhance the reporting and decision-support capabilities of CIS. This paper presents a new paradigm, called the motion picture paradigm, for information management. The paradigm views an organisation’s database and information system as a mechanism for recording motion pictures of organisational information scenes that can be queried and presented through on-the-fly, dynamic and interactive play and re-play operations.
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Paper Nr:	744
Title:	USING A DATAWAREHOUSE TO EXTRACT KNOWLEDGE FROM ROBOCUP TEAMS
Authors:	Isabel Gonzalez, Pedro Abreu and Luís Paulo Reis
Abstract:	RoboCup is a scientific and educational, international project that involves artificial intelligence, robotics and sport sciences. In these competitions, teams of all around the world participated in distinct leagues. In the begining of the Coach competition, one of RocoCup leagues,the goal of the researchers was to develop an agent (Coach that provides advices to teammates about how to act and with improve team performance. Using the resulting improved coach agent, with enhanced statistic calculation abilities, a huge amount of statistical data was gathered from the games held at Bremen 2006. This data was then stored and treated in a data warehouse system obtaining a good high level perspective/knowledge of the RoboCup simulated soccer tournament. According to the results, the team that represented our country, has a much more goal opportunities in comparison with the majority of the teams, but this team did not score many goals. In terms of more occupied regions, the best four teams in the tournament did not occupy many times the left and right wings, compared to others regions. In the future the our country team needs to develop new strategies that use these two areas preferrentialy in order to achieve better results.
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Paper Nr:	749
Title:	SODDA – A SERVICE-ORIENTED DISTRIBUTED DATABASE ARCHITECTURE
Authors:	Breno M. Rabelo and Clodoveu Augusto Davis Jr.
Abstract:	The dissemination of information systems over computer networks has reinforced the interest on distributed database management systems (DDBMS). A review on the architecture of such systems is motivated by the wide availability of networking resources, which allows the cost of communication among the nodes to be reduced. Besides, the coming of age of syntactic interoperability standards, such as XML, and of service-based networking allow for new alternatives for the implementation and deployment of distributed databases. This paper proposes the adoption of elements from service-oriented architectures for the implementation of the connections among distributed database components, thus configuring a service-oriented distributed database architecture.
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Paper Nr:	769
Title:	K-MEANS BASED APPROACH FOR OLAP DIMENSION UPDATES
Authors:	Fadila Bentayeb
Abstract:	Actual data warehouses models usually consider OLAP dimensions as static entities. However, in practice, structural changes of dimensions schema are often necessary to adapt the multidimensional database to changing requirements. This paper presents a new structural update operator for OLAP dimensions, named Rollup-WithKmeans based on k-means clustering method. This operator allows to create a new level to which, a pre-existent level in an OLAP dimension hierarchy rolls up. To define the domain of the new level and the aggregation function from an existing level to the new level, our operator classifies all instances of an existing level into k clusters with the k-means clustering algorithm. To choose features for k-means clustering, we pro- pose two solutions. The first solution uses descriptors of the pre-existent level in its dimension table while the second one proposes to describe the new level by measures attributes in the fact table. Moreover, we carried out some experimentations within Oracle 10 g DBMS which validated the relevance of our approach.
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Paper Nr:	837
Title:	GREEN COMPUTING - A Case for Data Caching and Flash Disks?
Authors:	Karsten Schmidt, Theo Härder, Joachim Klein and Steffen Reithermann
Abstract:	Green computing or energy saving when processing information is primarily considered a task of processor development. However, this position paper advocates that a holistic approach is necessary to reduce power consumption to a minimum. We discuss the potential of integrating NAND flash memory into DB-based architectures and its support by adjusted DBMS algorithms governing IO processing. The goal is to drastically improve energy efficiency while comparable performance as is disk-based systems is maintained.
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Paper Nr:	853
Title:	SCHEMA MAPPING FOR RDBMS
Authors:	Calin-Adrian Comes, Ioan Ovidiu Spatacean, Daniel Stefan, Beatrice Stefan, Lucian Dorel Savu, Vasile P. Bresfelean and Nicolae Ghisoiu
Abstract:	Schema mapping is a specification that describes how data structured from one schema S the source schema is to be transformed into data structured under schema T, the target schema. Schemata S and T without triggers and/or stored procedures(functions and procedures) are statical. In this article, we propose a Schema Mapping Model specification that describes the conversion of a Schema Model from one Platform-Specific Model to other Platform-Specific Model according to Meta-Object Facility-Query/Verify/Transform in dynamical mode.
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Area 2 - Artificial Intelligence and Decision Support Systems

Full Papers

Paper Nr:	55
Title:	AN ENHANCED SYSTEM FOR PATTERN RECOGNITION AND SUMMARISATION OF MULTI-BAND SATELLITE IMAGES
Authors:	Hema Nair
Abstract:	This paper presents an enhanced system developed in Java® for pattern recognition and pattern summarisation in multi-band (RGB) satellite images. Patterns such as island, land, water body, river, fire, urban settlement in such images are extracted and summarised in linguistic terms using fuzzy sets. Some elements of supervised classification are utilised in the system to assist in the development of linguistic summaries. Results of testing the system to analyse and summarise patterns in SPOT MS images and LANDSAT images are also discussed.
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Paper Nr:	122
Title:	ANOMALY DETECTION ALGORITHMS IN BUSINESS PROCESS LOGS
Authors:	Fábio Bezerra and Jacques Wainer
Abstract:	In some domains of application, like software development and health care processes, a normative business process system (e.g. workflow management system) is not appropriate because a flexible support is needed to the participants. On the other hand, while it is important to support flexibility of execution in these domains, security requirements can not be met whether these systems do not offer extra control, which characterizes a trade off between flexibility and security in such domains. This work presents and assesses a set of anomaly detection algorithms in logs of Process Aware Systems (PAS). The detection of an anomalous instance is based on the “noise” which an instance makes in a process model discovered by a process mining algorithm. As a result, a trace that is an anomaly for a discovered model will require more structural changes for this model fit it than a trace that is not an anomaly. Hence, when aggregated to PAS, these methods can support the coexistence of security and flexibility.
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Paper Nr:	352
Title:	RULE EVOLUTION APPROACH FOR MINING MULTIVARIATE TIME SERIES DATA
Authors:	Viet A. Nguyen and Vivekanand Gopalkrishnan
Abstract:	In the last few decades, due to the massive explosion of data over the world, time series data mining has attracted numerous researches and applications. Most of these works only focus on time series of a single attribute or univariate time series data. However, in many real world problems, data arrive as one or many series of multiple attributes, i.e., they are multivariate time series data. Because they contain multiple attributes, multivariate time series data promise to provide more intrinsic correlations among them, from which more important information can be gathered and extracted. In this paper, we present a novel approach to model and predict the behaviors of multivariate time series data based on a rule evolution methodology. Our approach is divided into distinct steps, each of which can be accomplished by several machine learning techniques. This makes our system highly flexible, configurable and extendable. Experiments are also conducted on real S&P 500 stock data to examine the effectiveness and reliability of our approach. Empirical results demonstrate that our system has substantial estimation reliability and prediction accuracy.
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Paper Nr:	393
Title:	DYNAMIC SEARCH-BASED TEST DATA GENERATION FOCUSED ON DATA FLOW PATHS
Authors:	Anastasis Sofokleous and Andreas Andreou
Abstract:	Test data generation approaches produce sequences of input values until they determine a set of test cases that can test adequately the program under testing. This paper focuses on a search-based test data generation algorithm. It proposes a dynamic software testing framework which employs a specially designed genetic algorithm and utilises both control flow and data flow graphs, the former as a code coverage tool, whereas the latter for extracting data flow paths, to determine near to optimum set of test cases according to data flow criteria. Experimental results carried out on a pool of standard benchmark programs demonstrate the high performance and efficiency of the proposed approach, which are significantly better compared to related search-based test data generation methods.
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Paper Nr:	434
Title:	A MEMETIC-GRASP ALGORITHM FOR CLUSTERING
Authors:	Yannis Marinakis, Magdalene Marinaki, Nikolaos Matsatsinis and Constantin Zopounidis
Abstract:	This paper presents a new memetic algorithm, which is based on the concepts of Genetic Algorithms (GAs), Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) and Greedy Randomized Adaptive Search Procedure (GRASP), for optimally clustering N objects into K clusters. The proposed algorithm is a two phase algorithm which combines a memetic algorithm for the solution of the feature selection problem and a GRASP algorithm for the solution of the clustering problem. In this paper, contrary to the genetic algorithms, the evolution of each individual of the population is realized with the use of a PSO algorithm where each individual have to improve its physical movement following the basic principles of PSO until it will obtain the requirements to be selected as a parent. Its performance is compared with other popular metaheuristic methods like classic genetic algorithms, tabu search, GRASP, ant colony optimization and particle swarm optimization. In order to assess the efficacy of the proposed algorithm, this methodology is evaluated on datasets from the UCI Machine Learning Repository. The high performance of the proposed algorithm is achieved as the algorithm gives very good results and in some instances the percentage of the corrected clustered samples is very high and is larger than 96%.
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Paper Nr:	448
Title:	ON CHECKING TEMPORAL-OBSERVATION SUBSUMPTION IN SIMILARITY-BASED DIAGNOSIS OF ACTIVE SYSTEMS
Authors:	Gianfranco Lamperti, Federica Vivenzi and Marina Zanella
Abstract:	Similarity-based diagnosis of large active systems is supported by reuse of knowledge generated for solving previous diagnostic problems. Such knowledge is cumulatively stored in a knowledge-base, when the diagnostic session is over. When a new diagnostic problem is to be faced, the knowledge-base is queried in order to possibly find a similar, reusable problem. Checking problem-similarity requires, among other constraints, that the observation relevant to the new problem be subsumed by the observation relevant to the problem in the knowledge-base. However, checking observation-subsumption, following its formal definition, is time and space consuming. The bottleneck lies in the generation of a nondeterministic automaton, its subsequent transformation into a deterministic one (the index space of the observation), and a regular-language containment-checking. In order to speed up the diagnostic process, an alternative technique is proposed, based on the notion of coverage. Besides being effective, subsumption-checking via coverage is also efficient because no index-space generation or comparison is required. Experimental evidence supports this claim.
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Paper Nr:	460
Title:	AN ONTOLOGY DRIVEN DATA MINING PROCESS
Authors:	Laurent BRISSON and Martine Collard
Abstract:	This paper deals with knowledge integration in a data mining process. We suggest to model domain knowledge during business understanding and data understanding steps in order to build an ontology driven information system (ODIS). We present the KEOPS Methodology based on this approach. In KEOPS, the ODIS is dedicated to data mining tasks. It allows using expert knowledge for efficient data selection, data preparation and model interpretation. In this paper, we detail each of these ontology driven steps and we define a part-way interestingness measure that integrates both objective and subjective criteria in order to evaluate model relevance according to expert knowledge.
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Paper Nr:	467
Title:	SERVICE-ORIENTED UNIVERSITY DIGITAL LIBRARY WITHIN THE FRAMEWORK OF SEMANTIC WEB CONCEPTION
Authors:	Oleksandr Novytskyi and Oleg Spirin
Abstract:	As all digital libraries should be integrated into the Internet network, where these libraries will be served by distributed services, this paper considers some approaches and problems relating to setting up a service-oriented digital library where access will be granted on a dynamic basis. For this purpose it is proposed to use a composition of web-services. In particular, for the composition of web-services Consortium W3c recommends to use the OWL-S language, which is intended for description of ontology of services covered by web services. The authors also put forward the concept of planning on the basis of target-oriented paradigms aimed at solving users’ problems.

Paper Nr:	509
Title:	BAYESIAN-NETWORKS-BASED MISUSE AND ANOMALY PREVENTION SYSTEM
Authors:	Pablo García Bringas, Yoseba K. Penya, Stefano Paraboschi and Paolo Salvaneschi
Abstract:	Network Intrusion Detection Systems (NIDS) aim at preventing network attacks and unauthorised remote use of computers. More accurately, depending on the kind of attack it targets, an NIDS can be oriented to detect misuses (by defining all possible attacks) or anomalies (by modelling legitimate behaviour and detecting those that do not fit on that model). Still, since their problem knowledge is restricted to possible attacks, misuse detection fails to notice anomalies and vice versa. Against this, we present here ESIDE-Depian, the first unified misuse and anomaly prevention system based on Bayesian Networks to analyse completely network packets, and the strategy to create a consistent knowledge model that integrates misuse and anomaly-based knowledge. Finally, we evaluate ESIDE-Depian against well-known and new attacks showing how it outperforms a well-established industrial NIDS.
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Paper Nr:	647
Title:	DISCOVERING MULTI-PERSPECTIVE PROCESS MODELS
Authors:	Francesco Folino, Gianluigi Greco, Antonella Guzzo and Luigi Pontieri
Abstract:	Process Mining techniques exploit the information stored in the executions log of a process in order to extract some high-level process model, which can be used for both analysis and design tasks. Most of these techniques focus on “structural” (control-flow oriented) aspects of the process, in that they only consider what elementary activities were executed and in which ordering. In this way, any other “non-structural” information, usually kept in real log systems (e.g., activity executors, parameter values, and time-stamps), is completely disregarded, yet being a potential source of knowledge. In this paper, we overcome this limitation by proposing a novel approach for discovering process models, where the behavior of a process is characterized from both structural and non-structural viewpoints. In a nutshell, different variants of the process (classes) are recognized through a structural clustering approach, and represented with a collection of specific workflow models. Relevant correlations between these classes and non-structural properties are made explicit through a rule-based classification model, which can be exploited for both explanation and prediction purposes. Results on real-life application scenario evidence that the discovered models are often very accurate and capture important knowledge on the process behavior.
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Paper Nr:	684
Title:	SEMI-AUTOMATIC PARTITIONING BY VISUAL SNAPSHOPTS
Authors:	Rosa Matias, João P. Moura, Paulo Martins and Fátima Rodrigues
Abstract:	It is stated that a closer intervention of experts in knowledge discovery can complement and improve the effectiveness of results. Normally, in data mining, automated methods display final results through visualization methods. A more active intervention of experts on automated methods can bring enhancements to the analysis; No meanwhile that approach raises questions about what is a relevant stopping stage. In this work, efforts are made to couple automatic methods with visualization methods in the context of partitioning algorithms applied to spatial data. A data mining workflow is presented with the following concepts: data mining transaction, data mining save point and data mining snapshot. Moreover to display results, novel visual metaphors are changed allowing a better exploration of clustering. In knowledge discovery, experts validate final results; certainly it would be appropriate to them validate intermediate results, avoiding, for instance, losing time, when in disagreement, starting it with new hypnoses or allow data reduction by disable an intermediate cluster from the next stage.
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Paper Nr:	715
Title:	RULES AS SIMPLE WAY TO MODEL KNOWLEDGE - Closing the Gap between Promise and Reality
Authors:	Valentin Zacharias
Abstract:	There is a considerable gap between the potential of rules bases to be a simpler way to formulate high level knowledge and the reality of tiresome and error prone rule bases creation processes. Based on the experience from three rule base creation projects this paper identifies reasons for this gap between promise and reality and proposes steps that can be taken to close it. An architecture for a complete support of rule base development is presented.
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Paper Nr:	722
Title:	COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS FOR THE DESIGN OF PERSONAL KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
Authors:	Max Völkel and Andreas Abecker
Abstract:	Knowledge Management (KM) tools have become an established part of Enterprise Information Systems in the recent years. While traditional KM initiatives typically address knowledge exchange within project teams, communities of practice, within a whole enterprise, or even within the extended enterprise (customer knowledge management, KM in the supply chain, . . . ), the relatively new area of Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) investigates how knowledge workers can enhance their productivity by better encoding, accessing, and reusing their personal knowledge. In this paper, we present a cost-benefit analysis of PKM – where benefit comes from efficiently finding task-specific, useful knowledge items, and costs come from search efforts as well as externalisation and (re-)structuring efforts for the personal knowledge base.
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Paper Nr:	756
Title:	SEMANTIC ANNOTATION OF EPC MODELS IN ENGINEERING DOMAINS BY EMPLOYING SEMANTIC PATTERNS
Authors:	Andreas Bögl, Michael Schrefl, Gustav Pomberger and Norbert Weber
Abstract:	Extracting process patterns from EPC (Event-Driven Process Chain) models requires to perform a semantic analysis of EPC functions and events. An automated semantic analysis faces the problem that an essential part of the EPC semantics is bound to natural language expressions in functions and events with undefined process semantics. The semantic annotation of natural language expressions provides an adequate approach to tackle this problem. This paper introduces a novel approach that enables an automated semantic annotation of EPC functions and events. It employs semantic patterns to analyze the textual structure of natural language expressions and to relate them to instances of a reference ontology. Thus, semantically annotated EPC model elements are input for subsequent semantic analysis.
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Short Papers

Paper Nr:	47
Title:	USING CASE-BASED REASONING TO EXPLAIN EXCEPTIONAL CASES
Authors:	Rainer Schmidt and Olga Vorobieva
Abstract:	In medicine many exceptions occur. In medical practice and in knowledge-based systems too, it is necessary to consider them and to deal with them appropriately. In medical studies and in research, exceptions shall be explained. We present a system that helps to explain cases that do not fit into a theoretical hypothesis. Our starting points are situations where neither a well-developed theory nor reliable knowledge nor a case base is available at the beginning. So, instead of reliable theoretical knowledge and intelligent experience, we have just some theoretical hypothesis and a set of measurements. In this paper, we propose to combine Case-Based Reasoning with a statistical model. We use Case-Based Reasoning to explain those cases that do not fit the model. The case base has to be set up incrementally, it contains the exceptional cases, and their explanations are the solutions, which can be used to help to explain further exceptional cases.
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Paper Nr:	91
Title:	ALGORITHMS FOR AI LOGIC OF DECISIONS IN MULTI-AGENT ENVIRONMENT
Authors:	Vladimir Rybakov and Sergey Babenyshev
Abstract:	This paper suggests a temporal multi-agent logic LDM A (with interacting agents), to imitate decision-making of independent agents, supported by access to knowledge through interaction with other agents. The interaction is modeled by considering all possible communication paths between agents in temporal Kripke/Hintikka like models. The logic LDM A distinguishes local and global decision-making and is based on temporal Kripke/Hintikka models with agents accessibility relations defined between the states of time clusters. The main result provides a decision algorithm for LDM A (so, we prove that the set of theorems of LDM A is decidable), which also solves the satisfiability problem for LDM A .
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Paper Nr:	103
Title:	BUILDING A DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM FOR STUDENTS BY USING CONCEPT MAPS
Authors:	Dumitru D. Burdescu, Cristian Mihaescu and Bogdan Logofatu
Abstract:	Concept maps are an effective way of representing organized knowledge (concepts) in hierarchical fashion regarding a person’s understanding of a domain of knowledge. Within our custom developed e-Learning platform it was created a concept map for a chapter of a discipline. The obtained concept map has been used for creation the test and exam questions such that knowledge regarding each concept is tested by a certain number of quizzes. We present the architecture of a decision support system that assesses the accumulated knowledge of students. The architecture’s business logic is based on a concept map of a chapter of a discipline. A custom algorithm has been designed and implemented to measure the coverage of the curriculum. The system may be generalized for entire discipline as long as for each chapter is set up a concept map and all other necessary settings.
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Paper Nr:	109
Title:	RECOGNITION OF VEHICLE NUMBER PLATES
Authors:	Ondrej Martinsky
Abstract:	This work deals with problematic from field of artificial intelligence, machine vision and neural networks in construction of an automatic number plate recognition system (ANPR). This problematic includes mathematical principles and algorithms, which ensure a process of number plate detection, processes of proper characters segmentation, normalization and recognition. Work comparatively deals with methods achieving invariance of systems towards image skew, translations and various light conditions during the capture. Work also contains an implementation of a demonstration model, which is able to proceed these functions over a set of snapshots.
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Paper Nr:	114
Title:	ENTERPRISE INFORMATION RETRIEVAL: A SURVEY
Authors:	Hamid T. Mirza
Abstract:	Efficient retrieval of the relevant information is a critical success factor for many enterprises. Despite of all the advancement in the web search technology, enterprise searching is still faced with many challenges and problems. Boundaries of the enterprise search are broad and expectations of the users are quite high, in addition to many challenges faced one of the major problems is the difference between the nature of web and enterprise searching. Many solutions have been proposed and techniques have been devised to improve the enterprise search, but still effective enterprise searching is a challenge for the researchers and the commercial companies, however it is realized that the solution for which will deliver enormous benefits.
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Paper Nr:	117
Title:	COMBINING INDEXING METHODS AND QUERY SIZES IN INFORMATION RETRIEVAL IN FRENCH
Authors:	Désiré Kompaoré, Josiane Mothe and Ludovic Tanguy
Abstract:	This paper analyses three type of different indexing methods applied on French test collections (CLEF from 2000 to 2005): lemmas, truncated terms and single words. The same search engine and the same characteristics are used independently to the indexing method to avoid variability in the analysis. When evaluated on French CLEF collections, indexing by lemmas is the best method compared to single words and truncated term methods. We also analyse the impact of combining indexing methods by using the CombMNZ function. As CLEF topics are composed of different parts, we also examine the influence of these topic parts by comparing the results when topic parts are considered individually, and when they are combined. Finally, we combine both indexing methods and query parts. We show that MAP can be improved up to 8% compared to the best individual methods.
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Paper Nr:	120
Title:	A FRAMEWORK FOR KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT ARCHITECTURE
Authors:	Emad Farazmand and Ali Moeini
Abstract:	Many organizations began to reexamine and rearrange their business strategies, processes, information technologies, and organizational structures from a knowledge perspective. Adoption and assimilation of the knowledge management paradigm requires the design and establishment of structures, processes, and technologies along with organizational knowledge resources. The knowledge differs from the data and information by origin. Many experiences about preexisting methods for information system planning are still usable for knowledge management planning. One of the well known of them is enterprise architecture and specially Zachman framework. This paper is about customization of Zachman framework for defining knowledge management architecture in an enterprise.

Paper Nr:	232
Title:	A NEW LEARNING ALGORITHM FOR CLASSIFICATION IN THE REDUCED SPACE
Authors:	Luminita State, Catalina Cocianu, Ion Rosca and Panayiotis Vlamos
Abstract:	The aim of the research reported in the paper was twofold: to propose a new approach in cluster analysis and to investigate its performance, when it is combined with dimensionality reduction schemes. Our attempt is based on group skeletons defined by a set of orthogonal and unitary eigen vectors (principal directions) of the sample covariance matrix. Our developments impose a set of quite natural working assumptions on the true but unknown nature of the class system. The search process for the optimal clusters approximating the unknown classes towards getting homogenous groups, where the homogeneity is defined in terms of the “typicality” of components with respect to the current skeleton. Our method is described in the third section of the paper. The compression scheme was set in terms of the principal directions corresponding to the available cloud. The final section presents the results of the tests aiming the comparison between the performances of our method and the standard k-means clustering technique when they are applied to the initial space as well as to compressed data.
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Paper Nr:	259
Title:	INTERNAL FRAUD RISK REDUCTION - Results of a Data Mining Case Study
Authors:	Mieke Jans, Nadine Lybaert and Koen Vanhoof
Abstract:	Corporate fraud these days represents a huge cost to our economy. Academic literature already concentrated on how data mining techniques can be of value in the fight against fraud. All this research focusses on fraud detection, mostly in a context of external fraud. In this paper we discuss the use of a data mining technique to reduce the risk of internal fraud. Reducing fraud risk comprehends both detection and prevention, and therefore we apply a descriptive data mining technique as opposed to the widely used prediction data mining techniques in the literature. The results of using a latent class clustering algorithm to a case company’s procurement data suggest that applying this technique of descriptive data mining is useful in assessing the current risk of internal fraud.
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Paper Nr:	269
Title:	FORECASTING WITH ARTMAP-IC NEURAL NETWORKS - An Application Using Corporate Bankruptcy Data
Authors:	Anatoli Nachev
Abstract:	Financial diagnosis and prediction of corporate bankruptcy can be viewed as a pattern recognition problem. This paper proposes a novel approach to solution based on ARTMAP-IC - a general-purpose neural network system for supervised learning and recognition. For a popular dataset, with proper preprocessing steps, the model outperforms similar techniques and provides prediction accuracy equal to the best one obtained by a backpropagation MLPs. An advantage of the proposed model over the MLPs is the short online learning, fast adaptation to novel patterns and scalability.
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Paper Nr:	274
Title:	A GLOBAL MODEL OF SEQUENCES OF DISCRETE EVENT CLASS OCCURRENCES
Authors:	Philippe Bouché, Marc Le Goc and Jérome Coinu
Abstract:	This paper proposes a global model of a set of alarm sequences that are generated by knowledge based system monitoring a dynamic process. The modelling approach is based on the Stochastic Approach to discover timed relations between discrete event classes from the representation of a set of sequences under the dual form of a homogeneous continuous time Markov chain and a superposition of Poisson processes. An abductive reasoning on these representations allows discovering chronicle models that can be used as diagnosis rules. Such rules subsume a temporal model called the average time sequence that sums up the initial set of sequences. This paper presents this model and the role it play in the analysis of an industrial process monitored with a network of industrial automata.
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Paper Nr:	298
Title:	APPLYING MULTI-AGENT SYSTEMS TO ORGANIZATIONAL MODELLING IN INDUSTRIAL ENVIRONMENTS
Authors:	Maria Del Carmen Romero Ternero, Richard M. Crowder, Y. W. Sim and Terry Payne
Abstract:	This paper considers an agent-based approach to organizational modelling within the engineering design domain. The interactions between individual designers within a design teams has a significant impact upon how well a task can be performed, and hence the quality of the resultant product, hence many organisations wish to model, and hence fully understand the process. Using multi-agent social modelling, designers and the design task attributes can be the subject of rules implying how well tasks can be performed given different levels of these attributes. In this paper we discuss the background to the work and the identifications of individual, and team variables.
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Paper Nr:	307
Title:	A KNOWLEDGE-BASED PERFORMANCE MEASUREMENT SYSTEM FOR IMPROVING RESOURCE UTILIZATION
Authors:	Annie C. Lam, S. K. Kwok and W. B. Lee
Abstract:	In current manufacturing industry, there are various challenges including short product life cycle, process automation and global competition. It is critical for the manufacturing companies to ensure effective utilization of production assets for overall business success. In order to focus scarce resources on areas that have the greatest impact on productivity, performance evaluation on the resource allocation is necessary to assist companies improving the resource utilization and accomplishing their objectives. In this paper, a knowledge-based performance measurement system (KPMS) is designed to evaluate the resource allocation decisions and provide recommendations to improve the performance and physical asset utilization. The framework of the proposed system, which is constructed by rule-based reasoning, case-based reasoning and a mathematical model, is introduced. By integrating the mathematical model with knowledge rules, performance indicators that are associated with the achievement of company objectives can be determined to quantify the performance of the resource allocation. Moreover, case-based reasoning technique is adopted to evaluate the performance and reuse the experience in past cases to provide recommendations for improvement.
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Paper Nr:	324
Title:	A MODEL TO RATE TRUST IN COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE
Authors:	Javier Portillo, Juan Pablo Soto, Aurora Vizcaino and Mario Piattini
Abstract:	Communities of Practice are an important centre of knowledge exchange in which feelings such as membership or trust play a significant role since both is the basis for a suitable sharing of knowledge. However, current Communities of Practice are often “virtual” as their members may be geographically distributed. This makes it more difficult for a feeling of trust to take place. In this paper we describe a trust model designed to help software agents, which represent communities of practice members, to rate how trustworthy a knowledge source is. It is important to clarify that we also consider members as knowledge sources since, in fact, they are the most important knowledge providers.
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Paper Nr:	353
Title:	A JOINT OPTIMIZATION ALGORITHM FOR DISPATCHING TASKS IN AGENT-BASED WORKFLOW MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
Authors:	Pavlos Delias, Anastasios Doulamis and Nikolaos Matsatsinis
Abstract:	Workflow problems generally require the coordination of many workers; machines and computers. Agents provide a natural mechanism for modelling a system where multiple actors operate, but they do not explicitly support coordination schemes. Efficient task allocation to these actors is a fundamental coordination prerequisite. A competent allocation policy should address both system performance issues and users’ quality demands. Since these factors are often contradictory, an efficient solution is hard to be identified. In this study, we suggest a task delegation strategy that jointly optimizes system performance (as expressed by workload balancing) and quality demands (as expressed by minimum task overlapping). A consistent modelling approach allows us to transform data of both these factors into a matrix format. The next step is to exploit the Ky-fan theorem and the notion of generalized eigenvalues to optimally solve the task allocation problem. A simple scheduling policy and an experimental setup were applied to test the efficiency of the proposed algorithm.
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Paper Nr:	357
Title:	ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE FOR WOUND IMAGE UNDERSTANDING
Authors:	Augustin Prodan, Madalina Rusu, Remus Campean and Rodica Prodan
Abstract:	This paper presents an e-learning framework for analyzing, processing and understanding wound images, to be used in teaching, learning and research activities. We intend to promote e-learning technologies in medical, pharmaceutical and health care domains. Our approach to e-learning is so called blended learning, which combines traditional face-to-face and Web-based on-line learning, with focus on principles of active learning. Using Java and XML technologies, we build models for various categories of wounds, due to various aetiologies. Based on colour and texture analysis, we identify the main barriers to wound healing, such as tissue non-viable, infection, inflammation, moisture imbalance, or edge non-advancing. This framework provides the infrastructure for preparing e-learning scenarios based on practice and real world experiences. We make experiments for wound healing simulation using various treatments and compare the results with experimental observations. Our experiments are supported by XML based databases containing knowledge extracted from previous wound healing experiences and from medical experts knowledge. Also, we rely on new paradigms of the Artificial Intelligence for creating e-learning scenarios to be used in a context of active learning, for wound image understanding. To implement the e-learning tools, we use Java technologies for dynamic processes and XML technologies for dynamic content.
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Paper Nr:	381
Title:	AWARENESS IN PROJECT INFORMATION SPACES FOR IMPROVED COMMUNICATION AND COLLABORATION
Authors:	Stefan Boddy, Matthew Wetherill, Yacine Rezgui and Grahame Cooper
Abstract:	The paper argues that facilitating timely and contextually grounded communication could help improve both coordination and decision making / problem solving in the construction project process. The paper discusses the authors’ previous work in construction IT, as well as related literature, and the findings that have led to the development of a framework for awareness of activity in project information spaces. A detailed description of the conceptual model and software architecture of the proposed resource awareness framework is given, followed by directions for future research.
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Paper Nr:	388
Title:	THE LINGUISTIC GENERALIZED OWA OPERATOR AND ITS APPLICATION IN STRATEGIC DECISION MAKING
Authors:	José M. Merigó and Anna M. Gil-Lafuente
Abstract:	We introduce the linguistic generalized ordered weighted averaging (LGOWA) operator. It is a new aggregation operator that uses linguistic information and generalized means in the OWA operator. It is very useful for uncertain situations where the available information can not be assessed with numerical values but it is possible to use linguistic assessments. This aggregation operator generalizes a wide range of aggregation operators that use linguistic information such as the linguistic generalized mean (LGM), the linguistic weighted generalized mean (LWGM), the linguistic OWA (LOWA) operator, the linguistic ordered weighted geometric (LOWG) operator and the linguistic ordered weighted quadratic averaging (LOWQA) operator. We also introduce a new type of Quasi-LOWA operator by using quasi-arithmetic means in the LOWA operator. Finally, we develop an application of the new approach. We analyze a decision making problem about selection of strategies.
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Paper Nr:	390
Title:	ORGANIZATIONAL MODELING AND ANALYSIS OF SAFETY OCCURRENCE REPORTING IN AIR TRAFFIC
Authors:	Alexei Sharpanskykh, Sybert H. Stroeve and Henk P. Blom
Abstract:	An Air Traffic Organization (ATO) is a complex organization that involves many parties with diverse goals performing a wide range of tasks. Due to this high complexity, inconsistencies and performance bottlenecks may occur in ATOs. By analysis, such safety- and performance-related problems of an ATO can be identified. To perform reliable and profound analysis automated techniques are required. A formal model specification that comprises both prescriptive aspects of a formal organization and autonomous behavioral aspects of agents forms the basis for such techniques. This paper describes how such a model specification is developed and analyzed in the frames of a simulation case of incident reporting in the ATO.
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Paper Nr:	427
Title:	REAL TIME CLUSTERING MODEL
Authors:	J. Cheng, M. R. Sayeh and Mehdi Zargham
Abstract:	This paper focuses on the development of a dynamic system model in unsupervised learning environment. This adaptive dynamic system consists of a set of energy functions which create valleys for representing clusters. Each valley represents a cluster of similar input patterns. The system includes a dynamic parameter for the clustering vigilance so that the cluster size or the quantizing resolution can be adaptive to the density of the input patterns. It also includes a factor for invoking competitive exclusion among the valleys; forcing only one label to be assigned to each cluster. Through several examples of different pattern clusters, it is shown that the model can successfully cluster these types of input patterns and form different sizes of clusters according to the size of the input patterns.
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Paper Nr:	429
Title:	AN INTELLIGENT DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM FOR SUPPLIER SELECTION
Authors:	R. J. Kuo, L. Y. Lee and Tung-Lai Hu
Abstract:	This study intends to develop an intelligent decision support system which integrates both fuzzy analytical hierarchy process (AHP) method and fuzzy data development analysis (DEA) for assisting organizations to make the supplier selection decision. A case study on an internationally well-known auto lighting OEM company shows that the proposed method is very well suitable for practical applications.
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Paper Nr:	429
Title:	AN INTELLIGENT DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM FOR SUPPLIER SELECTION
Authors:	R. J. Kuo, L. Y. Lee and Tung-Lai Hu
Abstract:	This study intends to develop an intelligent decision support system which integrates both fuzzy analytical hierarchy process (AHP) method and fuzzy data development analysis (DEA) for assisting organizations to make the supplier selection decision. A case study on an internationally well-known auto lighting OEM company shows that the proposed method is very well suitable for practical applications.
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Paper Nr:	444
Title:	DISCOVERING EXPERT’S KNOWLEDGE FROM SEQUENCES OF DISCRETE EVENT CLASS OCCURRENCES
Authors:	Marc Le Goc and Nabil Benayadi
Abstract:	This paper is concerned with the discovery of expert’s knowledge from a sequence of alarms provided by a knowledge based system monitoring a dynamic process. The discovering process is based on the principles and the tools of the Stochastic Approach framework where a sequence is represented with a Markov chain from which binary relations between discrete event classes can be find and represented as abstract chronicle models. The problem with this approach is to reduce the search space as close as possible to the relations between the process variables. To this aim, we propose an adaptation of the J-Measure to the Stochastic Approach framework, the BJ-Measure, to build an entropic based heuristic that help in finding abstract chronicle models revealing strong relations between the process variables. The result of the application of this approach to a real world system, the Sachem system that controls the blast furnace of the Arcelor-Mittal Steel group, is provided in the paper, showing how the combination of the Stochastic Approach and the Information Theory allows finding the a priori expert’s knowledge between blast furnace variables from a sequence of alarms.
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Paper Nr:	462
Title:	MACHINE GROUPING IN CELLULAR MANUFACTURING SYSTEM USING TANDEM AUTOMATED GUIDED VEHICLE WITH ACO BASED SIX SIGMA APPROACH
Authors:	Iraj Mahdavi, Babak Shirazi and Mohammad M. Paydar
Abstract:	Effective design of material handling devices is one of the most important decisions in cellular manufacturing system. Minimization of material handling operations could lead to optimization of overall operational costs. An automated guided vehicle (AGV) is a driverless vehicle used for the transportation of materials within a production plant partitioned into cells. The tandem layout is according to dividing workstations to some non-overlapping closed zones that in each zone a tandem automated guided vehicle (TAGV) is allocated for internal transfers. Also, among adjacent loops some places are determined for exchanging semi-produced parts. This paper illustrates a non-linear multi-objective problem for minimizing the material flow intra and inter-loops and minimization of maximum amount of inter cell flow, considering the limitation of TAGV work-loading. For reducing variability of material flow and establishing balanced loop layout, some new constraints have been added to the problem based on six sigma approach. Due to the complexity of the problem, ant colony optimization (ACO) algorithm is used for solving this model. Finally this approach has been compared with the existing methods to demonstrate the advantages of the proposed model.
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Paper Nr:	465
Title:	ANYTIME AHP METHOD FOR PREFERENCES ELICITATION IN STEREOTYPE-BASED RECOMMENDER SYSTEM
Authors:	Lior Rokach, Alon Schclar and Amnon Meisels
Abstract:	In stereotype-based recommendation systems, user profiles are represented as an affinity vector of stereotypes. Upon the registration of new users, the system needs to assign the new users to existing stereotypes. The AHP (Analytic Hierarchy Process) methodology can be used for initial elicitation of user preferences. However, using the AHP procedure as-is will require the user to respond to a very long set of pairwise comparison questions. We suggest a novel method for converting AHP into an anytime approach. At each stage, the user may choose not to continue. However, the system is still able to provide some classification into a stereotype. The more answers the user provides, the more specific the classification becomes.
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Paper Nr:	472
Title:	MULTICRITERIA DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM MULTIOPTIMA
Authors:	Mariana Vassileva, Vassil Vassilev, Boris Staykov, Krassimira Genova and Danail Dochev
Abstract:	The paper presents a multicriteria decision support system, called MultiOptima. It consists of two independent parts - the MKA-2 system and the MKO-2 system. The MultiOptima system is designed to support the decision maker in modelling and solving different problems of multicriteria analysis and linear and linear integer problems of multicriteria optimization. The system implements four methods for multicriteria analysis, as well as an innovative generalized interactive method for multicriteria optimization with variable scalarization and parameterization, which can apply twelve scalarizing problems and is applicable for different ways of defining preferences by the decision maker. The class of the solved problems, the system structure, the implemented methods and the graphical user interface of the MKA-2 and MKO-2 systems are discussed in the paper. The MultiOptima system can be used both for education and for solving of real-life problems.
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Paper Nr:	473
Title:	CASE STUDY OF DIFFERENT APPROACHES BASED ON NEURAL NETWORKS AND FUZZY MEASUREMENTS FOR PHONEME CLASSIFICATION
Authors:	Dorra Ben Ayed
Abstract:	Speech recognition is a difficult problem due to the inability of current systems to cope with connected speech. Neural networks and fuzzy logic are able to learn some aspects of this task. An unsupervised learning neural network scheme like self-organizing map (SOM) can be used to both classify and order speech sounds. SOM provides a means of reducing inherent dimensionality of speech data. Fuzzy logic has been applied very successfully in many areas where conventional model based approaches are difficult or not cost effective to implement. Fuzzy similarity measurement was used for approximate reasoning as it attempts to model the human reasoning process . In this paper, we propose SOM variants and fuzzy measurements in order to improve phoneme classification accuracy. The proposed SOM with locally neighbourhood radius (AdSOM) and fuzzy system based on Wang similarity (MSFLwen2) show good robustness and high phoneme classification rates in the context of phonetically near phonemes.

Paper Nr:	477
Title:	DETECTION OF INCOHERENCES IN A TECHNICAL AND NORMATIVE DOCUMENT CORPUS
Authors:	Susana Martin-Toral, Gregorio I. Sainz-Palmero and Yannis Dimitriadis
Abstract:	This paper is focused on the problems and effects generated by the use of a document corpus with mistakes, content incoherences amongst its connected documents and other errors. The problem introduced in this paper is very relevant in any area of human activity when this corpus is used as base element in the relationships between company partners, legal support, etc., and the way in which these incoherences can be detected. These problems can appear in several ways, and the produced effects are different, but a common situation exists in those areas of activity where many linked documents must be generated, managed and updated by different authors. This paper describes some examples of this problem in the case of a technical document corpus used amongst partners, and the solution framework developed for this case. Several types of incoherence have been detected and formulated, connected with problems described in other research areas such as information extraction and retrieval, text mining, document interpretation and others, but all of them have been bounded and introduced from the point of view of document incoherences and their effects, specially in a company context. Finally the computational architecture and methodology uses are described and some initial results of incoherence detection are discussed.
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Paper Nr:	532
Title:	COMPONENT-BASED SUPPORT FOR KNOWLEDGE-BASED SYSTEMS
Authors:	Sabine Moisan
Abstract:	Software development of knowledge-based systems is difficult. To alleviate this task we propose to apply software engineering techniques. This paper investigates BL O C K S, a component framework for designing and reengineering knowledge-based system inference engines. BL O C K S provides reusable building blocks common to various engines, independently on their task or application domain. It has been used to build several engines for various tasks (planning, classification, model calibration) in different domains. The approach appears well fitted to knowledge-based system generators; it allows a significant gain in time, as well as it improves software legibility and safeness.
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Paper Nr:	535
Title:	HIPPOCRATIC MULTI-AGENT SYSTEMS
Authors:	Ludivine Crépin, Laurent Vercouter, Olivier Boissier, Yves Demazeau and François Jacquenet
Abstract:	The current evolution of Information Technology leads to the increase of automatic data processing over multiple information systems. In this context, the lack of user’s control on their personal data leads to the crucial question of their privacy preservation. A typical example concerns the disclosure of confidential identity in- formation, without the owner’s agreement. This problem is stressed in multi-agent systems (MAS) where users delegate their control on their personal data to autonomous agents. Interaction being one of the main mechanism in MAS, sensitive information exchange and processing are a key issue with respect to privacy. In this article, we propose a model, ”Hippocratic Multi-Agent System” (HiMAS), to tackle this problem. This model defines a set of principles bearing on an agency to preserve privacy. In order to illustrate our model, we have chosen the concrete application of decentralized calendars management.
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Paper Nr:	540
Title:	AN EFFICIENT HYBRID METHOD FOR CLUSTERING PROBLEMS
Authors:	Hadi Panahi and Reza Tavakkoli-Moghaddam
Abstract:	This paper presents a hybrid efficient method based on ant colony optimization (ACO) and genetic algorithms (GA) for clustering problems. This proposed method assumes that agents of ACO has life cycle which is variable and changes by a special function. We also apply three local searches on the basis of heuristic rules for the given clustering problem. This proposed method is implemented and tested on two real datasets. Further, its performance is compared with other well-known meta-heuristics, such as ACO, GA, simulated annealing (SA), and tabu search (TS). At last, paired comparison t-test is also applied to proof the efficiency of our proposed method. The associated output gives very encouraging results; however, the proposed method needs longer time to proceed.
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Paper Nr:	669
Title:	A SIMILARITY MEASURE FOR MUSIC SIGNALS
Authors:	Gonçalo Marques and Thibault Langlois
Abstract:	One of the goals in the field of Music Information Retrieval is to obtain a measure of similarity between two musical recordings. Such a measure is at the core of automatic classification, query, and retrieval systems, which have become a necessity due to the ever increasing availability and size of musical databases. This paper proposes a method for calculating a similarity distance between two music signals. The method extracts a set of features from the audio recordings, models the features, and determines the distance between models. While further work is needed, preliminary results show that the proposed method has the potential to be used as a similarity measure for musical signals.
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Paper Nr:	686
Title:	MANAGING CHARACTERISTIC ORGANIZATION KNOWLEDGE IN COLLABORATIVE NETWORKS
Authors:	Ekaterina Ermilova and Hamideh Afsarmanesh
Abstract:	Modeling and management of the knowledge/information related to the organizations is fundamental to efficient operation of the Collaborative Networked Organizations (CNOs). Continuous changes in different aspects of involved organizations, is an unavoidable reflection to the dynamic changes in the demands of stakeholders and customers in the market / society. Organizations’ profiles, and especially their competency characteristics tailored to the requirements of opportunities emerging in the market, need to be modeled and managed. Furthermore, mechanisms are required for handling the flexible representation and processing of the organizations’ knowledge. Both research and practice have shown that the formation of collaborative networked organizations requires pre-establishment of a cluster, also called a breeding environment. In this paper we address the Virtual organizations Breeding Environments (VBEs), which provide the necessary conditions and support for configuration and creation of Virtual Organizations (VOs). Using the ontology engineering approaches, we present an approach for modeling of organizations’ knowledge inside VBEs, and specify the ontology for their profiles and competencies. Furthermore, we present the required mechanisms for management of the organizations’ knowledge, and specify the functionality required to manipulate organizations’ information through the life cycle of VBEs. The paper also addresses the logical design of a database for storage of organizations’ information and for the visualization of organizations’ profile and competency knowledge.
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Paper Nr:	704
Title:	AN APPROXIMATE PROPAGATION ALGORITHM FOR PRODUCT-BASED POSSIBILISTIC NETWORKS
Authors:	Amen Ajroud, Mohamed Nazih Omri, Salem Benferhat and Habib Youssef
Abstract:	Product-Based Possibilistic Networks appear to be important tools to efficiently and compactly represent possibility distributions. The inference process is a crucial task to propagate information into network when new pieces of information, called evidence, are observed. However, this inference process is known to be a hard task especially for multiply connected networks. In this paper, we propose an approximate algorithm for product-based possibilistic networks. More precisely, we propose an adaptation of the probabilistic approach “Loopy Belief Propagation” (LBP) for possibilistic networks.
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Paper Nr:	707
Title:	A PARTIAL-VIEW COOPERATION FRAMEWORK BASED ON THE SOCIOLOGY OF ORGANIZED ACTION
Authors:	Carmen D. Santos, Sandra Sandri and Christophe S. Blanc
Abstract:	In this work, we address the extension of the modeling of a fragment of the Sociology of Organized Action, making it possible to deal with a hierarchy of resources in an organization, allowing each of its members to have his own view of the organization.
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Paper Nr:	710
Title:	CELLULAR AUTOMATA BASED MODELING OF THE FORMATION AND EVOLUTION OF SOCIAL NETWORKS - A Case in Dentistry
Authors:	Rubens A. Zimbres, Eliane Z. Brito and Pedro PB de Oliveira
Abstract:	The stability and evolution of networks is a research area that is not well explored. There is an inadequate focus to the partner characteristics and to the environment influence over the evolution process. This study analysed social network formation in its dynamic aspect through agent-based modeling, using cellular automata. Relationships and decisions were modeled. Along the interactions the emergence of consensus in the network could be observed and the results show that the more impulsive the individuals in a network, the stronger will be the ties among them. Convergence of partner selection criteria could also be noticed. Additionally, a structural hole could be shown to have a local influence on how it moves an agent away from the network. This work waves positively towards using cellular automata in social (in the case, business) networks modeling, in spite of their well-known limitations for these kinds of problems.
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Paper Nr:	713
Title:	AN EVALUATION INSTRUMENT FOR LEARNING OBJECT QUALITY AND MANAGEMENT
Authors:	Erla M. Morales Morgado, Francisco García Peñalvo and Angela Barrón Ruiz
Abstract:	Being able to evaluate the quality of LOs is crucial for reliable LO management. LO quality evaluation must take into account both their pedagogical and the technical characteristics. It also needs to consider them as units of learning and to determine their level of granularity (size). This paper describes a proposal for a specific LO quality evaluation instrument and presents the results of its assessment by a panel of experts.
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Paper Nr:	752
Title:	EVS PROCESS MINER - Incorporating Ideas from Search and ETL into Process Mining
Authors:	Jon E. Ingvaldsen and Jon A. Gulla
Abstract:	Search is the process of locating information that matches a given query. Extract, Transform and Load (ETL) editors provide a user friendly and flexible environment for creating operation chains and digging into and explore data. In this paper, we describe the implementation of a process mining framework, the EVS Process Miner, which incorporates ideas from search and ETL. We also describe two industrial cases that show the value of applying search and graphical operation chain environments in process mining work.
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Paper Nr:	762
Title:	A DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM FOR INTEGRATED ASSEMBLY AND DISASSEMBLY PLANNING USING A GA APPROACH
Authors:	Yuan-Jye Tseng, Hsiao-Ting Kao and Feng-Yi Huang
Abstract:	In a decision support system for a complete product life cycle management, both assembly planning and disassembly planning need to be considered for producing an assembled product. To produce an assembled product, an assembly planning scheme is required to generate a proper assembly sequence with which the components can be grouped and fixed to construct a final product. At the end of the product life cycle, a disassembly planning scheme is performed to generate a disassembly sequence to disassemble and recycle the product. In this research, a new decision support system for a complete product life cycle management by integrating assembly and disassembly planning is presented. First, the spatial relationships of the components and the precedence of the assembly and disassembly operations are analyzed. Second, a genetic algorithm approach is applied to evaluate the integrated assembly and disassembly costs to find the good assembly sequences and disassembly sequences. A cost function by integrating the assembly costs and disassembly costs is formulated and used as an objective function. An example product is demonstrated and discussed. The test result shows that the decision support system is feasible and effective for integrating assembly and disassembly planning with a complete product life cycle management.
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Paper Nr:	767
Title:	KNOWLEDGE ACQUISITION WITH OM - A Heuristic Solution
Authors:	Adolfo Guzman and Alma Delia Cuevas Rasgado
Abstract:	Knowledge scattered through the Web inside unstructured documents (text documents) can not be easily interpreted by computers. To do so, knowledge contained from them must be extracted by a parser or a person and poured into a suitable data structure, the best form to do this, are with ontologies. For an appropriate merging of these “individual” ontologies, we consider repetitions, redundancies, synonyms, meronyms, different level of details, different viewpoints of the concepts involved, and contradictions, a large and useful ontology could be constructed. This paper presents OM algorithm, an automatic ontology merger that achieves the fusion of two ontologies without human intervention. Through repeated application of OM, we can get a growing ontology of a knowledge topic given. Using OM we hope to achieve automatic knowledge acquisition. There are two missing tasks: the conversion of a given text to its corresponding ontology (by a combination of syntactic and semantic analysis) is not yet automatically done; and the exploitation of the large resulting ontology is still under development.
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Paper Nr:	776
Title:	A BI-CRITERIA SCHEDULING FRAMEWORK FOR THE SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT OF MOBILE PROVIDERS
Authors:	Göktürk Gezer, İlker Yaz, Hasan Mert Taymaz, Tansel Ozyer and Reda Alhajj
Abstract:	In delivery sector answering the requests of customers quickly and efficiently became very important for recent years. Thus people who are working in delivery sector began challenging to build well settled synchronization for more complex delivering system. In this synchronization they try to keep customers information, providers (who answering requests) information, divide requests for providers and inform them about their recent jobs, provide fast and efficient delivering system. All of these lead to acquire customer pleasure with firm pleasure. We believe that using mobile device such as PDA with a host PC for building well settled synchronization with providers and host is simple but useful way. The aim of host is arranging received requests and sending them with their information to convenient providers by considering all providers position and their job intensity. So request would be answered as quickly as possible. Also providers can access information about their jobs and the shortest path for reaching these jobs by using their PDA. Our system makes all things simple and easy for people. Providers don’t have to care about how to reach their jobs and workers arrange requests don’t have to consider about convenient providers.
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Paper Nr:	801
Title:	A DATA MINING METHOD BASED ON THE VARIABILITY OF THE CUSTOMER CONSUMPTION - A Special Application on Electric Utility Companies
Authors:	Felix Biscarri, Ignacio Monedero, Carlos León de Mora, Juán I. Guerrero, Jesús Biscarri and Rocío Millán
Abstract:	This paper describes a method proposed in order to recover electrical energy (lost by abnormality or fraud) by means of a data mining analysis based in outliers detection. It provides a general methodology to obtain a list of abnormal users using only the general customer databases as input. The hole input information needed is taken exclusively from the general customers’ database. The data mining method has been successfully applied to detect abnormalities and fraudulencies in customer consumption. We provide a real study and we include a number of abnormal pattern examples.
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Paper Nr:	808
Title:	WHY HEIDEGGER? - Critical Insights for IS Design from Pragmatism and from Social Semiotics
Authors:	Angela L. Nobre
Abstract:	Martin Heidegger’s ontology represents a landmark in terms of how human knowledge is theorised. Heidegger’s breakthrough achievement is to consider scientific knowledge as a particular case of the broader being-in-the-world instance. Science develops without needing to acknowledge this dependence though in times of crisis, when previous approaches are no longer effective, it is the link with daily experience that enables the rethinking of earlier assumptions. This valorisation of quotidian practices and the centrality of experience and of informal knowledge – the prereflexive work – in terms of being the antecedents of formal and explicit knowledge, has profound consequences regarding the creation of organisational information systems. The American School of Pragmatism, developed by Charles Sanders Peirce, had previously argued in similar lines in terms of the non-severing of the dual relations such as theory/practice or individual/social. In later times, Social Semiotics, also developed under the same implicit assumptions, where the individual and the social dimensions of human reality are mutually determined. These arguments have been established for long as being relevant for information systems design by several authors. However, there is an obvious lack of understanding of the kernel role of such theories in current mainstream research. Concrete approaches to organisational learning - such as Semiotic Learning - are an example of the huge potential that lies largely unexplored under the umbrella of socio-philosophy.
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Paper Nr:	810
Title:	ARCHCOLLECT - A Tool for WEB Usage Knowledge Acquisition from User’s Interactions
Authors:	Ahmed Esmin, Joubert de Castro Lima, Edgar T. Yano and Tiago S. Carneiro
Abstract:	This paper presents a low coupled acquisition mechanism focused on users interactions, associated with semantic data. This tool, named ArchCollect, is used for collecting, transforming, loading and displaying user interactions. Its architecture is composed by seven components that gather information coming directly from the user, regardless the user monitored applications. The ArchCollect architecture has a relational model with capacity for keeping important information for two main areas: the commerce with products or services, quantities and prices, and applications with process, quantities, prices and employees. The relational model also added the possibility of obtaining the time spent to serve each user interaction on the application servers and on the ArchCollect servers. In this architecture, data extraction and analysis are performed either by internal algorithms, or by decision support tools, such as OLAP, Data Mining and Statistic.
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Paper Nr:	50
Title:	A NEW APPROXIMATE REASONING BASED ON SPMF
Authors:	Dae-Young Choi
Abstract:	A new approximate reasoning based on standardized parametric membership functions (SPMF) is proposed. It provides an efficient mechanism for approximate reasoning within linear time complexity.
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Paper Nr:	59
Title:	TEMPORAL INFORMATION INDEXING MODEL
Authors:	Witold Abramowicz and Andrzej Bassara
Abstract:	Modern information retrieval models are not capable of resolving queries containing temporal criteria. One is not able to search for documents which content relates to certain time (for instance, find all documents related to the third quarter of the last year“). This limitation is mainly due to syntactic nature of modern information retrieval models, which perform query-document matching based on syntactic or simplified semantic similarity measures. In this article, we are focusing on the problem of creating document indexes, which represent time to which document contents relate, and which in turn allow for searching documents using temporal criteria.
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Paper Nr:	64
Title:	MULTI-AGENT AND EMBEDDED SYSTEM TECHNOLOGIES FOR AUTOMATIC SURVEILLANCE
Authors:	Maria Del Carmen Romero Ternero, Francisco Sivianes, Alejandro Carrasco Muñoz, Maria Dolores Hernandez Vazquez and Jose Ignacio Escudero Fombuena
Abstract:	Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems have traditionally used text-based Human Machine Interfaces (HMI). We propose a system which integrates multimedia information in SCADA systems in order to improve and support the telecontrol tasks. This system has been deployed in a real environment and we have obtained satisfactory results. Then, we also propose an improvement for this system. This improvement allows telecontrol operators to use the system without needing any experience with computers and also it allows an automatic surveillance of the elements in the utility environment. The development of this improved system is accomplished by using the main advantages of embedded and multi-agent system technologies.
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Paper Nr:	84
Title:	THE SWARM EFFECT MINIMIZATION ALGORITHM - Utilized to Optimise the Frequency Assignment Problem
Authors:	Grant B. O'Reilly and Elizabeth M. Ehlers
Abstract:	The swarm effect minimization algorithm (SEMA) is presented in this paper. The SEMA was used to produce improved solutions for the minimum interference frequency assignment problem (MI-FAP) in mobile telecommunications networks. The SEMA is a multi-agent orientated design. The SEMA is based on the stigmergy concept. The stigmergy concept allows the actual changes in the environment made by entities in a swarm to act as a source of information that aids the swarm entities when making further changes in the environment. The entities do not blindly control the changes in the environment the actual changes guide the entities. The SwarmAFP is tested against the COST 259 Siemens bench marks as well as tested in a commercial mobile telecommunications network and the results are presented in this paper.
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Paper Nr:	115
Title:	A DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM FOR FACILITY LOCATION SELECTION BASED ON A FUZZY HOUSE OF QUALITY METHOD
Authors:	Reza Tavakkoli-Moghaddam and Saman Hassanzadeh-Amin
Abstract:	Companies investigate decision supports systems (DSSs) for facility location selection to reduce cost and manage risk. In this paper, a decision support system for location selection is proposed based on a house of quality (HOQ) method, adopting an analysis to fuzzy logic and triangular fuzzy numbers. Special attention is also paid to the subjective assessment in the HOQ concept. Further, the differences between decision makers are taken into account. Finally, a case study is presented to demonstrate the procedure of the proposed algorithm and identify the suitable location.
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Paper Nr:	236
Title:	SUBJECTIVE PREFERENCES IN FINANCIAL PRODUCTS
Authors:	Emili Vizuete Luciano and Anna M. Gil-Lafuente
Abstract:	When the decision maker invests in the banking organizations, he is faced with the need to choose between apparently different products. The financial advisers have to offer an agile and well-qualified service to be able to continue counting on the confidence of their customers and to increase their results consequently. In this paper, presents a further step in justifying such evalutation. Results from the proposed approach present a better undestanding of each system to decision makers for evaluating justification issues which sometimes cannot be defined.
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Paper Nr:	267
Title:	AN OBJECT SELECTION MECHANISM FOR SCHEMA INTEGRATION OF AGENT’S KNOWLEDGE STRUCTURE IN VIRTUAL REALITY
Authors:	Dong H. Kim and Jong-Hee Park
Abstract:	Similar to human knowledge, the knowledge of agents should be able to express various and vast information in the virtual reality. In order to represent the numerous information we should construct the lots of schemas. For such a reason, the schemas are represented redundantly bringing about the problems such as update and insertion anomalies. In order to solve these problems we should consider the method of schema integration. In this paper, we propose the methods of selecting object which are suitable for the schema integration.
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Paper Nr:	272
Title:	A STOCHASTIC APPROACH FOR PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS OF PRODUCTION FLOWS
Authors:	Philippe Bouché and Cécilia Zanni
Abstract:	In our increasingly competitive world, today companies are implementing improvement strategies in every department and, in particular, in their manufacturing systems. This paper discusses the use of a global method based on a knowledge-based approach for the development of a software tool for modelling and analysis of production flows. This method will help promote the companies competitiveness by guaranteeing the efficiency of their production lines and, therefore, the quality and traceability of the manufactured products. Different kind of techniques will be used: graphic representation of the production, identification of specific behaviour, and research of correlations among events on the production line. Most of these techniques are based on statistical and probabilistic analyses. To carry on high level analyses, a stochastic approach will be used to identify specific behaviour with the aim of defining action plans, etc...
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Paper Nr:	273
Title:	DISTRIBUTED ENSEMBLE LEARNING IN TEXT CLASSIFICATION
Authors:	Catarina Silva, Bernardete M. Ribeiro, Uros Lotric and Andrej Dobnikar
Abstract:	In today’s society, individuals and organizations are faced with an ever growing load and diversity of textual information and content, and with increasing demands for knowledge and skills. In this work we try to answer part of these challenges by addressing text classification problems, essential to managing knowledge, by combining several different pioneer kernel-learning machines, namely Support Vector Machines and Relevance Vector Machines. To excel complex learning procedures we establish a model of high-performance distributed computing environment to help tackling the tasks involved in the text classification problem. The presented approach is valuable in many practical situations where text classification is used. Reuters-21578 benchmark data set is used to demonstrate the strength of the proposed system while different ensemble based learning machines provide text classification models that are efficiently deployed in the Condor and Alchemi platforms.
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Paper Nr:	279
Title:	ASSESSMENT OF THE EFFECT OF NOISE ON AN UNSUPERVISED FEATURE SELECTION METHOD FOR GENERATIVE TOPOGRAPHIC MAPPING
Authors:	Alfredo Vellido and Jorge S. Velazco
Abstract:	Unsupervised feature relevance determination and feature selection for dimensionality reduction are important issues in many clustering problems. An unsupervised feature selection method for general Finite Mixture Models was recently proposed and subsequently extended to Generative Topographic Mapping (GTM), a nonlinear manifold learning constrained mixture model for data clustering and visualization. Some of the results of a previous preliminary assessment of this method for GTM suggested that its performance may be affected by the presence of uninformative noise in the dataset. In this brief study, we test in some detail such limitation of the method.
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Paper Nr:	285
Title:	LOCAL SEARCH AS A FIXED POINT OF FUNCTIONS
Authors:	Eric Monfroy, Frédéric Saubion , Broderick Crawford and Carlos Castro
Abstract:	Constraint Satisfaction Problems (CSP) provide a general framework for modeling many practical applications (planning, scheduling, time tabling, . . . ). CSPs can be solved with complete methods (e.g., constraint propagation), or incomplete methods (e.g., local search). Although there are some frameworks to formalize constraint propagation, there are only few studies of theoretical frameworks for local search. Here we are concerned with the design and use of a generic framework to model local search as the computation of a fixed point of functions.
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Paper Nr:	320
Title:	THE PROTÉGÉ - PROMETHEUS APPROACH TO SUPPORT MULTI-AGENT SYSTEMS CREATION
Authors:	Marina V. Sokolova and Antonio Fernández-Caballero
Abstract:	The integration of two existing and widely accepted tools, Protégé Ontology Editor and Knowledge-Base Framework, and Prometheus Development Kit, into a common approach, aiming to include the principal stages of MAS development life cycle and offering a general sequence of steps facilitating application creation, is proposed in this paper. The approach is successfully being applied to situation assessment issues, which has concluded in an agent-based decision-support system for environmental impact evaluation.
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Paper Nr:	328
Title:	K-NN: ESTIMATING AN ADEQUATE VALUE FOR PARAMETER K
Authors:	Bruno Borsato, Alexandre Plastino and Luiz Merschmann
Abstract:	The k-NN (k Nearest Neighbours) classification technique is characterized by its simplicity and efficient performance on many databases. However, the good performance of this method relies on the choice of an appropriate value for the input parameter k. In this work, we propose methods to estimate an adequate value for parameter k for any given database. Experimental results have shown that, in terms of predictive accuracy, k-NN using the estimated value for k usually outperforms k-NN with the values commonly used for k, as well as well-known methods such as decision trees and naive Bayes classification.
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Paper Nr:	342
Title:	K-SITE RULES - Integrating Business Rules in the Mainstream Software Engineering Practice
Authors:	José L. Martínez-Fernández, José C. González and Pablo Suárez
Abstract:	The technology for business rule based systems faces two important challenges: standardization and integration within conventional software development lifecycle models and tools. Despite the standardization effort carried out by international organizations, commercial tools incorporate their own flavours in rule languages, making difficult the migration among tools. On the other hand, although some business rules systems vendors incorporate interfaces to encapsulate decision models as web services, it is still difficult integrating business rules in traditional object-oriented analysis and design methodologies. This is the rationale behind the development of K-Site Rules, a tool that facilitates the cooperation of business people and software designers in business applications.
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Paper Nr:	344
Title:	IMPROVING CASE RETRIEVAL PERFORMANCE THROUGH THE USE OF CLUSTERING TECHNIQUES
Authors:	Paulo Tomé, Ernesto Costa and Luís Amaral
Abstract:	The performance of Case-Based Reasoning (CBR) systems is highly depend on the performance of the retrieval phase. Usually, if the case memory has a large number of cases the system turn to be very slow. Several mechanisms have been proposed in order to prevent a full search of the case memory during the retrieval phase. In this work we propose a clustering technique applied to the memory of cases. But this strategy is applied to an intermediate level of information that defines paths to the cases. Algorithms to the retrieval and retention phase are also presented.
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Paper Nr:	351
Title:	COMPARING PEOPLE IN THE ENTERPRISE
Authors:	Gianluca Demartini
Abstract:	Enterprise Search Systems are requested to provide more and more functionalities for supporting decision at the management level. An important aspect to consider is the human power and the knowledge which is available. For this reason, in this paper, after extracting a list of requirements out of a specific scenario, and presenting the previous work, we describe an improved approach to compare experts in order to retrieve and present to the user the most appropriate candidates for a given project.
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Paper Nr:	389
Title:	THE GENERALIZED HYBRID AVERAGING OPERATOR AND ITS APPLICATION IN FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING
Authors:	José M. Merigó and Montserrat Casanovas
Abstract:	We present the generalized hybrid averaging (GHA) operator. It is a new aggregation operator that generalizes the hybrid averaging (HA) operator by using the generalized mean. Then, we are able to generalize a wide range of mean operators such as the HA, the hybrid quadratic averaging (HQA), etc. The HA is an aggregation operator that includes the ordered weighted averaging (OWA) operator and the weighted average (WA). Then, with the GHA, we are able to get all the particular cases obtained by using generalized means in the OWA and in the WA such as the weighted geometric mean, the ordered weighted geometric (OWG) operator, the weighted quadratic mean (WQM), etc. We further generalize the GHA by using quasi-arithmetic means. Then, we obtain the quasi-arithmetic hybrid averaging (Quasi-HA) operator. Finally, we apply the new approach in a financial decision making problem.
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Paper Nr:	415
Title:	GENETIC FEATURE SELECTION AND STATISTICAL CLASSIFICATION OF VOIDS IN CONCRETE STRUCTURE
Authors:	Giuseppe Acciani, Girolamo Fornarelli, D. Magarielli and Domenico Maiullari
Abstract:	In this work simulated ultrasonic waveforms in a concrete specimen obtained by a software based on finite element method were used to develop an automatic inspection method. A piezoelectric transducer is used to generate stress waves that are reflected by voids. Then the waves are received by another transducer set at a fixed distance from the first one on the same specimen surface. Time and frequency features has been extracted from the waveforms, the most significant features have been chosen by a genetic feature selection and the classification performances were estimated referring to a k-NN classifier.
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Paper Nr:	435
Title:	NURSE SCHEDULING BY COOPERATIVE GA WITH VARIABLE MUTATION OPERATOR
Authors:	Shin-ya Uneme, Hikaru Kawano and Makoto Ohki
Abstract:	This paper proposes an effective mutation operator for the cooperative genetic algorithm (CGA) to solve a nurse scheduling problem. The nurse scheduling is very complex task for a clinical director in a general hospital. Even veteran director requires one or two weeks to create the schedule. Besides, we extend the nurse schedule to permit the change of the schedule. This permission has explosively increased computation time for the nurse scheduling. We propose the new mutation operator to solve the problem. The CGA with the new mutation operator has brought surprising effective results.
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Paper Nr:	441
Title:	ANALYSING MULTIDIMENSIONAL DATABASES USING DATA MINING AND BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE TO PROVIDE DECISION SUPPORT
Authors:	Rajveer S. Basra and Kevin Lu
Abstract:	After relational databases and data warehouses, the techniques used for data management have entered the next phase, Business Intelligence Tools. These tools provide enhanced business functionality by integrating data mining and advanced analytics into data warehouse systems to provide comprehensive support for the purposes of data management, analysis and decision support. In this paper, we introduce an on-going project aimed at developing BI tools on data warehouse systems for multi-dimensional analysis. A prototype has been developed and has been tested for two examples, which are also reported in this paper.
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Paper Nr:	455
Title:	A MULTI AGENT SYSTEM MODEL TO EVALUATE THE DYNAMICS OF A COLLABORATIVE NETWORK
Authors:	Ilaria Baffo, Giuseppe Confessore, Graziano Galiano and Silvia Rismondo
Abstract:	The paper provides a model based on the Multi Agent System (MAS) paradigm able to give a methodological base to evaluate the dynamics in a collaborative environment. The model dynamics is strictly driven by the competence concept. In the provided MAS the agents represent the actors operating on a given area. In particular, it is supposed the agents being composed by two distinct typologies: (i) the territorial agent, and (ii) the enterprise agent. Each agent has its local information and goals, and interacts with the others by using an interaction protocol. The decision-making processes and the competences characterize in a specific way each one of the different agent typologies working on the system.
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Paper Nr:	458
Title:	NEURAL NETWORKS APPLICATION TO FAULT DETECTION IN ELECTRICAL SUBSTATIONS
Authors:	Luiz Biondi Neto, Pedro G. Coelho, Alexandre Mendonça Lopes, Marcelo Nestor da Silva and David Targueta
Abstract:	This paper proposes an application of neural networks to fault detection in electrical substations, particularly to the Parada Angélica Electrical Substation, part of the AMPLA Energy System provider in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. For research purposes, that substation was modeled in a bay oriented fashion instead of component oriented. Moreover, the modeling process assumed a substation division in five sectors or set of bays comprising components and protection equipments. These five sectors are: 11 feed bays, 2 capacitor bank bays, 2 general/secundary bays, 2 line bays and 2 backward bays. Electrical power engineer experts mapped 291 faults into 134 alarms. The employed neural networks, also bay oriented, were trained using the Levenberg-Marquardt method, and the AMPLA experts validated training patterns, for each bay. The test patterns were directly obtained from the SCADA (Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition) digital system signal, suitably decoded were supplied by AMPLA engineers. The resulting maximum percentage error obtained by the fault detection neural networks was within 1.5 % which indicates the success of the used neural networks to the fault detection problem. It should be stressed that the human experts should be the only ones responsible for the decision task and for returning the substation safely into normal operation after a fault occurrence. The role of the neural networks fault detectors are to support the decision making task done by the experts.
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Paper Nr:	464
Title:	NEGOTIATION SUPPORTED THROUGH RISK ASSESSMENT
Authors:	Sérgio A. Rodrigues, Jano Moreira De Souza and Melise Paula
Abstract:	In organizations, decision-making processes usually require great effort in solving conflicts. These disagreements are generally time-consuming and jeopardize negotiations. Thus, negotiation planning is the key factor to balance negotiator’s expectations and reach an agreement. In this scenario, risk management tools play an important role in identifying possibly controversial points of view. This paper aims at presenting software which supports negotiation through risk assessment. The proposed software, named RisNeg presents mechanisms which are able to identify, analyze, respond to, monitor, and control negotiation risks. RisNeg also provides mechanisms to indicate the chances of achieving agreement. Therefore, the use of such software may minimize the conflicts in the decision-making process.
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Paper Nr:	490
Title:	ONTOLOGICAL APPROACH FOR THE CONFORMITY CHECKING MODELING IN CONSTRUCTION
Authors:	Catherine Faron-Zucker, Nhan Le-thanh, Anastasiya Yurchyshyna and Alain Zarli
Abstract:	This paper presents an ontological method and a corresponding system C3R aimed to semi-automatically check the conformity of a construction project represented by RDF graph against a set of construction norms formalized as SPARQL queries. Our conformity-checking model has a two-level structure: the reasoning relies on matching of these queries and graphs and on expert rules guiding the checking process itself by optimal scheduling of matching procedures, according to semantic annotations of conformity queries, which integrate the meta-knowledge on the checking process (formalized with the help of CSTB experts). The reasoning results with a detailed (non)conformity report in terms of the Construction domain.
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Paper Nr:	492
Title:	A NOVEL TERM WEIGHTING SCHEME FOR A FUZZY LOGIC BASED INTELLIGENT WEB AGENT
Authors:	Ariel Gomez, Jorge Ropero, Carlos León de Mora and Alejandro Carrasco Muñoz
Abstract:	Term Weighting (TW) is one of the most important tasks for Information Retrieval (IR). To solve the TW problem, many authors have considered Vector Space Model, and specifically, they have used the TF-IDF method. As this method does not take into account some of the features of terms, we propose a novel alternative fuzzy logic based method for TW in IR. TW is an essential task for the Web Intelligent Agent we are developing. Intelligent Agent mode of operation is also explained in the paper. An application of the Intelligent Agent will be in operation soon for the University of Seville web portal.
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Paper Nr:	497
Title:	EXPLORATIVE ASSOCIATION MINING - Cross-sector Knowledge for the European Home Textile Industry
Authors:	Jessica Huster, Michael Spenke and Gerrit Bury
Abstract:	The European home-textile industry lacks cross-sector knowledge and knowledge about its end consumers. Click and ordering data reflect the consuming behaviour as well as the preferences and their changes. They are therefore an important trend indicator, which is not harnessed up to now by this industry sector. In this paper, we report on the solution of the Trend Analyser association mining component that helps designers and product developers to better understand their end consumers. Our component uses explorative data mining to perform a market basket analysis and identify interesting associations. Such associations can help decision makers to understand and study the consuming behaviour and identify early changes in their preferences in order to perform a better production planning.
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Paper Nr:	498
Title:	MULTICRITERIA DECISION AID USE FOR CONFLICTING AGENT PREFERENCES MODELING UNDER NEGOTIATION
Authors:	Noria Taghezout and ABDELKADER ADLA
Abstract:	Individual decisions in multi-agent domains are rarely enough for producing optimal plans which satisfy all the goals. Therefore, agents need to cooperate to generate the best multi-agent plan through sharing tentative solutions, exchanging sub goals, or having other agents to satisfy their goals. In this paper, we propose a new negotiation mechanism independent of domain properties to handle real-time goals. The mechanism is based on the well-known Contract net Protocol. Integrated Station of Production agents will be equipped with a sufficient behavior to carry out practical operations and simultaneously react to the complex problems caused by the dynamic scheduling in real situations. These agents express their preferences by using ELECTRE III method in order to resolve differences. The approach is tested for simple scenarios.
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Paper Nr:	500
Title:	CONGESTION CONTROL SYSTEM WITH PID CONTROLLER USING FUZZY ADAPTATION MECHANISM
Authors:	Magdalena Turowska
Abstract:	The congestion control in computer network is a problem of controlling a specific object such as a computer network. The paper provides an adaptation mechanism designed to prevent unstable behavior of the system, with fuzzy rules, and with an inference mechanism that identifies the possible sources of nonlinear behavior. The adaptation mechanism can be designed to adjust PID controller tuning parameters when oscillatory behavior is detected. Tests in nonlinear and uncertainty process are performed.
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Paper Nr:	543
Title:	MODEL FOR TRUST WITHIN INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY MANAGEMENT
Authors:	Dayse de Mello Benzi, Rafael T. Timoteo Timóteo de Sousa Jr, Christophe Bidan and LUDOVIC MÉ
Abstract:	This work presents a model for applying the concept of trust in the management of information technology. It presents relevant aspects on the application of trust within IT Management and focuses on the necessity of aligning a trust model with the organizational strategies and main activities. The impacts of trust in IT management are described and related to recent studies on the reduction of risks in business-oriented IT management. In this context, the model presented in this paper is based on the understanding trust indicators are highly desirable to IT management, as long as they are measured and controlled, and used as a means for IT management to acquire greater effectiveness in its alignment to general organizational and business strategy.
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Paper Nr:	549
Title:	OPTIMAL LAYOUT SELECTION USING PETRI NET IN AN AUTOMATED ASSEMBLING SHOP
Authors:	Iraj Mahdavi, Mohammad M. Paydar, Babak Shirazi and Magsud Solimanpur
Abstract:	Abstract In today's competitive manufacturing systems, it is crucial to respond quickly to the demand of customers and to decrease total cost of production. To achieve higher performance of automated assembling shop, it is needed to utilize methods to minimize production cycle time (makespan) and work-in-process (WIP) in buffers. This paper intends to focus on the selection of optimal layout based on allocation of machines to different locations as they can perform similar operations with different processing times. The time Petri net (TPN) has been used to illustrate the applications of proposed model in case study.
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Paper Nr:	559
Title:	A NEW STATISTICAL MODEL - To Designing a Decision Support System
Authors:	Morteza Zahedi, Ali Pouyan and Esmat Hejazi
Abstract:	In this paper we propose a new statistical approach to simulate a technical support center as a help desk for a web site which makes use of scientific documents and university protocols for the students and lecturers. In contrary to the existing statistical approaches which are modelled by general statistical graphs named Bayesian network or decision graph, we propose a statistical approach which can be used consistently in different domains and problem spaces without any need for a new designing regarding the new domain. Furthermore, the proposed statistical model which is trained by a set of training data collected from the experts in a special field is applicable to high-dimensional, large-sized, non-geometric-based data for decision making support.
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Paper Nr:	641
Title:	FACILITATION SUPPORT FOR ON-LINE FOCUS GROUP DISCUSSIONS BY MESSAGE FEATURE MAP
Authors:	Noriko I. Y., Shunsuke Saruwatari, Xavier Llora and David E. Goldberg
Abstract:	Face-to-face focus group discussion has been one of the reliable approaches for collecting variety of ideas and opinions for building marketing strategy, even though various network-based communication tools have been available. This is due to complications in facilitation of on-line discussions. The goal of this paper is to maximize the profit from on-line focus group discussions by supporting facilitators’ task. In this paper, we propose a message feature map and two metrics for measuring message feature; centrality and novelty. The message feature map plots discussion messages on centrality-novelty plane, and gives us intuitive understanding of the discussions in various aspects. Reporting experimental results by using real data collected in on-line focus group discussions, we discuss how we can utilize the message feature map for the effective facilitation.
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Paper Nr:	645
Title:	SOLVING THE UNIVERSITY COURSE TIMETABLING PROBLEM BY HYPERCUBE FRAMEWORK FOR ACO
Authors:	José R. León, Broderick Crawford and Franklin J. P.
Abstract:	We present a resolution technique of the University Course Timetabling Problem (UCTP), this technique is based in the implementation of Hypercube framework using the Max-Min Ant System. We show the structure of the problem and the design of resolution using this framework. A simplification of the UCTP problem is used, involving three types of hard restrictions and three types of soft restrictions. We solve experimental instances and competition instances, the results are presented of comparative form to other techniques. We present an appropriate construction graph and pheromone matrix representation. Finally the conclusions are given.
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Paper Nr:	648
Title:	THE DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION OF THE INTEGRATED DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM ON LABOR MARKET
Authors:	Dongjin Yu, Shixin Feng and Guangming Wang
Abstract:	Nowadays labor resources in China face the fierce situation in their employment. The decision support system on labor market helps the government to have a sound grip of the composition, migration and trend of regional labor resources’ supply and requirement . This paper proposes an integrated architecture of the decision support system on regional labor markets, which leverages the Service Oriented Architecture. The real system implemented on this architecture, called as LMDSS, is also presented to show the features of the multi-dimension analysis of job introducing.
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Paper Nr:	677
Title:	AUTOMATIC CLASSIFICATION OF MIDI TRACKS
Authors:	Alexandre Bernardo and Thibault Langlois
Abstract:	This paper presents a system for classifying MIDI tracks according to six predefined classes: Solo, Melody, Melody+Solo, Drums, Bass and Harmony. No metadata present in the MIDI file is used. The MIDI data (pitch of notes, onset time and note durations) are preprocessed in order to extract a set of features. These data sets are then used with several classifiers (Neural Networks, k-NN).
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Paper Nr:	691
Title:	INTEGRATING SIMULATION INTO A WEB-BASED DECISION SUPPORT TOOL FOR THE COST EFFECTIVE PLANNING OF VESSEL DISMANTLING PROCESSES
Authors:	Hara Pylarinou, Dimitrios Koumanakos, Antonios Hapsas, Nikos Karacapilidis and Emmanuel Adamides
Abstract:	Vessel dismantling is a complex process, which requires advanced planning subject to environmentally safe as well as cost and energy effective standards. Aiming to facilitate stakeholders involved in such activities and augment the quality of their related decision making, this paper presents an innovative decision support system that takes into account the diversity of the associated constraints (i.e. available resources, environmental issues, health and safety of the workforce, etc.). The proposed system aids stakeholders make decisions on qualitative issues such as the appropriateness of a disposal methodology or the level of the safety of the workforce in a specific dismantling yard. Being seamlessly integrated with a visual interactive simulation environment, the system facilitates the collaborative design and redesign of dismantling processes.
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Paper Nr:	697
Title:	RESEARCH ON LEARNING-OBJECT MANAGEMENT
Authors:	Erla M. Morales Morgado, Francisco García Peñalvo and Angela Barrón Ruiz
Abstract:	Although LO management is an interesting subject to study due to the current interoperability potential, it is not promoted very much because a number of issues remain to be resolved. LOs need to be designed to achieve educational goals, and the metadata schema must have the kind of information to make them reusable in other contexts. This paper presents a pilot project in the design, implementation and evaluation of learning objects in the field of university education, with a specific focus on the development of a metadata typology and quality evaluation tool, concluding with a summary and analysis of the end results.
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Paper Nr:	701
Title:	FUZZY INDUCED AGGREGATION OPERATORS IN DECISION MAKING WITH DEMPSTER-SHAFER BELIEF STRUCTURE
Authors:	José M. Merigó and Montserrat Casanovas
Abstract:	We develop a new approach for decision making with Dempster-Shafer theory of evidence when the available information is uncertain and it can be assessed with fuzzy numbers. With this approach, we are able to represent the problem without losing relevant information, so the decision maker knows exactly which are the different alternatives and their consequences. For doing so, we suggest the use of different types of fuzzy induced aggregation operators in the problem. As a result, we get new types of fuzzy induced aggregation operators such as the belief structure – fuzzy induced ordered weighted averaging (BS-FIOWA) operator. We also develop an application of the new approach in a financial decision making problem.
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Paper Nr:	716
Title:	MULTIAGENTS IN MANUFACTURING PRODUCTION LINES - Designing Fault Tolerant Adaptive Production Lines
Authors:	Eugen Volk
Abstract:	The usage of multiagents for autonomous, fault tolerant and flexible adaptation of production lines is not widespread in industrial applications. This paper presents usage of multiagents in industrial applications by showing a realization within a fictive example of a car body manufacturing production line. The mechanism presented here for coordination of agents in multiagent based production line factory is based on contract net protocol and uses ontological matching of individual task ontologies, to find an appropriate contractor.
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Paper Nr:	751
Title:	TOWARDS ENCOURAGING CONTRIBUTION TO A SEMANTIC WIKI-BASED EXPERIENCE REPOSITORY
Authors:	Alessandro Borges and Germana Nobrega
Abstract:	Recent trends on organizational context include tools allowing collaboration under a perspective of emergent structure rather than a priori embedded one. While these new tools are suitable for promoting spontaneous large-scale content evolution and/or communication, bringing them to companies intranets seems still a challenge. In educational settings, findings when applying mechanisms that provide awareness on community needs improve quality and help to achieve on-time content evolution. We are currently defining a mechanism inspired both in a particular company and based on theoretical background from previous work from literature.
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Paper Nr:	753
Title:	MULTIPLICATIVE NEURAL NETWORK WITH SWARM INTELLIGENCE FOR MULTICARRIER TRANSMITTER
Authors:	Nibaldo Rodriguez, Claudio Cubillos and Orlando Duran
Abstract:	In this paper, we propose a novel effective distortion compensation scheme suitably developed to reduce nonlinearities of the traveling wave tube amplifier (TWTA) in orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) systems at the multicarrier transmitter side. This compensator is developed in order to combine in the most effective way the capability of the quantum particle swarm optimization technique and multiplicative neural networks. The compensator effectiveness has been tested through computer simulations. The improvements in the reduction of constellation warping and enhanced performance in terms of the bit error rate (BER) are offered for the TWTA with an input back-off level of 0 dB.
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Paper Nr:	771
Title:	A TOOL OF DECISION SUPPORT FOR THE NATURAL RISK MANAGEMENT
Authors:	Nadia Abdat and Zaia Alimazighi
Abstract:	In this paper, we propose a space balanced scorecard for the seismic risk management. Indeed, to install an effective policy of prevention against the natural risk, the phenomenon should be controlled. This can be carried out only after a good knowledge of this last. From where, the need for having a large volume of information coming from various sources. The Geographical information systems (GIS) are largely used for the decision support. However, they give a rather static vision whereas the management of an environmental process in general and natural risk in particular requires tools based on dynamic models. In addition, the scorecards are often used to build decision support systems. In this paper, we propose a balanced scorecard for the management of a seismic risk which is established on the basis of spatial indicators.
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Paper Nr:	790
Title:	ALGORITHMS FOR ESTIMATING FOREST INVENTORY PARAMETERS FROM DATA ACQUIRED BY REMOTE SENSING METHODS
Authors:	Ingus Smits and Salvis Dagis
Abstract:	Two technologies- LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) and aero photography- have a huge potential in forest taxation, which is a process of gathering different parameters of specific region. Both technologies can be used for finding different parameters of interest, such as number of trees, tree height and other. This paper presents the results of usage analysis for LiDAR and aero photography, and describes their possibilities. Also it contains an analysis of tree identifying algorithms and describes ways of their usage in different processes.
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Paper Nr:	790
Title:	ALGORITHMS FOR ESTIMATING FOREST INVENTORY PARAMETERS FROM DATA ACQUIRED BY REMOTE SENSING METHODS
Authors:	Ingus Smits and Salvis Dagis
Abstract:	Two technologies- LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) and aero photography- have a huge potential in forest taxation, which is a process of gathering different parameters of specific region. Both technologies can be used for finding different parameters of interest, such as number of trees, tree height and other. This paper presents the results of usage analysis for LiDAR and aero photography, and describes their possibilities. Also it contains an analysis of tree identifying algorithms and describes ways of their usage in different processes.
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Paper Nr:	804
Title:	MASSIVE PARALLEL NETWORKS OF EVOLUTIONARY PROCESSORS AS NP-PROBLEM SOLVERS
Authors:	Nuria Gomez Blas, FERNANDO DE MINGO and EUGENIO SANTOS
Abstract:	This paper presents a new connectionist model that might be used to solve NP-problems. Most well known numeric models are Neural Networks that are able to approximate any function or classify any pattern set provided numeric information is injected into the net. Concerning symbolic information new research area has been developed, inspired by George Paun, called Membrane Systems. A step forward, in a similar Neural Network architecture, was done to obtain Networks of Evolutionary Processors (NEP). A NEP is a set of processors connected by a graph, each processor only deals with symbolic information using rules. In short, objects in processors can evolve and pass through processors until a stable configuration is reach. Despite their simplicity, we show how the latter networks might be used for solving an NP-complete problem, namely the 3-colorability problem, in linear time and linear resources (nodes, symbols, rules).
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Paper Nr:	811
Title:	NEW APPROACHES TO CLUSTERING DATA - Using the Particle Swarm Optimization Algorithm
Authors:	Ahmed Esmin and Dilson L. Pereira
Abstract:	This paper presents a new proposal for data clustering based on the Particle Swarm Optimization Algorithm (PSO). In the PSO algorithm, each individual in the population searches for a solution taking into account the best individual in a certain neighbourhood and its own past best solution as well. In the present work, the PSO algorithm was adapted by using different finenesses functions and considered the situation where the data is uniformly distributed. It is shown how PSO can be used to find the centroids of a user specified number of clusters. The proposed method was applied in an unsupervised fashion to a number of benchmark classification problems and in order to evaluate its performance.
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Area 3 - Information Systems Analysis and Specification

Full Papers

Paper Nr:	28
Title:	A PROCESS FOR DETERMINING USER REQUIREMENTS IN eCRM DEVELOPMENT - A Strategic Aspect and Empirical Examination
Authors:	Ing-Long Wu and Ching-Yi Hung
Abstract:	Customer relationship management (CRM) has incerasingly become important while business focus has shifted from product-centric to customer-centric,. However, many organizations fail to achieve the objectives. One of the important determinants is the deployment of electronic CRM (eCRM) in organizations. In essence, CRM is complex in comprising product, channel, consumer, delivery, and service aspects. This requires different approaches in eCRM development. Determining user requirement is the most important phase and the key to the final success in system use. This research proposes a strategy-based process for system requirement analysis. Previous research has not discussed the important role of the CRM strategies in building eCRM. Moreover, the implemenation process was only reported partially in literature. Basically, the framework contains three steps: (1) define CRM strategies, (2) identify consumer and marketing characteristics, and (3) determine system requirements. This framework is further examined by empirical data. The results indicate that CRM strategies have positive impact on system requirement analysis while developing eCRM.
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Paper Nr:	275
Title:	INCREMENTAL ONTOLOGY INTEGRATION
Authors:	Thomas Heer, Daniel Retkowitz and Bodo Kraft
Abstract:	In many areas of computer science ontologies become more and more important. The use of ontologies for domain modeling often brings up the issue of ontology integration. The task of merging several ontologies, covering specific subdomains, into one unified ontology has to be solved. Many approaches for ontology integration aim at automating the process of ontology alignment. However, a complete automation is not feasible, and user interaction is always required. Nevertheless, most ontology integration tools offer only very limited support for the interactive part of the integration process. In this paper, we present a novel approach for the interactive integration of ontologies. The result of the ontology integration is incrementally updated after each definition of a correspondence between ontology elements. The user is guided through the ontologies to be integrated. By restricting the possible user actions, the integrity of all defined correspondences is ensured by the tool we developed. We evaluated our tool by integrating different regulations concerning building design.
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Paper Nr:	282
Title:	DESIGNING BUSINESS PROCESS MODELS FOR REQUIRED UNIFORMITY OF WORK
Authors:	Kimmo Tarkkanen
Abstract:	Business process and workflow models play important role in developing information system integration and later training of its usage. New ways of working and information system usage practices are designed with as-is and to-be process models, which are implemented into system characteristics. However, after the IS implementation the work practices may become differentiated. Variety of work practices on same business process can have unexpected and harmful social and economic consequences in IS-mediated work environment. This paper employs grounded theory methodology and a case study to explore non-uniformity of work in a Finnish retail business organization. By differentiating two types of non-uniform work tasks, the paper shows how process models can be designed with less effort, yet maintaining the required amount of uniformity by the organization and support for employees’ uniform actions. In addition to process model designers, the findings help organizations struggling with IS use practices’ consistency to separate practices that may emerge most harmful and practices that are not worth to alter.
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Paper Nr:	301
Title:	BETTER IT GOVERNANCE FOR ORGANIZATIONS - A Model for Improving Flexibility and Capabilities of Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP) through EA and BPR under e-Business Environment
Authors:	Jungho Yang
Abstract:	Within more turbulent, and increasingly globalized and digitalized environments, Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP) has been recognized as one of the most significant factors for effective and efficient IT governance to improve organizations’ effectiveness and capabilities by changing the characteristics or overall governance of organizations. Although organizations have been introduced, various well-known methodologies for creating the SISP successfully to maximize their strategic opportunities and values, the current literatures indicate that there is no perfect and fully comprehensive methodology or model to make organizations satisfactory. The purpose of this paper is to propose a model that can complement issues of the existing model and support improved flexibility and capabilities, and at the same time minimize waste and systems inconsistency by incorporating EA, BPR and concurrent approach. On-going research will be a case study to validate the proposed model in the government of Korea and to seek for other potential issues and factors compared with other sectors.
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Paper Nr:	304
Title:	SEMANTICS AND REFINEMENT OF BEHAVIOR STATE MACHINES
Authors:	Kevin Lano and David Clark
Abstract:	In this paper we present an axiomatic semantics for UML 2 behavior state machines, and give transformation rules for establishing refinements of behavior state machines, together with proofs of the semantic validity of these rules, based on a unified semantics of UML 2.
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Paper Nr:	318
Title:	ASSESSING THE QUALITY OF ENTERPRISE SERVICES - A Model for Supporting Service Oriented Architecture Design
Authors:	Matthew Dow, Pascal Ravesteijn and Johan Versendaal
Abstract:	Enterprise Services have been proposed as a more business-friendly form of web services which can help organizations bridge the gap between the IT capabilities and business benefits of Service Oriented Architecture. However up until now there are almost no methodologies for creating enterprise services, and no lists of definite criteria which constitute a “good” enterprise service. In this paper we present a model which can aid Service Oriented Architecture designers with this by giving them a set of researched criteria that can be used to measure the quality of enterprise service definitions. The model and criteria have been constructed by interviewing experts from one of the big five consultancy firms and by conducting a literature study of software development lifecycle methods and Service Oriented Architecture implementation strategies. The results have been evaluated using a quantitative survey and qualitative expert interviews, which have produced empirical support for the importance of the model criteria to enterprise service design. The importance of business ownership and focusing on business value of enterprise services is stressed, leading to suggestions of future research that links this area more closely with Service Oriented Architecture governance, Service Oriented Architecture change management, and Business Process Management.
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Paper Nr:	329
Title:	USING ASSOCIATION RULES TO LEARN CONCEPT RELATIONSHIPS IN ONTOLOGIES
Authors:	Jon A. Gulla, Terje Brasethvik and Gøran Sveia Kvarv
Abstract:	Ontology learning is the application of automatic tools to extract ontology concepts and relationships from domain text. Whereas ontology learning tools have been fairly successful in extracting concept candidates, it has proven difficult to detect relationships with the same level of accuracy. This paper discusses the use of association rules to extract relationships in the project management domain. We evaluate the results and compare them to another method based on tf.idf scores and cosine similarities. The findings confirm the usefulness of association rules, but also expose some interesting differences between association rules and cosine similarity methods in ontology relationship learning.
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Paper Nr:	373
Title:	AN APPROACH TO SUPPORT THE STRATEGIC ALIGNMENT OF SOFTWARE PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PROGRAMS
Authors:	André Luiz Becker, Jorge Audy and Rafael Prikladnicki
Abstract:	The alignment between the strategy of a software process improvement program and the organizations’ business strategies has been mentioned as a critical factor of success. However, the main software process reference models do not explicitly guide the companies towards defining processes which meet their strategic goals. Based on this context, the purpose of this paper is to present a process for the strategic alignment of software process improvement programs. Preliminary results indicate benefits beyond the demands of a software process reference model itself, which include the planning and execution of a software process improvement program taking into account the organization’s strategic goals in a more systematic way.
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Paper Nr:	374
Title:	SORCER: COMPUTING AND METACOMPUTING INTERGRID
Authors:	Michael Sobolewski
Abstract:	This paper investigates grid computing from the point of view three basic computing platforms. Each platform considered consists of virtual compute resources, a programming environment allowing for the development of grid applications, and a grid operating system to execute user programs and to make solving complex user problems easier. Three platforms are discussed: compute grid, metacompute grid and intergrid. Service protocol-oriented architectures are contrasted with service object-oriented architectures, then the current SORCER metacompute grid based on a service object-oriented architecture and a new metacomputing paradigm is described and analyzed. Finally, we explain how SORCER, with its core services and federated file system, can also be used as a traditional compute grid and an intergrid — a hybrid of compute and metacompute grids.
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Paper Nr:	461
Title:	A CONCEPTUAL SCHEME FOR COMPOSITIONAL MODEL–CHECKING VERIFICATION OF CRITICAL COMMUNICATING SYSTEMS
Authors:	Luis E. Mendoza, Manuel I. Capel-tuñón, María A. Perez and Kawtar Benghazi Akhlaki
Abstract:	When we build complex business and communication systems, the question worth to be answered: How can we guarantee that the target system meets its specification? Ensuring the correctness of large systems becomes more complex when we consider that their behaviour is the result of the concurrent execution of many components. This article presents a compositional verification scheme, that integrates MEDISTAM–RT (Spanish acronym of Method for System Design based on Analytic Transformation of Real-Time Models), which is formally supported by state–of–the–art Model–Checking tools. To facilitate and guarantee the verification of large systems, the proposed scheme uses CCTL temporal logic as the property specification formal language, in which temporal properties required to any system execution are specified. In its turn, CSP+T formal language is used to formally describe a model of the system being verified, which is made up of a set of communicating processes detailing specific atomic–tasks of the system. In order to show a practical use of the proposed conceptual scheme, the critical part of a realistic industry project related to mobile phone communication is discussed.
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Paper Nr:	463
Title:	TOWARDS REVERSE-ENGINEERING OF UML VIEWS FROM STRUCTURED FORMAL DEVELOPMENTS
Authors:	Akram Idani and Bernard Coulette
Abstract:	Formal methods, such as B, were elaborated in order to ensure a high level of precision and coherence. Their major advantage is that they are based on mathematics, which allow, on the one hand, to neutralize risks of ambiguity and uncertainty, and on the other hand, to guarantee the conformance of a specification and its realization. However, these methods use specific notations and concepts which often generate a weak readability and a difficulty of integration in the development and the certification processes. In order to overcome this shortcoming several research works have proposed to bridge the gap between formal developments and alternate UML models which are more intuitive and readable. In this paper we are interested by the B method, which is a formal method used to model systems and check their correction by refinements. Existing works which tried to combine UML and B notations don’t deal with the composition aspects of formal models. This limitation upsets their use for large scale specifications, such as those of information systems, because such specifications are often developed by structured modules. This paper improves the state of the art by proposing an evolutive MDA-based framework for reverse-engineering of UML static diagrams from B specifications built by composing abstract machines.
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Paper Nr:	552
Title:	DO SME NEED ONTOLOGIES? - Results from a Survey among Small and Medium-sized Enterprises
Authors:	Annika Öhgren and Kurt Sandkuhl
Abstract:	During the last years, an increasing number of successful cases of using ontologies in industrial application scenarios have been reported, the majority of these cases stem from large enterprises. The intention of this paper is to contribute to an understanding of potentials and limits of ontology-based solutions in small and medium-sized enterprises (SME). The focus is on identifying application areas for ontologies, which motivate the development of specialised ontology construction methods. The paper is based on results from a survey performed among 113 SME in Sweden, most of them from manufacturing industries. The results of the survey indicate a need from SME in three application areas: (1) management of product configuration and variability, (2) information search and retrieval, and (3) management of project documents.
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Paper Nr:	558
Title:	APPLYING ACTIVITY PATTERNS FOR DEVELOPING AN INTELLIGENT PROCESS MODELING TOOL
Authors:	Lucinéia Heloisa Thom, Manfred Reichert, Carolina Chiao and Cirano Iochpe
Abstract:	Due to their high level of abstraction and their reusability, workflow patterns are increasingly attracting the interest of both BPM researchers and BPM tool vendors. Frequently, process models can be assembled out of a set of recurrent business functions (e.g., task execution request, approval, notification), each of them having generic semantics that can be described as activity pattern. To our best knowledge, so far, there has been no extensive work implementing such activity patterns in a process modeling tool. In this paper we present an approach for modeling business processes and workflows. It is based on a suite which, when being implemented in a process modeling tool, allows to design business processes based on well-defined (process) activity patterns. Our suite further provides support for analysing and verifying certain properties of the composed process models (e.g., absence of deadlocks and livelocks). Finally, our approach considers both business processes designed from scratch and processes extracted from legacy systems.
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Paper Nr:	671
Title:	A SERVICE-ORIENTED FRAMEWORK FOR MAS MODELING
Authors:	Yves Wautelet, Youssef Achbany and Manuel Kolp
Abstract:	This paper introduces an analysis framework made of different models proposing complementary views. First view - the strategic services diagram (SSD) - is the most aggregate knowledge level; it uses services for representing the system to be in a global manner. Second view offers a more detailed perspective of the agents involved into the services using traditional i* Strategic Dependency (SDD) and Strategic Rationale Diagrams (SRD). Finally, the third view - the Dynamic Services Hypergraph (DSH) - offers a dynamic approach of services realization paths at various Qualities of Service (QoS). Using those models at analysis level is interesting in a model driven software development approach. Indeed, the project stakeholders can share a common vision through a lookup at the services the system has to offer, at the depender and dependee agents for the services constituents and at the different realization paths and their QoS. The framework also offers the fundamental elements to develop a complete model driven software project management framework. It can be considered as a startup for a global broader software engineering method.
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Paper Nr:	680
Title:	IMPROVING THE UNDERSTANDABILITY OF I* MODELS
Authors:	Fernanda Alencar, Carla Silva, Márcia Lucena, Jaelson Castro, Emanuel Santos and Ricardo Ramos
Abstract:	Requirements engineering (RE) has been considered a key activity in almost all software engineering process. i* is a goal-oriented approach widely adopted in the earlier phases of RE, as it offers a modelling language that describes the system and its environment in terms of actors and dependencies among them. However, often the models become cluttered even for small applications, compromising their understanding, evolution and scalability. In large and complex applications, this problem increases significantly. In this paper we investigate the use of structuring mechanisms to deal with the complexity which may arise when i* is used to model complex domains.
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Paper Nr:	690
Title:	BUSINESS PROCESS MODELLING THROUGH EQUIVALENCE OF ACTIVITY PROPERTIES
Authors:	Carla M. Pereira and Pedro Sousa
Abstract:	Since two decades ago, business processes have been gaining attention from IS’ managers, consultants and researchers and are becoming a key element in driving IT innovation. Despite such prominence, the concept of business process is not clear enough and even more unclear is the way to depict organization activities into a process blueprint. We claim that a much more precise and consolidate concept for “business process” is required. In this paper, we explain the constraints that influence business process modelling and we propose a solution based on a multi dimensional representation that decomposes processes into the Zachman Framework dimensions. Upon our solution we build up the concept of process equivalence.
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Paper Nr:	711
Title:	IMPROVEMENT OF A WEB ENGINEERING METHOD APPLYING SITUATIONAL METHOD ENGINEERING
Authors:	Kevin Vlandeeren, Francisco Valverde and Oscar Pastor
Abstract:	In recent years, the Web Engineering community has introduced several model-driven methods in order to simplify Web Application development. However, these methods are too general and mainly focus on data intensive Web Applications. A solution to this problem is the Situational Method Engineering. This approach allows the creation or improvement of a web engineering method by reusing method fragments from previous methods. This way, a method suitable for a concrete project or domain can be designed. In this work, the OOWS method metamodel is defined with the purpose of applying Situational Method Engineering. Because of this metamodel, OOWS method fragments can be formalised and used to improve the efficiency of another Web Engineering Methods. Furthermore, the suitability of the OOWS method in the context of CMS-based web applications is evaluated through a user-registration case study. The results of this evaluation, is a list of current limitations of the OOWS Method in the CMS Web Systems domain and possible solutions.
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Paper Nr:	774
Title:	IT SERVICE MANAGEMENT OF USING HETEROGENEOUS, DYNAMICALLY ALTERABLE CONFIGURATION ITEM LIFECYCLES
Authors:	David Loewenstern and Larisa Shwartz
Abstract:	IT service management requires the management of heterogeneous artifacts such as configuration items with differing lifecycles and complex interrelationships. Lifecycle management in such environments is critical in providing feedback and control between processes and sustaining communication and synchronization between and within processes while maintaining the integrity of the configuration item database (CMDB). We propose a method for managing lifecycles of multiple types, with automated methods for inheritance of lifecycles, authorization of state changes, propagation of state changes through relationships, and dynamic lifecycle updates.
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Paper Nr:	800
Title:	A FAHP-BASED TECHNOLOGY SELECTION AND SPECIFICATION METHODOLOGY
Authors:	Kin C. Liu, Dennis F. Kehoe and Dong Li
Abstract:	Selection of technology in IT projects is recognized as a multi-criteria decision-making (MDCM) problem because it is important to incorporate multiple opinions from people and consider the interdependence among criteria (Lee and Kim, 2000). Various techniques were proposed to address the technology selection problems and some of them, such as analytic hierarchy process (AHP) (e.g. Bard, 1986), were proved effective in literatures. However, technology selection problem in a system development project can be viewed as a system design activity and there is lack of literatures view technology selection from system design perspective and integrate it with other system design activity. The research argues that AHP can be applied to generate technology specification and other useful information for system design purpose, in additions of technology selection. A high-level system design framework and the FAHP-based technology selection and specification (TSS) methodology are presented in this paper.
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Short Papers

Paper Nr:	46
Title:	PRODUCTION CONFIGURATION OF PRODUCT FAMILIES - An Approach based on Petri Nets
Authors:	Lianfeng L. Zhang, Brian Rodrigues, Jannes Slomp and Gerard C. Gaalman
Abstract:	Configuring production processes for product families has been acknowledged as an effective means of dealing with product variety while maintaining production stability and efficiency. In an attempt to assist practitioners to better understand and implement production configuration, we study the underlying logic for configuring production processes for product families by means of dynamic modelling and visualization. Accordingly, we develop a formalism of nested colored timed Petri nets (PNs) to model production configuration. To cope with the modelling difficulties resulting from the fundamental issues in production configuration, three types of nets, namely process nets, assembly nets and manufacturing nets, together with a nested net system are defined by integrating the principles of colored PNs, timed PNs and nested PNs. An industrial example of electronics products is used throughout the whole paper to demonstrates how the proposed formalism is applied to specify production processes at differently levels of abstraction to achieve production configuration.
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Paper Nr:	56
Title:	AN EXTREME PROGRAMMING RELEASE PLAN THAT MAXIMIZES BUSINESS PERFORMANCE
Authors:	Marcelo Fernandes, Antonio Alencar and Eber Schmitz
Abstract:	This paper proposes a multi-criteria method to evaluate the value of XP release plans to business. The method, which is based upon information economics and stochastic modeling, helps XP practitioners to select the release plan that maximizes business performance, with considerable consequences for the use of information technology as a competitive advantage tool.
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Paper Nr:	57
Title:	DEFINING THE IMPLEMENTATION ORDER OF SOFTWARE PROJECTS IN UNCERTAIN ENVIRONMENTS
Authors:	Eber Schmitz, Antonio Alencar, Marcelo C. Fernandes and Carlos Mendes de Azevedo
Abstract:	In the competitive world in which we live, where every business opportunity not taken is an opportunity handed to competitors, software developers have distanced themselves, in both language and values, from those who define the requirements that software has to satisfy and come up with the money that funds its development process. Such a distance helps to reduce or, in some cases, completely eliminate the competitive advantage that software development may provide to an organization; transforming this value creation activity into a business cost that is better kept low and under tight control. This article proposes a method for obtaining the optimal implementation order of software units in an information technology development project. This method, which uses a combination of heuristic procedures and Monte Carlo simulation, takes into consideration the fact that software development is generally carried out under cost and investment constraints in an uncertain environment, whose proper analysis indicate how to obtain the best possible return on investment. The article shows that decisions made under uncertainty may be substantially different from those made in a risk-free environment.
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Paper Nr:	87
Title:	WORKFLOW TREES FOR REPRESENTATION AND MINING OF IMPLICITLY CONCURRENT BUSINESS PROCESSES
Authors:	Daniel Nikovski
Abstract:	We propose a novel representation of business processes called workflow trees that facilitates the mining of process models where the parallel execution of two or more sub-processes has not been recorded explicitly in workflow logs. Based on the provable property of workflow trees that a pair of tasks are siblings in the tree if and only if they have identical respective workflow-log relations with each and every remaining third task in the process, we describe an efficient business process mining algorithm of complexity only cubic in the number of process tasks, and analyze the class of processes that can be identified and reconstructed by it.
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Paper Nr:	92
Title:	ON CONCEPTUALIZATION AS A SYSTEMATIC PROCESS
Authors:	A. J. J. van Breemen and Janos J. Sarbo
Abstract:	We are concerned with the early phases of ER-modeling consisting in the primary conceptualization of the underlying application domain. To this end we introduce a process model for the generation of a domain description. In virtue of its close relation with cognitive activity, this model enables the modeler as well as the user to comprehend the concepts of the resulting domain in a natural way.
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Paper Nr:	96
Title:	GENERALIZATION AND BLENDING IN THE GENERATION OF ENTITY-RELATIONSHIP SCHEMAS BY ANALOGY
Authors:	Marco A. Casanova, Simone Barbosa, Karin Koogan Breitman and Antonio Furtado
Abstract:	To support the generation of database schemas of information systems, a five-step design process is proposed that explores the notions of generic and blended spaces and favours the reuse of predefined schemas. The use of generic and blended spaces is essential to achieve the passage from the source space into the target space in such a way that differences and conflicts can be detected and, whenever possible, conciliated.
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Paper Nr:	133
Title:	VARIABILITY MANAGEMENT IN SOFTWARE PRODUCT LINES FOR DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEMS CONSTRUCTION
Authors:	Maria Eugenia Cabello and Isidro Ramos
Abstract:	This paper presents software variability management in complex cases of Software Product Lines where two kinds of variabilities emerge: domain variability and application variability. We illustrate the problem by means of a case study in Decision Support Systems. We have death with the first one by using variability points that are captured using decision-tree techniques in order to select base architectures and the second one by decorating the base architectures with the features of the application domain. In order to present this variability management, we focus on the diagnostic domain, a special case of Decision Support Systems. A generic solution for the automatic construction of systems of this kind is given using our approach: Baseline Oriented Modeling (BOM).
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Paper Nr:	138
Title:	COMBINING DIFFERENT CHANGE PREDICTION TECHNIQUES
Authors:	Daniel Cabrero Moreno, Javier Garzás and Mario Piattini
Abstract:	This work contributes to software change prediction research and practice in three ways. Firstly, it reviews and classifies the different types of techniques used to predict change. Secondly, it provides a framework for testing those techniques in different contexts and for doing so automatically. This framework is used to find the best combination of techniques for a specific project (or group of projects) scenario. In third place, it provides a new prediction technique based on what the expectation of change is, from the user’s point of view. This new proposal is based on a gap found in the relevant research, during the course of a review of the relevant literature.
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Paper Nr:	141
Title:	A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF DOCUMENT CORRELATION TECHNIQUES FOR TRACEABILITY ANALYSIS
Authors:	Anju Parvathy, Bintu G Vasudevan and Rajesh Balakrishnan
Abstract:	One of the important aspects of software engineering is to ensure traceability across the development lifecycle. Traceability matrix is widely used to check for completeness and to aid impact analysis. We propose that this computation of traceability can be automated by looking at the correlation between the documents. This paper describes and compares four novel approaches for traceability computation based on text similarity, term structure and inter-document correlation algorithms. These algorithms base themselves on different information retrieval techniques for establishing document correlation. Observations from our experiments are also presented. The advantages and disadvantages of each of these approaches are discussed in detail. Various scenarios where these approaches would be applicable and the future course of action are also discussed.
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Paper Nr:	235
Title:	SELF-ADAPTIVE CUSTOMIZING WITH DATA MINING METHODS - A Concept for the Automatic Customizing of an ERP System with Data Mining Methods
Authors:	Rene Schult and Gamal Kassem
Abstract:	The implementation of an ERP system is a long and cost intensive process. Functions of the ERP system, which are delivered in an enterprise neutral but sector specific fashion need to be adjusted to the specific business requirements of an enterprise. Exact knowledge of the ERP system is required because each ERP system has its own technical concepts and terminologies. Therefore many enterprises employ ERP system experts in order to customise the ERP system to be introduced as well as to further enhance the customisation after its introduction. A concept for the implementation of a Self-Adaptive ERP System should allow for the automatic customisation of an ERP system on the basis of the of enterprise process models provided and analysis of the ERP system usage.
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Paper Nr:	237
Title:	DIAPASON: A FORMAL APPROACH FOR SUPPORTING AGILE AND EVOLVABLE INFORMATION SYSTEM SERVICE-BASED ARCHITECTURES
Authors:	Hervé Verjus and Frédéric Pourraz
Abstract:	This paper presents a novel approach called Diapason, for expressing, verifying and deploying evolvable information system service-based architectures. Diapason promotes a π-calculus-based layered language and a corresponding virtual machine for expressing and executing dynamic and evolvable services orchestration that support agile business processes. Information system service-based architecture may dynamically evolve, whatever the changes may occur during the services orchestration lifecycle.
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Paper Nr:	238
Title:	A PROCESS-DRIVEN METHODOLOGY FOR CONTINUOUS INFORMATION SYSTEMS MODELING
Authors:	Alfredo Cuzzocrea, Andrea Gualtieri and Domenico Saccà
Abstract:	In this paper, we present a process-driven methodology for continuous information systems modeling. Our approach supports the whole information system life-cycle, from planning to implementation, and from usage to re-engineering. The methodology includes two different phases. First, we produce a scenario analysis adopting a Process-to-Function approach in order to capture interactions among components of organization, information and processes. Then, we produce a requirement analysis adopting a Function-for-Process and package-oriented approach. Finally, we deduce an ex-post scenario analysis by applying process mining techniques on repositories of process execution traces. The whole methodology is supported by UML diagrams organized in a Business Model, a Conceptual Model, and an Implementation Model.
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Paper Nr:	239
Title:	IS THERE A ROLE FOR PHILOSOPHY IN GROUP WORK SUPPORT?
Authors:	Roger Tagg
Abstract:	There appears to be evidence that much potential IT support for group work is yet to be widely adopted or to achieve significant benefits. It has been suggested that, in order to achieve better results when applying IT to group work, designers should take more notice of modern philosophies that avoid the so-called "Cartesian Dualism" of mind separated from matter. It is clear that group work support is more than a matter of automating formal procedures. This paper reviews the question from the author’s lifetime of experience as a consultant, academic and group worker; proposes some models to address some of the missing perspectives in current approaches; and suggests how future efforts could be re-orientated to achieve better outcomes.
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Paper Nr:	242
Title:	ON-THE-FLY AUTOMATIC GENERATION OF SECURITY PROTOCOLS
Authors:	Shinsaku Kiyomoto, Haruki Ota and Toshiaki Tanaka
Abstract:	In this paper, we presented an automatic generation tool for authentication and key exchange protocols. Our tool generates a security protocol definition file from input data of requirements for the protocol. The tool constructs a new protocol that combines a pieces of security protocols as building blocks. The transaction time of the tool is less than one second and it is able to realize more rapid generation of security protocols in comparison to existing generation tools.
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Paper Nr:	254
Title:	KNOWLEDGE ELICITATION TECHNIQUES FOR DERIVING COMPETENCY QUESTIONS FOR ONTOLOGIES
Authors:	Lila Rao, Han Reichgelt and Kweku-Muata Osei-Bryson
Abstract:	This research explores the applicability of existing knowledge elicitation techniques for the development of competency questions for ontologies. This is an important area of research as competency questions are used to evaluate an ontology. The use of appropriate knowledge elicitation techniques increases the likelihood that these competency questions will be reflective of what is needed of the ontology. It thus helps ensure the quality of the ontology (i.e. the competency questions will adequately reflect the end users requirements).
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Paper Nr:	256
Title:	MODELING INCREASINGLY COMPLEX SOCIO-TECHNICAL ENVIRONMENTS
Authors:	Igor Hawryszkiewycz
Abstract:	The paper focuses on modeling large open information systems. These are systems composed of many activities, which include relationships between activity participants to create new knowledge and services. The systems are further complicated by the changing nature of both the activities and relationships. The paper proposes increased emphasis on modelling work and social structures and using the models to generate role based interfaces. It illustrates the application to the design of complex outsourcing systems.
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Paper Nr:	270
Title:	ENGINEERING MOBILE AGENTS
Authors:	Arnon Sturm, Dov Dori and Onn Shehory
Abstract:	As the mobile agent paradigm becomes of interest to many researchers and industries, it is essential to introduce an engineering approach for designing such systems. Recent studies on agent-oriented modeling languages have recognized the need for modeling mobility aspects such as why a mobile agent moves, where the agent moves to, when it moves and how it reaches its target. These studies extend existing languages to support the modeling of agent mobility. However, these fall short in addressing some modeling needs. They lack in their expressiveness: some of them ignore the notion of location (i.e., the "where") while others do not handle all types of mobility (the "how"). Additionally, they lack in their accessibility, as the handling of the mobility aspects is separated into multiple views and occasionally the mobility aspect is tightly coupled with the functional behavior specification. View multiplicity reduces the comprehensibility and the ease of specification, whereas the coupling with the functional behavior specification reduces the flexibility of deploying a multi-agent systems in different configurations (i.e., without mobility). In this paper, we address these problems by enhancing an expressive and accessible modeling language with capabilities for specifying mobile agents. We provide the details of the extension, then illustrate the use of the extended modeling language, and demonstrate the way in which it overcomes existing problems.
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Paper Nr:	296
Title:	A REQUIREMENTS ENGINEERING PROCESS MODEL FOR DISTRIBUTED SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT - Lessons Learned
Authors:	Leandro Lopes and Jorge N. Audy
Abstract:	In the growing market of global software development (GSD), requirements engineering emerges as a critical process impacted by distribution. The need of a process to address the difficulties caused by team dispersion in requirements engineering is recognized. The objective of this paper is to present lessons learned from a case study conducted to evaluate a requirements engineering process model for distributed software development. Empirical results were obtained in a multinational organization that develops software with teams distributed in a global setting. The main contribution of this paper is providing an insight in the use of a requirements engineering process model for GSD, as well as, new information on current needs for changes or revision in traditional requirements engineering models.
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Paper Nr:	300
Title:	CHALLENGES IN SOFTWARE DESIGN IN LARGE CORPORATIONS - A Case Study at Siemens AG
Authors:	Peter Killisperger, Markus Stumpnter, Georg Peters and Thomas Stückl
Abstract:	Successful software development is still a challenge and improvements in software processes and their application is an active research domain. Siemens has started research projects aiming to improve software process related activities. The adaptation of generic software process models to project specific context and the application of instantiated processes play a major role in these efforts. Several solutions have been put forward in literature in recent years to better standardise and automate these procedures. However, no approach has become a de facto standard. Instantiation and application of processes in practice are still often done manually and not standardised. On the basis of an analysis of Siemens’ current practice, a New Software Engineering Framework (NSEF) is suggested for improving the instantiation and the application of software processes within the company. In particular, the paper suggests the development of a gradual instantiation approach.
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Paper Nr:	308
Title:	A METADATA-DRIVEN APPROACH FOR ASPECT-ORIENTED REQUIREMENTS ANALYSIS
Authors:	Sérgio Agostinho , Ana Moreira, André Marques, João Araújo, Isabel Brito, Ricardo Ferreira, Ricardo Raminhos, Jasna Kovacevic, Rita Ribeiro and Philippe Chevalley
Abstract:	This paper presents a metadata-driven approach based on aspect-oriented requirements analysis. This approach has been defined in cooperation with the European Space Agency in the context of the “Aspect Specification for the Space Domain” (ASSD) project. ASSD aims at assessing the applicability and usefulness of aspect-orientation for the space domain (ground segment software projects in particular), focusing on the early stages of the software development life cycle. This paper describes a rigorous representation of requirements analysis concepts, refines a method for handling early aspects, and proposes a client/server architecture based on a metadata repository.
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Paper Nr:	311
Title:	CAMEL FRAMEWORK - A Framework for Realizing Complete Separation of Developer’s and Designer’s Work in Rich Internet Application
Authors:	Hiroaki Fukuda and Yoshikazu Yamamoto
Abstract:	This paper provides a framework called Camel which is able to separate developer’s and designer’s work completely in developing Rich Internet Applications. In the last years, web becomes one of the most popular methods to transfer information such as search contents, advertise information and online shopping. We usually use an appropriate web application to achieve our requirement. In the development process of current web applications, designers design interfaces of an application by using HTML, CSS, image and developers not only implement business logics but also modify the interface for dynamic generation of HTML tags based on the executed logic. Therefore, not only designers but also developers have to work every time when design of the interface is changed. This paper describes camel framework and its implementation, which is based on Flex, and then demonstrate its usage and utility by implementing a real application.
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Paper Nr:	316
Title:	SECURITY ANALYSIS OF THE HEALTH CARE TELEMATICS INFRASTRUCTURE IN GERMANY
Authors:	Michael Huber, Ali Sunyaev and Helmut Krcmar
Abstract:	Based on ISO 27001 for Information Security Management Systems, this paper introduces a newly developed security analysis approach, suitable for technical security analyses in general. This approach is used for a security analysis of several components and processes of the Health Care Telematics in Germany. Besides the results of the analysis, basics for further analysis and verification activities is given.
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Paper Nr:	317
Title:	MANAGING PROCESS VARIANTS IN THE PROCESS LIFE CYCLE
Authors:	Alena Hallerbach, Thomas Bauer and Manfred Reichert
Abstract:	When designing process-aware information systems, often variants of the same process have to be specified. Each variant then constitutes an adjustment of a particular process to specific requirements building the process context. Current Business Process Management (BPM) tools do not adequately support the management of process variants. Usually, the variants have to be kept in separate process models. This leads to huge modeling and maintenance efforts. In particular, more fundamental process changes (e.g., changes of legal regulations) often require the adjustment of all process variants derived from the same process; i.e., the variants have to be adapted separately to meet the new requirements. This redundancy in modeling and adapting process variants is both time consuming and error-prone. This paper presents the Provop approach, which provides a more flexible solution for managing process variants in the process life cycle. In particular, process variants can be configured out of a basic process following an operational approach; i.e., a specific variant is derived from the basic process by applying a set of well-defined change operations to it. Provop provides full process life cycle support and allows for flexible process configuration resulting in a maintainable collection of process variants.
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Paper Nr:	325
Title:	MAXIMIZING THE BUSINESS VALUE OF SOFTWARE PROJECTS - A Branch & Bound Approach
Authors:	Antonio Alencar, Eber Schmitz, Enio Abreu, Marcelo Carvalho Fernandes and Armando L. Ferreira
Abstract:	This work presents a branch & bound method that allows software managers to determine the optimum order for the development of a network of dependent software parts that have value to customers. In many different circumstances the method allows for the development of complex and otherwise expensive software from a relatively small investment, favoring the use of software development as a means of obtaining competitive advantage.
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Paper Nr:	327
Title:	RANKING REFACTORING PATTERNS USING THE ANALYTICAL HIERARCHY PROCESS
Authors:	Eduardo Piveta, Ana Moreira, Marcelo Pimenta, João Araújo, Pedro Guerreiro and Roberto Tom Price
Abstract:	This paper describes how to rank refactoring patterns to improve a set of quality attributes of a piece of software. The Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) is used to express the relative importance of the quality attributes and the relative importance of refactoring patterns in regards to those selected quality attributes. This ranking of refactoring patterns can be used to focus the refactoring effort on the most beneficial patterns to the software being developed or maintained.
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Paper Nr:	334
Title:	ITO-TRACKER - A Tool for Evaluating ITO Projects based on Critical Success Factors
Authors:	Edumilis M. Ortega, María A. Perez, Luis E. Mendoza and Maryoly Ortega
Abstract:	Nowadays, the Latin American software industry, as it is mostly represented by Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), should focus on improving its service capacity towards high quality, low costs, and timely delivery. Within this context, SMEs providing Information Technology Outsourcing (ITO) services require information that allows to assess and monitor their contractual relationships and the agreements contained therein, considering a set of critical success factors that may vary depending on the type of project addressed. This article is aimed at describing the development of a tool named ITO-Tracker designed for the evaluation of ITO projects oriented to software, hardware, network and databases, based on Critical Success Factors (CSFs). ITO-Tracker offers guidance to the parties involved in the service through regular control and follow-up activities. The methodology used for developing this tool was the iterative and incremental process known as Rational Unified Process (RUP). For this purpose, we documented the development process and results from ITO-Tracker conceptualization, analysis, design and construction. Besides it is presented the evaluation of an ITO project in the software development area using the tool.
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Paper Nr:	335
Title:	CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS TO EVALUATE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY OUTSOURCING PROJECTS
Authors:	Edumilis M. Ortega, María A. Perez, Luis E. Mendoza and Maryoly Ortega
Abstract:	Nowadays, a large number of companies delegate their tasks to third parties in order to reduce costs, increase profitability, expand their horizon, and increase their competitive capacity. The level of success of such contracting and related agreements is influenced by a set of critical factors that may vary depending on the type of project addressed. This article proposes a model of Critical Success Factors (CSFs) to evaluate Information Technology Outsourcing (ITO) projects. The model is based on the ITO state-of-the-art, related technologies and different aspects that affect ITO project development. Altogether, 22 CSFs were formulated for data center, network, software development and hardware support technologies. Additionally, the model proposed was evaluated using the Features Analysis Case Study Method proposed by DESMET. The methodology applied for this research consisted of an adaptation of the Methodological Framework for Research of Information Systems, including the Goal Question Metric (GQM) approach. For model operationalization, 400 metrics were established, which allowed measuring CSFs and ensuring model effectiveness to evaluate the probability of success of an ITO project and provide guidance to the parties involved in such service.
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Paper Nr:	339
Title:	A GROUP AUTHENTICATION MODEL FOR WIRELESS NETWORK SERVICES BASED ON GROUP KEY MANAGEMENT
Authors:	Huy H. Ngo, Xianping Wu and Phu Dung Le
Abstract:	Group authentication provides authentication for members of communication group between services and users in insecure environments such as wireless networks. Most of the group authentication models do not consider the risk of compromised share secrets in the group under various security threats such as cryptanalysis. Although authentication key exchange in groups can benefit from group key management to minimise this risk, the group key management schemes are inefficient for authentication services. In this paper, a group authentication model for wireless networks services using a group key management is presented. The group key management is specially designed with forward secrecy and session keys for efficient and secure key exchange. Based on this secure session keys, a dynamic group authentication scheme provides a secure and efficient group authentication for wireless network users and services.
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Paper Nr:	350
Title:	INTRODUCING SERVICE-ORIENTATION INTO SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN
Authors:	Prima Gustiene and Remigijus Gustas
Abstract:	The conventional methods of information system analysis and design are not based on service-oriented paradigm that facilitates control of business process continuity and integrity. Service-oriented representations are more comprehensible for business experts as well as system designers. It is reasonable to conceptualize a business process in terms of service-oriented events, before the supporting technical system is designed. UML design primitives abstract from the concrete implementation artefacts and therefore they are difficult to comprehend for business analysis experts. The presented approach for service-oriented analysis is based just on three types of events: creation, reclassification and termination, which can also be used for the semantic integrity and consistency control. In this paper, the basic service-oriented constructs are defined. Semantics of these implementation neutral artefacts are analysed in terms of their associated counterparts that are used in object-oriented design.
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Paper Nr:	360
Title:	A FRAMEWORK FOR MONITORING AND RUNTIME RECOVERY OF WEB SERVICE-BASED APPLICATIONS
Authors:	Rene Pegoraro, Riadh Ben Halima, Khalil Drira, Karim Guennoun and João M. Rosário
Abstract:	Service provisioning is a challenging research area for the design and implementation of autonomic service-oriented software systems. It includes automated QoS management for such systems and their applications. Monitoring, Diagnosis and Repair are three key features of QoS management. This work presents a self-healing Web service-based framework that manages QoS degradation at runtime. Our approach is based on proxies. Proxies act on meta-level communications and extend the HTTP envelope of the exchanged messages with QoS-related parameter values. QoS Data are filtered over time and analysed using statistical functions and the Hidden Markov Model. Detected QoS degradations are handled with proxies. We experienced our framework using an orchestrated electronic shop application (FoodShop).
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Paper Nr:	364
Title:	REPRESENTATION AND REASONING MODELS FOR C3 ARCHITECTURE DESCRIPTION LANGUAGE
Authors:	Abdelkrim Amirat and Mourad Oussalah
Abstract:	Component-based development is a proven approach to manage the complexity of software and its need for customization. At an architectural level, one describes the principal system components and their pathways of interaction. So, Architecture is considered to be the driving aspect of the development process; it allows specifying which aspects and models in each level needed according to the software architecture design. Early Architecture description languages (ADLs), nearly exclusive, focus on structural abstraction hierarchy ignoring behavioural description hierarchy, conceptual hierarchy, and metamodeling hierarchy. In this paper we focus on those four hierarchies which represent views to appropriately “reason about” software architectures described using our C3 metamodel which is a minimal and complete architecture description language. In this paper we provide a set of mechanisms to deal with different levels of each hierarchy, also we introduce our proper structural definition for connector’s elements deployed in C3 Architectures.
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Paper Nr:	365
Title:	CONTEXT-ORIENTED WEB METHODOLOGY WITH A QUALITY APPROACH
Authors:	Anna Grimán, María A. Perez, Maryoly Ortega and Luis E. Mendoza
Abstract:	Dependency on Web systems and applications has increased in recent years. Their use and quality have gained relevance and demands in this field have significantly increased in time. This has driven to the application of processes that include considerations related to business dynamism and quality expectations for the final product. This work is aimed at describing a methodology for Web applications development that ensures quality at all phases and is especially useful in small and medium-sized projects regardless of the platform or architecture used. We performed an analysis of the main existing methodologies that allowed us to extract the best practices known and combining them in the proposed solution. Comparison between agile and plan-driven methodologies established the most suitable process model for this type of development. As a result thereof, a context-oriented web methodology -COWM- was obtained, including best practices to ensure quality throughout the whole process. Finally, a COWM evaluation was performed on a case study in order to prove its applicability and efficiency for Web systems development.
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Paper Nr:	371
Title:	MODELS FOR PARALLEL WORKFLOW PROCESSING ON MULTI-CORE ARCHITECTURES
Authors:	Thomas Rauber and Gudula Rünger
Abstract:	The advent of multi-core processors offers ubiquitous parallelism and a new source of powerful computing resources for all kinds of software products. However, most software systems, especially in business computing, are sequential and cannot exploit the new architectures. Appropriate methodologies and models to includes parallel features into business software are required. In this article, we consider workflow software systems using explicit workflow descriptions and explore the possibilities to define parallel and concurrent executions in business processes for an implementation on multi-core systems. The article also presents a parallel execution model for workflows and addresses the scheduling of workflow tasks for multi-core architectures.
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Paper Nr:	371
Title:	MODELS FOR PARALLEL WORKFLOW PROCESSING ON MULTI-CORE ARCHITECTURES
Authors:	Thomas Rauber and Gudula Rünger
Abstract:	The advent of multi-core processors offers ubiquitous parallelism and a new source of powerful computing resources for all kinds of software products. However, most software systems, especially in business computing, are sequential and cannot exploit the new architectures. Appropriate methodologies and models to includes parallel features into business software are required. In this article, we consider workflow software systems using explicit workflow descriptions and explore the possibilities to define parallel and concurrent executions in business processes for an implementation on multi-core systems. The article also presents a parallel execution model for workflows and addresses the scheduling of workflow tasks for multi-core architectures.
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Paper Nr:	375
Title:	ROUND-TRIP ENGINEERING OF WEB APPLICATIONS FOCUSING ON DYNAMIC MODELS
Authors:	Yuto Imazeki, Shingo Takada and Norihisa Doi
Abstract:	Enterprise information systems take many forms, one of which is Web applications. The demand for rapid development of such Web applications is becoming stronger, but there is still no good way. Round-trip engineering is a software development method that iterates between the modeling phase and coding phase, allowing for iterative and incremental development. However conventional tools only support static models such as class diagrams. We thus propose a tool for round-trip engineering of Web applications that supports dynamic models such as sequence diagrams and statecharts. We introduce a navigation model to model the navigation between Web pages. This model is used to link the various diagrams as well as to generate source code. We describe a case study to show the effectiveness of our tool.
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Paper Nr:	377
Title:	SIMILARITY MATCHING OF BUSINESS PROCESS VARIANTS
Authors:	Noor M. Mahmod, Shazia Sadiq and Ruopeng Lu
Abstract:	Evidence from business work practice indicates that variance from prescribed business process models is not only inevitable and frequent, but is in fact a valuable source of organizational intellectual capital that needs to be captured and capitalized, since variance is typically representative of preferred and successful work practice. In this paper, we present a framework for harnessing the value of business process variants. An essential aspect of this framework is the ability to search and retrieve variants. This functionality requires variants to be matched against a given criteria. The focus of this paper is on the structural criteria which is rather challenging as query process structures may have different levels of similarity with variant process structures. The paper provides methods for undertaking the similarity matching and subsequently providing ranked results in a systematic way, as well as a reference architecture within which the methods may be deployed.
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Paper Nr:	424
Title:	BRIDGING UNCERTAINTIES GAPS IN SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS
Authors:	Deniss Kumlander
Abstract:	The uncertainties is a well known factor affecting the final result of nearly any software project nowadays. Their negative impact is either a misfit between customers’ expectations and released software or extra efforts that software vendors have to invest into the development process. The paper presents some novel approaches to uncertainties handling including an ambassador driven communication, discussion groups and varying length internal cycles with software demonstration meetings.
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Paper Nr:	439
Title:	FORMAL VERIFICATION OF THE SECURE SOCKETS LAYER PROTOCOL
Authors:	Llanos Tobarra, Diego Cazorla, J.José Pardo and Fernando Cuartero
Abstract:	Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) has become one of the most popular security protocols in the Internet. In this paper we present a formal verification of this protocol using the Casper/FDR2 toolbox. In the analysis of SSL v3.0 Handshake we have used a methodology that considers incremental versions of the protocol. We have started with the most basic protocol, and then we have included other features such as server and client authentication, digital signatures, etc. We have also verified SSL v2.0 because of the so called version rollback attack. Each version has been modelled and verified, and the results have been interpreted. Using this methodology it is easy to understand why some messages are needed in order to ensure confidential communication between a client and a server.
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Paper Nr:	451
Title:	ONTOLOGICAL ERRORS - Inconsistency, Incompleteness and Redundancy
Authors:	Muhammad Fahad, Muhammad Abdul Qadir and Muhammad W. Noshairwan
Abstract:	Mapping and merging of multiple ontologies to produce consistent, coherent and correct merged global ontology is an essential process to enable heterogeneous multi-vendors semantic-based systems to communicate with each other. To generate such a global ontology automatically, the individual ontologies must be free of (all types of) errors. We have observed that the present error classification does not include all the errors. This paper extends the existing error classification (Inconsistency, Incompleteness and Redundancy) and provides a discussion about the consequences of these errors. We highlight the problems that we faced while developing our DKP-OM, ontology merging system and explain how these errors became obstacles in efficient ontology merging process. It integrates the ontological errors and design anomalies for content evaluation of ontologies under one framework. This framework helps ontologists to build semantically correct ontology free from errors that enables effective and automatic ontology mapping and merging with lesser user intervention.
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Paper Nr:	454
Title:	REALIZING WEB APPLICATION VULNERABILITY ANALYSIS VIA AVDL
Authors:	Ha-Thanh Le and Peter Kok Keong Loh
Abstract:	Several vulnerability analysis techniques in web-based applications detect and report on different types of vulnerabilities. However, no single technique provides a generic technology-independent handling of web-based vulnerabilities. In this paper we present our experience with and experimental exemplification of using the Application Vulnerability Description Language (AVDL) to realize a unified data model for technology-independent vulnerability analysis of web applications. We also introduce an overview of a new web vulnerability analysis framework. This work is part of a project that is funded by the Centre for Strategic Infocomm Technologies, Ministry of Defence Singapore.
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Paper Nr:	457
Title:	PHYSICAL-VIRTUAL CONNECTION IN UBIQUITOUS BUSINESS PROCESSES
Authors:	Pau Giner, Manoli Albert and Vicente Pelechano
Abstract:	Ubiquitous Computing (Ubicomp) when applied to organizations can improve their Business Processes. An example of improvement is the integration of real world objects in the Information System. This reduces inconsistencies in the information and improves information acquisition rates. Automatic identification is the key technology to achieve this paradigm shift. The present work inspects the relevance of the identification concept for Business Processes supported by Ubicomp technologies and presents a conceptual framework to define the elements involved in the identification process. Taking into account that Business Processes tend to be very dynamic, it is important to have technological-independent definitions in order to enable the evolution of systems. The presented framework is independent of the underlying technology, in order not to be locked with one particular solution.
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Paper Nr:	459
Title:	A METHOD FOR ENGINEERING A TRUE SERVICE-ORIENTED ARCHITECTURE
Authors:	G. Engels, A. Hess, Bernhard Humm, O. Juwig, M. Lohmann, J.-P. Richter, M. Voß and J. Willkomm
Abstract:	Service oriented architecture (SOA) is currently the most discussed concept for engineering enterprise IT architectures. True SOA is more than web services and web services style of communication. In the first place, it is a paradigm for structuring the business of an enterprise according to services. This allows companies to flexibly adapt to changing market demands. Subsequently, it is a paradigm for structuring the enterprise IT architecture according to those business services. This paper presents a concrete method and rules for engineering an enterprise IT architecture towards a true SOA. It can be seen as an instantiation of roadmaps in enterprise architecture frameworks.
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Paper Nr:	479
Title:	EVALUATING CONSISTENCY BETWEEN UML ACTIVITY AND SEQUENCE MODELS
Authors:	Yoshiyuki Shinkawa
Abstract:	UML activity diagrams and sequence diagrams describe the behavior of a target domain or a system from different viewpoints. When we use these diagrams for modeling the same matter in an application, these diagrams, or the models written by them, must be consistent from each other. However, the evaluation for the consistency is difficult, since these diagrams have considerably different syntax and semantics. This paper presents a process algebraic approach to evaluating the consistency between these models. CCS (Communicating Sequential Processes) is used as process algebra.
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Paper Nr:	499
Title:	MODELLING AND DISTRIBUTING INDIVIDUAL AND COLLECTIVE ACTIVITIES IN A WORKFLOW SYSTEM
Authors:	Saida Boukhedouma and Zaia Alimazighi
Abstract:	This paper deals with the modelling and the dispatching of individual and collective work in a workflow system. It particularly, focuses on workflow processes of organizations where actors are organized by teams. In such a system, participants must interact with each other, coordinate, exchange informations, cooperate and synchronize their work. To do that, it is essential to define firstly, the way of dispatching individual and collective parts of work to all participants in the system. We describe some static and dynamic aspects of the system and we propose a simple algorithm for managing human resources at the runtime of the process. The algorithm aims to balance the workload between human actors in the system, it is based on a workload criteria computed according to the activities durations.
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Paper Nr:	539
Title:	B2B AUTOMATIC TAXONOMY CONSTRUCTION
Authors:	Ivan Bedini, Benjamin Nguyen and Georges Gardarin
Abstract:	The B2B domain has already been subject to several research experiences, but we believe that the real advantage of introducing semantic technologies within enterprise application integration has not yet been investigated fully. In this paper we provide a new use case for the next generation Semantic Web applications with regards to enterprise application integration. We also present the results of our experience in automatically generating a taxonomy from numerous B2B standards, constructed using Janus, a software tool we have developed in order to extract semantic information from XML Schema corpora. The main contribution of this paper is the presentation of the results of our tool.
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Paper Nr:	539
Title:	B2B AUTOMATIC TAXONOMY CONSTRUCTION
Authors:	Ivan Bedini, Benjamin Nguyen and Georges Gardarin
Abstract:	The B2B domain has already been subject to several research experiences, but we believe that the real advantage of introducing semantic technologies within enterprise application integration has not yet been investigated fully. In this paper we provide a new use case for the next generation Semantic Web applications with regards to enterprise application integration. We also present the results of our experience in automatically generating a taxonomy from numerous B2B standards, constructed using Janus, a software tool we have developed in order to extract semantic information from XML Schema corpora. The main contribution of this paper is the presentation of the results of our tool.
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Paper Nr:	542
Title:	FROM PROCESS TO SOFTWARE SYSTEMS’ SERVICES - Using a Layered Model to Connect Technical and Process-related Views
Authors:	Christian Prpitsch
Abstract:	A layered model is a solution to the problem of two disjunct points of view on the same problem. One group has a technical background but does not know much processes. The other group’s members have a process perspective. This contribution introduces a meta–model consisting of three layers. The outer ones represent the disjunct points of view. The inner one contains elements of both other layers and combines them. It also contains a system–independent scripting language to automatically configure software systems.
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Paper Nr:	547
Title:	A MODEL DRIVEN ARCHITECTURE TOOL BASED ON SEMANTIC ANALYSIS METHOD
Authors:	Thiago D. Santos, Rodrigo Bonacin, M. Cecilia C. Baranauskas and Marcos Antônio Rodrigues
Abstract:	Literature in Information Systems presents a set of approaches to analyzing and modeling the organizational context in order to improve the quality of the computational systems. The research community also looks for alternatives for aligning these approaches with Software Engineering techniques, which support the large scale and low cost software production and maintenance. In this work is proposed an approach and a tool to support the construction of computational models taken from the organizational models. This approach is based on concepts, methods and techniques from MDA (Model Driven Architecture), and from Organizational Semiotics, more specifically the MEASUR (Methods for Eliciting, Analyzing and Specifying User’s Requirements). A MDA tool was constructed in order to realize the approach. The first version of this tool provides means to model Ontology Charts. By using semi-automated transformations, it is also possible to produce UML (Unified Modeling Language) class diagrams from the modeled Ontology Charts. The tool features, design solutions, and capabilities are explained.
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Paper Nr:	548
Title:	AN ANALYSIS PATTERN FOR MOBILE GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEMS TOWARD MUNICIPAL URBAN ADMINISTRATION
Authors:	Bruno R. Monteiro, Jugurta Lisboa-Filho, José Luis Braga and Waister S. Martins
Abstract:	This paper introduces an analysis pattern for Mobile Geographic Information Systems (Mobile GIS) focused on urban administration applications. This pattern provides a class and associations diagram and can be used in the development of an urban Mobile GIS application. The paper also describes a process that guided us in obtaining this analysis pattern, presenting an example of its use in the conceptual modeling of an actual application.
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Paper Nr:	554
Title:	STRUCTURAL MODEL OF REAL-TIME DATABASES
Authors:	Nizar Idoudi, Claude Duvallet, Bruno Sadeg, Rafik Bouaziz and Faiez Gargouri
Abstract:	A real-time database is a database in which both the data and the operations upon the data may have timing constraints. Our objective in this paper is to model easily real-time database structures using the Model-Driven Engineering paradigm, specially the UML2 language. For that purpose, we propose an UML2.0 profile, entitled UML-RTDB, which is based on UML2.O Profiles package, in order to cope with the specific need of designing real-time databases.
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Paper Nr:	644
Title:	IT GOVERNANCE FRAMEWORKS AS METHODS
Authors:	Matthias Goeken and Stefanie Alter
Abstract:	IT management of today only to a surprisingly low degree is based on sound methods. Rather it is considered still as an art attributed to the capabilities of individual managers. On the other hand, there is little academic support for the challenges of IT management. To fill this obvious gap, various best practice frameworks have been developed. These frameworks cover both support of management tasks and improvement of compliance with regulations. Both areas can be subsumed under the topic IT governance. Whereas the frameworks reflect best practice experience, they do not provide prove of e.g. completeness and coherence with respect to the application area they were designed for. To undertake a step in this direction we will explore, to what degree the well known IT governance framework COBIT may be classified as a method. By analyzing the underlying logical and semantically rich structure of this framework we gain insights on how to compare and integrate further frameworks with COBIT. We will conclude by giving indications on how we intend to implement IT governance frameworks into a toolset based on semantic nets.
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Paper Nr:	681
Title:	USING VARIANTS IN KAOS GOAL MODELLING
Authors:	Joël Brunet, Farida SEMMAK, Regine Laleau and Christophe Gnaho Gnaho
Abstract:	In this paper we apply a certain kind of variability in KAOS goal and responsibility models: links can be conditioned depending on the choice of variants. These variants are grouped in facets and organized in a variant tree having a metagraph semantics: instances are all the goal/responsibility graphs generated when all variants are fixed. We use a case study from the land transportation domain: a simplified cycab (or cybercar) with some variants. The overall case study is part of the ANR TACOS project, whose final aim is to define a component-based approach to specify systems with high-level safety requirements.
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Paper Nr:	687
Title:	QUALITY IMPROVEMENT OF WORKFLOW DIAGRAMS BASED ON PASSBACK FLOW CONSISTENCY
Authors:	Osamu Takaki, Takahiro Seino, Izumi Takeuti, Noriaki Izumi and Koichi Takahashi
Abstract:	Passback flows are a kind of flows which appear as replays of operations in a workflow diagram. In order to consider consistency of a workflow diagram and to verify the consistency, it needs to deal with passback flows as special ones. In this paper, we formalize a passback flow in a workflow diagram with only graph theoretical properties of the workflow diagram, and we give an algorithm detecting and removing all passback flows in a workflow diagram. Furthermore, with the algorithm, we extend consistency properties of the structure and life cycles of evidences over an acyclic workflow diagram into those over a general workflow diagram. Our methodology enables us to improve quality of a workflow diagram with loops.
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Paper Nr:	692
Title:	A QVT-BASED APPROACH FOR MODEL COMPOSITION - Application to the VUML Profile
Authors:	Adil Anwar, Sophie Ebersold, Mahmoud Nassar, Bernard Coulette and Abdelaziz Kriouile
Abstract:	With the increasing importance of models in software development, many activities such as transformation, verification and composition are becoming crucial in the field of Model Driven Engineering (MDE). Our main objective is to propose a model-driven approach to compose design models. This approach is applied to the VUML profile that allows to analyse/design a system on the basis of functional points of view. In this paper we first describe a transformation-based composition process and then we specify transformations as a collection of QVT-Core rules implemented in ATL. The proposal is illustrated by a simple example.
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Paper Nr:	693
Title:	ECM SYSTEMS ANALYSIS AND SPECIFICATION - Towards a Framework for Business Process Re-Engineering
Authors:	Jan V. Brocke, Alexander Simons and Anne Cleven
Abstract:	In today’s working life, the management of content represents one of the most critical success factors. Quick access to required information considerably enhances business process efficiency as well as effectiveness. Enterprise Content Management (ECM)―a presently emerging field in Information Systems (IS) research―aims at providing concepts on how to best administer an organization’s individual content situation. Nevertheless, due to the novelty of the topic, there is still a lack of methodical support for ECM systems (ECMS) analysis and specification. A further drawback to a frictionless implementation of ECM results from the negligence of re-engineering affected business processes. With this paper, we present an integrated framework for ECM adoption and business process re-engineering, reverting to established methods in the field of Business Process Management (BPM) and IS analysis and specification techniques.
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Paper Nr:	717
Title:	BP-FAMA: BUSINESS PROCESS FRAMEWORK FOR AGILITY OF MODELLING AND ANALYSIS
Authors:	Mohamed Boukhebouze, Youssef Amghar and Aïcha-Nabila Benharkat
Abstract:	In this paper we present the BP-FAMA framework (Business Process Framework for Agility of Modelling and Analysis), motivated by the need to have an abstraction level in which algorithmic preoccupation and the management rules are separated for a better evolution of processes. Nowadays the approaches proposed are based on a mixing of business rules and algorithmic structures making the process difficult to change. The other motivation is the improvement of the quality of the translation of process specification to high-level executable process. These objectives don’t go without the need for new agile modelling languages: BPAMN (Business Process Agile Modelling Notation) and a new agile execution language: BPAEL (Business Process Agile Execution Language).
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Paper Nr:	721
Title:	RICAD: TOWARDS AN ARCHITECTURE FOR RECOGNIZING AUTHOR'S TARGETS
Authors:	Hassan Kanso, ALI ELHORE, CHANTAL SOULE-DUPUY and Said Tazi
Abstract:	We present RICAD system based on a semi-automatic method from specific-domain corpus (with which it is impossible to apply classical method information research). This approach is based on a model of intentional structure and RICAD system to recognize the author’s intentions from written documents in a specific domain. Our RICAD system happens in three stage: 1) to make a segmentation in a semi-automatic way of a document according to the authors intentions, and to extract the intentional verbs accompanied by their concepts of each segment through the system algorithms, 2) ontology building and 3) This system is also able to update the ontology of intentions for the enrichment of the knowledge base containing all possible intentions of a domain.
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Paper Nr:	728
Title:	TOWARDS A VALUE-ORIENTED APPROACH TO BUSINESS PROCESS MODELLING
Authors:	Jan V. Brocke, Jan Mendling and Jan Recker
Abstract:	To date, typical process modelling approaches put a strong emphasis on behavioural aspects of business operations. However, they often neglect value-related information. Yet, such information is of key importance to strategic decision-making, for instance in the context of process re-engineering. In this paper we propose a value-oriented approach to business process modelling that facilitates managerial decision-making in the context of process re-design based on concepts and metrics from financial and operations management..
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Paper Nr:	731
Title:	TESTING-BASED COMPONENT ASSESSMENT FOR SUBSTITUTABILITY
Authors:	Andres Flores and Macario Polo
Abstract:	Updating systems assembled from components demand a careful treatment due to stability risks. Replacement components must be properly evaluated to identify the required similar behaviour. Our proposal complements the regular compatibility analysis with black-box testing criteria to reinforce reliability. The aim is to analyze functions of data transformation encapsulated on components, i.e. their behaviour. This complies with the observability testing metric. A Component Behaviour Test Suite is built concerning the integration level to be later applied on candidate upgrades. The approach is supported through a tool developed on our group, testooj, which is focused on Java components.
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Paper Nr:	757
Title:	TOWARDS CREATION OF LOGICAL FRAMEWORK FOR EVENT-DRIVEN INFORMATION SYSTEMS
Authors:	Darko Anicic and Nenead Stojanovic
Abstract:	Event-Condition-Action (ECA) rules offer extensible and flexible approach to realizing active Enterprise Information Systems. Such systems are enabled to actively respond on events or state changes. Hence their behavior is programable by means of ECA rules. We propose an implementation of ECA rules in a completely logical framework, using Transaction Datalog¬ as an underlying logic. In this way, we extend the current ECA framework by means of powerful and declarative semantics, which also have an appropriate procedural interpretation. We show how a logical calculus of Transaction Datalog¬ can be exploited for realizing composite events, conditions, and actions; justifying the use of declarative semantics for solving some of the existing issues in reactive systems.
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Paper Nr:	770
Title:	A SUPPLY CHAIN ONTOLOGY CONCEPTUALIZATION WITH FOCUS ON PERFORMANCE EVALUATION
Authors:	Alicia Bohm, Horacio Leone and Gabriela Henning
Abstract:	Organizations all over the world are increasingly aligning in Supply Chains (SCs) in order to perform more efficiently and to achieve better results. This contribution presents a SC ontology that aims at conceptualizing and formalizing this domain knowledge. Its goal is to: a) enable a better understanding among the various stakeholders & b) set the basis for an effective information sharing and the development of integrations tools. The ontology introduces concepts associated with the SC structure, functions, resources, and management issues. Since one key component of management is performance assessment, which must be done along the whole SC, the proposed ontology focuses on performance evaluation issues.
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Paper Nr:	773
Title:	METHODOLOGICAL EXTENSIONS FOR SEMANTIC BUSINESS PROCESS MODELING
Authors:	David de Francisco, Henar Muñoz, Noelia Pérez, Javier Martínez Elicegui and Ivan Markovic
Abstract:	Semantic Business Process Management (SBPM) aims, among other advantages, to facilitate the reuse of knowledge related to the definition of business processes, as well as to provide an easier transition from models to executable processes by applying semantic technologies to BPM. In this article the authors focus on extending the scope of knowledge being reused from executable processes to semantic models' scope. This is done by providing some methodological extensions to existing BPM methodologies in order to take advantage of semantic technologies during business process modeling.
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Paper Nr:	791
Title:	TOWARDS A SEMI-AUTOMATIC TRANSFORMATION PROCESS IN MDA - Architecture and Methodology
Authors:	Slimane Hammoudi, Wajih ALOUINI and Denivaldo Lopes
Abstract:	Recently, Model Driven Engineering (MDE) approaches have been proposed for supporting the development, maintenance and evolution of software systems. Model driven architecture (MDA) from OMG (Object Management Group), “Software Factories” from Microsoft and the Eclipse Modelling Framework (EMF) from IBM are among the most representative MDE approaches. Nowadays, it is well recognized that model transformations are at the heart of these approaches and represent as a consequence one of the most important operations in MDE. However, despite the multitude of model transformation languages proposals emerging from university and industry, these transformations are often created manually. In this paper we propose in the first part an extended architecture that aims to semi-automate the process of transformation in the context of MDA. This architecture introduces mapping and matching as first class entities in the transformation process, represented by models and metamodels. In the second part, our architecture is enforced by a methodology which details the different steps leading to a semi-automatic transformation process. Finally, a classification of these different steps according to two main criteria is presented: how the steps are achieved (manual/automatic), and who is responsible for their achievement (expert, designer or software).
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Paper Nr:	797
Title:	MEASURING THE e-PARTICIPATION IN DECISION-MAKING PROCESSES THROUGH ONLINE SURVEYS
Authors:	Cristiano Maciel, Licinio Roque and Ana Cristina Bicharra Garcia
Abstract:	The deliberative decision-making process of the group can be a result of counseling and voting mediated by technology. The involvement of citizens in this process is crucial and measuring participation in process allows for assessment of the effectiveness of participation. Measuring the maturity of this decision, i.e. assessment of individual participation and its consequent reflection on the group’s decision, can be accomplished through the maturity level method discussed in this paper. In order to accomplish an examination of the relative potential and difficulties in achieving and measuring e-participation, we found it necessary to have a reasonable level of information structuring. For this purpose, online surveys were built and tested in stages, structured according to the Government-Citizen Interactive Model in a way as to support the Maturity of Decision-Making method (MDM). The main goal is to test the method proposed with the use of online surveys by stages and, through this experiment, indicate both positive and negative points.
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Paper Nr:	814
Title:	TOWARD A HYBRID ALGORITHM FOR WORKFLOW GRAPH STRUCTURAL VERIFICATION
Authors:	Fodé Touré, Karim Baina and Walid Gaaloul
Abstract:	Appropriate definition, analysis, checking and improvement of business process models are indispensable before their deployment within workflow management systems. In this paper, we focus on business process model verification that insures business process structural correctness. Our proposal consist in a new hybrid algorithm of workflow graph structural validation combining graph reduction and traversal mechanisms. Our algorithm will be discussed and compared to existing workflow structural checking approaches.
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Paper Nr:	816
Title:	INFORMATION SYSTEM ENGINEERING FOR AN ELECTRICITY DISTRIBUTION COMPANY
Authors:	Diane Asensio, Abdelaziz Khadraoui and Michel Léonard
Abstract:	Information Systems (IS) of electricity distribution companies are often composed of various and heterogeneous applications or systems that need to exchange information. Distribution activities evolve in different contexts and environments, and the interoperability is a particular difficult task to realize for electricity distribution companies. A laws-based IS engineering approach is proposed in our research laboratory. Given the distribution activities are regulated by a legal framework, we propose to apply this approach to the electricity distribution domain.
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Paper Nr:	844
Title:	APPLYING MDA TO GAME SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
Authors:	Takashi Inoue and Yoshiyuki Shinkawa
Abstract:	Game software becomes more and more complex, according as the game platforms are improved or the requirements of game users become sophisticated, and so does the development of game software. However, there are few established development methodologies for game software development, and it decreases the productivity of the development. One of the solutions for this problem is to apply modeling technologies to it as we do to other application areas, and through modeling we can anticipate productivity improvement. This paper evaluates the applicability and suitability of MDA (Model driven Architecture) to game software development, along with establishing a UML modeling process for typical game categories.
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Paper Nr:	847
Title:	EXTRACTING CLASS STRUCTURE BASED ON FISHBONE DIAGRAMS
Authors:	Makoto Shigemitsu and Yoshiyuki Shinkawa
Abstract:	Current software development methodologies usually assume the existence of definite rules and processes in target problem domains. However, in the software development for non-routine applications, this assumption might decrease the productivity, and makes it difficult to identify the optimal solutions. The paper proposes a development method for such software development using fishbone diagrams in order to analyze the requirements of stake holders, which can finally derive UML diagrams from the cause-result structure defined by the fishbone diagrams. The method could improve the productivity of the above development, creating high quality software specifications. We also show a case study on developing education assistance software using the proposed method.
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Paper Nr:	850
Title:	IMPROVING REQUIREMENTS ANALYSIS - Rigourous Problem Analysis and Formulation with Coloured Cognitive Maps
Authors:	John Venable
Abstract:	This position paper argues that methodical and rigourous attention to problem formulation should be an essential part of requirements analysis and proposes a method for modelling problems and potential solutions. Currently, most IS Development Methodologies ignore the issue of problem formulation. Furthermore, in practice, most IS development projects ignore or pay little attention to this issue. In this paper we argue that the resulting lack of proper problem analysis and formulation is a major cause of IS failures. In place of this lack of attention, this paper proposes and reports on research in progress on the development and evaluation of a new technique, Coloured Cognitive Maps (CCM), for use in problem formulation at the early stages of Information Systems Development. The notation of coloured cognitive maps and a procedure to use them for problem analysis and solution derivation are briefly described. Initial anecdotal results in employing CCM by students and practitioners are briefly described.
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Paper Nr:	16
Title:	INFORMATION SYSTEM PROCESS INNOVATION EVOLUTION PATHS
Authors:	Erja Mustonen-Ollila and Jukka Heikkonen
Abstract:	This study identifies Information System process innovations’ (ISPIs) evolution paths in three organisations using a sample of 213 ISPI development decisions over a period that spanned four decades: early computing (1954-1965); main frame era (1965-1983); office computing era (1983-1991), and distributed applications era (1991-1997). These follow roughly Friedman’s and Cornford’s categorisation of IS development eras. Four categories of ISPI’s are distinguished: base line technologies, development tools, description methods, and managerial process innovations. Inside the ISPI categories ISPI evolution paths are based on the predecessor and successor relationships of the ISPIs over time. We analyse for each era the changes and the dependencies between the evolution paths over time. The discovered dependencies were important in understanding that the changes on ISPIs are developed through many stages of evolution over time. It was discovered that the dependencies between the evolution paths varied significantly according to the three organisations, the four ISPI categories, and the four IS development eras.
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Paper Nr:	25
Title:	NEW DIRECTIONS FOR IT GOVERNANCE IN THE BRAZILIAN GOVERNMENT
Authors:	Fabio Perez Marzullo, Carlos A. Moreira, Jano Moreira De Souza and José R. Blaschek
Abstract:	This paper presents an IT Governance Framework and a Competency Model that are being developed to identify the intellectual capital and the strategic actions needed to implement an efficient IT Governance program in the Brazilian Government. This work in progress is driven by the premise that the human assets of an organization should adhere to a set of core competencies in order to correctly prioritize and achieve business results that, regarding government issues, relates to public resources administration. It is now widely accepted that IT Governance may help the organization to succeed in its business domain; consequently, through effective investment policies and correct IT decisions the organization can align business needs with IT resources, achieving highly integrated business services.
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Paper Nr:	43
Title:	MODELING UNIT TESTING PROCESSES - A System Dynamics Approach
Authors:	KUMAR SAURABH
Abstract:	Software development is a complex activity that often exhibits counter-intuitive behavior, in that outcomes often vary quite radically from the intended results. The production of a high quality software product requires application of both defect prevention and defect detection techniques. A common defect detection strategy is to subject the product to several phases of testing such as unit, integration, and system. These testing phases consume significant project resources and cycle time. As software companies continue to search for ways for reducing cycle time and development costs while increasing quality, software-testing processes emerge as a prime target for investigation. This paper presents a system dynamics (SD) model of software development, better understanding testing processes. Motivation for modeling testing processes is presented along with an executable model of the unit test phase. Some sample model runs are described to illustrate the usefulness of the model.
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Paper Nr:	76
Title:	MODELLING & SIMULATION OF A VIRTUAL CAMPUS - A Case Study Regarding the Open University of Catalonia
Authors:	Angel A. Juan, Pau Fonseca, Joan M. Marquès, Xavi Vilajosana and Javier Faulin
Abstract:	In this paper we present a case study regarding the modelling and simulation of a real computer system called Castelldefels. This system gives support to the Virtual Campus of the Open University of Catalonia (UOC), an online university that offers e-learning services to thousands of users. After analyzing several alternatives, the OPNET software was selected as the convenient tool for developing this network-simulation research. The main target of the project was to provide the computer system’s managers with a realistic simulation model of their system. This model would allow the managers: (i) to analyze the behaviour of the current system in order to discover possible performance problems such as bottlenecks, weak points in the structure, among others, and (ii) to perform what-if analysis regarding future changes in the system, including the addition of new Internet-based services, variations in the number and types of users, changes in hardware or software components, etc.
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Paper Nr:	234
Title:	DELIVERING ACTIONABLE BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE THROUGH SERVICE-ORIENTED ARCHITECTURE
Authors:	Zeljko Panian
Abstract:	The paper discusses the main characteristics of Service-oriented Architecture and examines the feasible ways of using business intelligence solutions as Web services in an SOA environment. With the evolution of Web services, organizations are becoming more sophisticated in their goals for and requirements of this technology as it offers faster and more flexible deployment, customization and easy integration of BI solutions. Those organizations that choose a Web services strategy will be best positioned to deliver BI content across and beyond the enterprise, making BI accessible to everyone, wherever they work, at a lower cost and in more innovative ways.
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Paper Nr:	248
Title:	AN OVERVIEW OF THE OSTRA FRAMEWORK FOR THE TRANSITION TO SOA
Authors:	Fabiano T. Tiba, Shuying Wang and Miriam Capretz
Abstract:	Service-Oriented Architecture is an emerging paradigm to build applications as a collection of services that can be coordinated to provide flexible applications. At its full potential, the development of services is considered from the perspective of the enterprise to deliver services that can be reused across applications and provide flexible solutions. However, the achievement of an enterprise-wide SOA is challenging, as it remains unclear how organizations should evolve towards the SOA paradigm. This paper discusses issues related to transition to SOA and provides an overview of OSTRA - a framework which provides a realistic approach for the transition to SOA, by considering short-term and long-term goals and balancing planning and management with practical experimentation.
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Paper Nr:	250
Title:	SUPPORT DISCIPLINES FOR SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT IN SMEs - A Conceptual Map
Authors:	Luis E. Mendoza, María A. Perez, Edumilis M. Ortega and Wilfredo Báez
Abstract:	Both software configuration management (SCM) and project management (PM) involve applying knowledge, skills, tools and techniques which support the development of software systems (SS). Developing an effective project management plan, which minimizes risks and restrictions inherent to the project, becomes more difficult as time goes on. Achieving an effective balance between the scope, timeframe, and costs associated with the project is also a complex task. This task is equally challenge for the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). SCM is a powerful tool for the administration and control of the life cycle of the SS, and it is linked to the process of quality assurance. This article presents the first results of an ongoing research whose purpose is to develop a framework which incorporates the methodological aspects of PM and SCM for SMEs. The first step for the design of this framework was to build a conceptual model that would be used as a systemic vision of the semantic basis to unify and support the relationships between these concepts.
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Paper Nr:	289
Title:	A CONCEPTUAL MODEL FOR GROUP SUPPORT SYSTEMS IN LOCAL COUNCILS
Authors:	Joycelyn Harris and Lily Sun
Abstract:	This paper proposes a conceptual model of a context-aware group support system (GSS) to assist local council employees to perform collaborative tasks in conjunction with inter- and intra-organisational stakeholders. Most discussions about e-government focus on the use of ICT to improve the relationship between government and citizen, not on the relationship between government and employees. This paper seeks to expose the unique culture of UK local councils and to show how a GSS could support local government employer and employee needs.
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Paper Nr:	297
Title:	A DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM TAYLORED FOR ROMANIAN SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES
Authors:	razvan petrusel
Abstract:	This paper presents an overview of a prototype of a real-world decision support system (DSS) that was developed in order to improve financial decisions in Romanian small and medium enterprises (SME). The goal of the paper is to show weaknesses in strategic, tactic and operative financial decision making in Romanian SME and to show how improvement is possible by use of a cash-flow based DSS and several specialised expert systems. The paper focuses mainly on requirements elicitation and on system validation. The impact and benefits of using the Information Technology in decision-making processes within the enterprise are highlighted.
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Paper Nr:	341
Title:	INTEGRATING CREATIVITY INTO EXTREME PROGRAMMING PROCESS
Authors:	Broderick Crawford and Claudio Leon de la Barra
Abstract:	Human and social factors are very important in developing software and the development of new software requires the generation of novel ideas. In this paper, the Agile method called eXtreme Programming (XP) is analyzed and evaluated from the perspective of the creativity. The conclusion is that XP can be fostered from a creativity perspective.
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Paper Nr:	348
Title:	DATA ENCRYPTION AND DECRYPTION USING ANZL ALGORITHM
Authors:	Artan Luma and Nderim Zeqiri
Abstract:	What is the ANZL Algorithm? It is a genuine result of our work which is theoretically and practically proved. By using the ANZL Algorithm, we can test whether a given number x belongs to Lucas’s series. It can also be used to find a sequence of Lucas’s numbers, starting from any number x. If a given number x, completes the relation 5∙x^2±4=λ^2, we can say that it is a Lucas number and we mark it as L_n=x. From the pair of numbers (L_n,λ), we can find the preceding L_(n-1) and the succeeding L_(n+1) e L_n. Based on these three elements of Lucas’s series, we can create the key for data encryption and decryption.
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Paper Nr:	363
Title:	MANAGING REQUIREMENTS CHANGE AS PLM PROCESS
Authors:	Morad Messaadia, Jacqueline Konaté and Abd-El K. Sahraoui
Abstract:	This paper is on PLM issues within a systems engineering framework. The study considered is mainly focused on requirements change issue how to integrate it into the PLM information systems. The contribution is in two steps. Firstly, analyze requirements evolution engineering in terms of collaboration processes. Secondly, we consider both the final product and requirements change impact on enabling product, then we illustrate the approach by a case study.
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Paper Nr:	378
Title:	TOWARDS AN EXTENDED ALIGNMENT MODEL FOR A COMPLETE ALIGNMENT OF MANUFACTURING INFORMATION SYSTEMS
Authors:	Oscar Avila, Virginie Goepp and François Kiefer
Abstract:	Today companies need flexible and adaptable Information Systems (IS) to support their business strategies and organisational processes, as well as to facilitate their adaptation to changes in environment. In particular, in the manufacturing sector companies need flexible IS to make the integration of infrastructures easier, to support production management and to be able to respond to the evolution of support technologies. To deal with these specific requirements the alignment between the manufacturing IS with the organisation's strategy and its outside environment is necessary. However, most of the research in the IS alignment field is related to the alignment of IS with the organisation's strategy, neglecting the alignment with the external environment. Thus, in order to support complete alignment of manufacturing IS we propose in this paper an extension to the Strategic Alignment Model (SAM) of Henderson and Venkatraman (1999). The extended SAM allows the definition of possible alignment perspectives that accentuate elements to be aligned and the alignment sequence. This set of perspectives and the extended SAM are a first step towards tackling the alignments with the strategy and with the environment.
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Paper Nr:	379
Title:	ASSESSING REPUTATION AND TRUST IN SCIENTIFIC GRIDS
Authors:	ANDREA BOSIN, NICOLETTA DESSI and Balachandar R. Amarnath
Abstract:	Up to now, reputation and trust are widely acknowledged to be important for business environments, but little attention has been placed in security aspects of Grids devoted to scientific applications. This paper addresses these aspects and proposes both a Reputation Management System and a mechanism for assessing the reputation of computing resources belonging to a scientific Grid. Because the overall performance of the Grid depends on the quality of service given by each single resource, the resource reputation is a measure of trustworthiness, in the sense of reliability and is asserted on a set of properties, namely the resource operative context, that express the resource capability in providing available and reliable services. Unlike the business applications, we are not interested in assessing the reputation of a single resource but in finding a set of resource that have similar capabilities of successfully executing a specific job. Toward this end, the paper proposes a mechanism that assesses reputation by clustering Grid resources in groups that exhibit similar behavioural patterns and share similar operative contexts. Simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed approach and the possible integration of such a model in a real Grid.
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Paper Nr:	414
Title:	AUTOMATIC GENERATION OF UML-BASED WEB APPLICATION PROTOTYPES
Authors:	Shinpei Ogata and Saeko Matsuura
Abstract:	The key to success in business system development is to sufficiently elicit user requirements from the customers and to fully and correctly define the requirements analysis model that meets these requirements. Prototyping is recognized as an effective software development method that enables customers to confirm the validity of the requirements analysis model at an early stage of system development. However, the development process requires guaranteeing consistency between the system model and customer requirements that arise as a result of the confirmation. This paper proposes a method for the incremental validation of a Web application wherein a prototype system is automatically generated from a requirements analysis model based on UML (Unified Modeling Language). This model defines the interaction between a system and the user, in addition to defining the input/output data. Moreover, the automatic generation tool of the prototype system enables the developer to confirm the system image incrementally while developing the requirements analysis model in UML. We discuss the expressiveness of the generated prototype in comparison with the current group work support tool.
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Paper Nr:	414
Title:	AUTOMATIC GENERATION OF UML-BASED WEB APPLICATION PROTOTYPES
Authors:	Shinpei Ogata and Saeko Matsuura
Abstract:	The key to success in business system development is to sufficiently elicit user requirements from the customers and to fully and correctly define the requirements analysis model that meets these requirements. Prototyping is recognized as an effective software development method that enables customers to confirm the validity of the requirements analysis model at an early stage of system development. However, the development process requires guaranteeing consistency between the system model and customer requirements that arise as a result of the confirmation. This paper proposes a method for the incremental validation of a Web application wherein a prototype system is automatically generated from a requirements analysis model based on UML (Unified Modeling Language). This model defines the interaction between a system and the user, in addition to defining the input/output data. Moreover, the automatic generation tool of the prototype system enables the developer to confirm the system image incrementally while developing the requirements analysis model in UML. We discuss the expressiveness of the generated prototype in comparison with the current group work support tool.
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Paper Nr:	436
Title:	ACTION-BASED ANALYSIS OF BUSINESS PROCESSES
Authors:	Reuven Karni and Maya Lincoln
Abstract:	We suggest a method for supporting the management of a business process suite through reliance on an action-based viewpoint. We abstract the action verb from each process descriptor, and perform a verb frequency analysis. Through a Pareto approach those common to a large number of processes are identified. Semantic analysis of these significant actions provides three directions for BPM support: locating actions in the planning, execution or control domain; identifying common procedures to be implemented; and ascertaining where operational consistency and coordination is required between organizational units.
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Paper Nr:	450
Title:	SELECTION CRITERIA FOR SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT TOOLS FOR SMES - SMEs and Cooperatives in Venezuela
Authors:	Lornel Rivas, María A. Perez, Luis E. Mendoza and Anna Grimán
Abstract:	Software engineering tools have regained interests in recent years due to different changes affecting software developing organizations. These organizations carry out activities that might be undertaken in a plan driven and agile manner with the support of such tools. A proper balance between both approaches and the effective tool adoption will help organizations to meet their objectives and evolve. Small and medium enterprises and Cooperatives (S&C) share common characteristics throughout Latin America. Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) lack of formality in their roles and relationships among interacting individuals, whereas Cooperatives are usually small companies with weaknesses as to management techniques and technological equipment. In fact, both have difficulties when finding the right personnel and tools that best suit their needs. Considering Venezuela as our study subject, we have herein proposed some criteria to assist S&C in the tools selection that support their development processes while fostering the balance required between agility and discipline. Such criteria were formulated based on the characterization of five factors aimed at determining this balance. These contributions will help subsequently identifying methodological and technical aspects to provide guidance to S&C in the improvement of their development processes.
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Paper Nr:	456
Title:	IMPROVING ANALYSIS PATTERNS IN THE GEOGRAPHIC DOMAIN USING ONTOLOGICAL META-PROPERTIES
Authors:	Evaldo D. De Silva, Jugurta Lisboa Filho and Gabriel Silva Gonçalves
Abstract:	This article shows the improving of analysis patterns in the geographic domain through ontological meta-properties, where each pattern’s class has its concept analyzed ontologically. This improvement also permits to restructure the class diagram of analysis patterns, increasing the reuse quality. Besides improving the analysis patterns, it is proposed one more topic in the template for analysis patterns documentation. This topic is based on the specification of the main classes defined during the process.
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Paper Nr:	471
Title:	MARVIN - Modeling Environments with Ubiquitous Computing
Authors:	Caio D'Agostini and Patricia Vilain
Abstract:	When different devices and applications start to work with one another, physical and behavioral aspects from the environment have to be taken into account when designing a system. It is impractical, if not impossible, to list all possible devices, applications and new characteristics and behaviors that might emerge as result from the autonomy of each part from the parts of the system, different data interpretation and self-organization capability. In order to cope with this difficulty, this paper combines the contributions from different works as a way to improve the modeling process of this type of computational environment.
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Paper Nr:	493
Title:	EXPRESSING BUSINESS RULES IN BPMN
Authors:	Li Peng and Hang Li
Abstract:	The Business Process Modelling Notation is a graph-oriented language for executable business processes. Business rules describe fundamental constraints on a system’s transactions. Changes of business rules bring high impact on business processes. It is important for these rules to be represented explicitly, and to be automatically applicable. However, business rules are expressed in a markedly different way than business processes, it can be challenging to integrate them in a model. In this paper, we propose an approach for expressing business rules in BPMN. The key idea is that business rules are operationalized by BPMN subprocesses. This method can improve requirements traceability in process design, as well as minimize the efforts of system changes due to the changes of business rules.
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Paper Nr:	502
Title:	BUSINESS DRIVEN RISK ASSESSMENT - A Methodical Approach to Risk Assessment and Business Investment
Authors:	Dave Enstrom and Siavosh Hossendoust
Abstract:	Dynamic business environments require concurrent, distributed, and flexible architectures that must provide an agreeable level of reliability and acceptable level of trust. A three level undisruptive business driven planning process has been formulated using a risk analysis model that provides a justifiable direction for implementing a low risk solution and selecting appropriate products. The methodology includes identification of “Risk Priority” through assessment of risks for: business effectiveness, logical IT solution architecture (PIM) aspects, and physical IT solution architecture (PSM) aspects. It also introduces a risk dependency analysis process as an aid in understanding relationships between architectural layers. This proposed methodology aids in understanding and prioritizing risks within the context of the organization; it has broadened the concept of a TRA into a risk controlled solution architecture domain.
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Paper Nr:	507
Title:	STUDY ON IP TRACEBACK SYSTEM FOR DDoS
Authors:	Cheol J. Chae, Bong-Han Kim and Jae-Kwang Lee
Abstract:	The rapid growth in technology has caused misuse of the Internet like cyber Crime. There are several vulnerabilities in current firewall and Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) of the Network Computing resources. Automatic real time station chase techniques can track the internet invader and reduce the probability of hacking Due to the recent trends the station chase technique has become inevitable. In this paper, we design and implement IP traceback system. In this design no need to modify the router structure and we can deploy this technique in larger network. Our Implementation shows that IP traceback system is safe to deploy and protect data in Internet from hackers and others.
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Paper Nr:	531
Title:	SEMIOTICS, MODELS AND COMPUTING
Authors:	Bertil Ekdahl
Abstract:	Recently, semiotics has begun to be related to computing. Since semiotics is about the interpretation of signs, of which language is a chief part, such an interest may seem quite reasonable. The semiotic approach is supposed to bring semantics to the computer. In this paper I discuss the realistic in this from the point of view of computers as linguistic systems, that is, as interpreters of descriptions (programs). I maintain the holistic view of language in which the parts are a whole and cannot be detached. This has the implication that computers cannot be semiotic systems since the necessary interpretation part cannot be made part of the program. From outside, a computer program can very well be considered semiotically since the equivalence between computers and formal system implies that there is a well defined model (interpretation) that has to be communicated.
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Paper Nr:	649
Title:	FROM INTERORGANIZATIONAL MODELLING TO ESSENTIAL USE CASES
Authors:	Luciana C. Ballejos and Jorge M. Montagna
Abstract:	Requirements Engineering (RE) must initially focus on information system (IS) domain modeling rather than on its functionalities. Existing techniques do not consider many attributes of contexts where two or more organizations interact (interorganizational –IO-). An extension is proposed for i* framework (Yu, 1995) for analysis of IO information systems (IOSs). Essential use cases are also derived from the proposed model. Diverse transformation rules are explained and an example is instantiated.
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Paper Nr:	668
Title:	RELATING SYSTEM DYNAMICS AND MULTIDIMENSIONAL DATA MODELS - A Metamodel based Language Mapping
Authors:	Lars Burmester and Matthias Goeken
Abstract:	System Dynamics (SD) is an approach with a long tradition used for modelling and simulation of complex system. Early, a conceptual modelling language was applied to bridge the ‘linguistic gap’ between the natural language of the model users and the targeted simulation language. Despite the maturity of the modelling approach, up to today no linguistic metamodel exists for the used language, resulting in non complying language extensions and the lack of reasonable combination with other modelling languages, e.g. for use in Business Intelligence (BI) systems. This paper aims at the development of a linguistic metamodel of the SD modelling language. Further, by relating the elaborated SD metamodel with multidimensional data modelling, an approach for positioning SD in a modern BI context is shown.
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Paper Nr:	696
Title:	PROGNOSTIC CAPACITY MANAGEMENT FROM AN IT SERVICE MANAGEMENT PERSPECTIVE
Authors:	Thomas Jirku and Peter Reichl
Abstract:	Maintaining the balance between keeping the IT continuously running and at the same time enhancing the quality of the services and responding with increasing agility towards changing business needs under the usual budget constraints is one of the core challenges for IT service management. Over the last years, ITIL has become the de facto standard best practice recommendation for this purpose. Among the 10 different ITIL disciplines, capacity management is one of the most important ones. However, the ITIL perspective is restricted towards describing the current state of an IT system. In this paper, we propose to go a step ahead and turn capacity management into a proactive discipline for managing IT infrastructure. To this end, we discuss requirements on a platform-independent capacity data base and present a case study which shows how to simplify its performance evaluation through an approximation approach. Finally, we draw a couple of practical conclusions and describe further steps towards a capacity management which allows to deal proactively with potential problems and bottlenecks.
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Paper Nr:	700
Title:	ONTOLOGY BASED SEMANTIC REPRESENTATION OF THE REPORTS AND RESULTS IN A HOSPITAL INFORMATION SYSTEM
Authors:	Mª B. Prados Suárez, E. González Revuelta, C. Peña Yáñez, G. Carmona Martínez and C. Molina Fernández
Abstract:	The main purpose of this paper is to contextualize the access to the huge amount of results and reports that a Hospital Information System (HIS) can reach to have. Our target is to integrate a semantic layer with the HIS, so that the user can employ this layer to access just the precise information needed, under his working context. Here we propose a new navigation system based on the semantic characteristics of the data acceded, their complementary characteristics, properties and relations, providing so the HIS with a new tool to solve an evident problem for the users.
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Paper Nr:	702
Title:	CASE ON MODELING OF MANUFACTURING SYSTEMS BY MODIFIED IDEF0 TECHNIQUE
Authors:	Vladimír Modrák
Abstract:	The paper is concerned with a process management from the point of view of business process mapping. It is focused on methodological aspects of business process modeling leading to development map of processes with consistent linkages between all hierarchical levels. Used approach is directed at support of managing processes that flow across departments and/or functions within the organization. Developed process mapping technique is based on process decomposition that is resulting in a set of business structure models, which are represented by diagrams.
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Paper Nr:	706
Title:	INTEGRATING TECHNICAL APPROACHES, ORGANISATIONAL ISSUES, AND HUMAN FACTORS IN SECURITY RISK ASSESSMENT BY ORGANISING SECURITY RELATED QUESTIONS
Authors:	Lili Yang, Malcolm King and Shuanghua Yang
Abstract:	This paper aims to develop a multiple perspective framework for employee security risk assessment by simultaneously, not sequentially, addressing three distinct perspectives: technical, organisational, and human factor perspectives. Interactions between technical approaches and human factors, and between organisational issues and human factors are investigated. A security related question library that integrates organisational culture and human factors with network security risk assessment in a BS ISO/IEC 27001 compliant environment is established in order to identify security vulnerabilities.
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Paper Nr:	708
Title:	FACILITATING AND BENEFITING FROM END-USER INVOLVEMENT DURING REQUIREMENTS ANALYSIS
Authors:	Jose Luis de la Vara and Juan Sanchez
Abstract:	Problems related to requirements analysis of information systems are frequent. System analysts usually lack understanding of the business and focus on the purpose of the system, and can easily miscommunicate with end-users. To prevent these problems, this paper describes an approach that tries to facilitate and benefit from end-user involvement during requirements analysis. The business environment is modelled in the form of business process diagrams by means of BPMN. The diagrams are validated by end-users, and the purpose of the system is then analyzed through the goal/strategy Map approach in order to agree on the effect that the system should have on the business processes. Finally, functional requirements are specified by means of the description of the business process tasks to be supported by the system.
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Paper Nr:	712
Title:	INSCO REQUISITE - A Web-Based RM-Tool to support Hybrid Software Development
Authors:	Francisco J. Orellana Zubieta, Joaquín Cañadas, Isabel Maria Del Aguila Cano and S. Túnez
Abstract:	This paper presents InSCo Requisite, a Web-based Requirements Management Tool (RM-tool) supporting InSCo, a methodology based on CommonKADS and RUP, for developing software systems in which information systems coexist with knowledge-based components. A revision of similar requirement management tools is presented, as well as a review of the main requirements proposed for this kind of tools.
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Paper Nr:	719
Title:	LEGACY SYSTEMS ADAPTATION USING THE SERVICE ORIENTED APPROACH
Authors:	F. Javier Nieto, Íñigo Cañadas and Leire Bastida
Abstract:	Legacy systems are the core IT assets of the great majority of organisations that support their critical business processes. Integrating those existing legacy systems with the rest of IT infrastructure is a complex and difficult task. Legacy systems are often undocumented, inflexible and tightly coupled and imply high cost of maintenance. Many organisations are starting to look at Service Oriented Architectures (SOA) as a potential way to expose their existing legacy investment as functional units to be re-used and exploited externally. This paper is focused on providing guidance to those organisations which want to use SOA on legacy adaptation and transformation. For doing so, this paper defines a vision and a set of best practices that any organisation should follow in order to expose their useful legacy functionalities as part of a SOA environment, allowing the development of hybrid systems understood as compositions of new services as well as of legacy systems and existing components wrapped as services.
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Paper Nr:	724
Title:	NORM ANALYSIS SUPPORTING THE DESIGN OF CONTEXT-AWARE APPLICATIONS
Authors:	Boris Shishkov, Marten van Sinderen, Kecheng Liu and Hui Du
Abstract:	In this paper, we consider the challenge of designing context-aware applications, stressing especially on the usefulness of elaborating process models with semiotic norms. Such an elaboration can bring value in specifying and elaborating complex behaviors that may include alternative (context-driven) processes (we assume that a user context space can be defined and that each context state within this space corresponds to an alternative application service behavior). Hence, the main contribution of this paper comprises an adaptability-driven methodological support to the design of context-aware applications.
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Paper Nr:	733
Title:	TOWARDS A DATA INTEGRATION APPROACH BASED ON BUSINESS PROCESS MODELS AND DOMAIN ONTOLOGIES
Authors:	Fernanda Baião, Flavia Santoro, Hadeliane Iendrike, Claudia Cappelli, Mauro Lopes, Vanessa Nunes and Ana P. Dumont
Abstract:	Information integration is still a challenge in the Information Systems research area. Domain ontologies are intensively studied to solve this problem, since they allow people and software agents to share common agreement about information and semantics on a specific domain of knowledge. However, for this integration to be carried out effectively, the ontology should be kept up-to-date according to concept definitions and current business rules. This may be very difficult to achieve in dynamic organizations. In this paper we present an approach for developing domain ontologies from business process models, thus helping in building integrated data models.
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Paper Nr:	734
Title:	AN OVERVIEW OF SOFTWARE PROCESS QUALITY INSTRUMENTS ADOPTION AT BRAZIL - Preliminary Results of a Survey
Authors:	Rodrigo Espindola, Edimara Mezzomo Luciano and Jorge N. Audy
Abstract:	This paper presents results from a quantitative research that was conducted among 260 participants of a software quality event in Brazil. This research aims the understanding the occurrence of several IT problems in the analyzed organizations and the impact of the quality instruments adoption on those problems. The main contribution is the identification of the respondent’s perception about the relationship of the quality instruments adoption and their impact on several IT problems throughout statistical analysis of the data.
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Paper Nr:	741
Title:	A WEB 2.0 CASE TOOL SUPPORTING PACKAGED SOFTWARE IMPLEMENTATION
Authors:	Harris Wu and Georges Arnaout
Abstract:	Companies increasingly rely on implementing packaged software instead of developing custom solutions. Packaged software implementation (PSI) is the process to solve business problems by customizing and integrating an off-the-shelf software package. However, there has been a lack of CASE (Computer Aided Software Engineering) tools to support PSI. This paper presents a Web 2.0 based tool that supports case-based reasoning in PSI. The tool helps users explore past design cases, find a similar case, and reuse the design for that case in new problem situations. Our belief is that by utilizing the social power of a large group of users, better designs can be achieved at lower risks and lower costs.
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Paper Nr:	755
Title:	EVOLUTION OF INFORMATION SYSTEMS WITH DATA HIERARCHIES
Authors:	Bogdan Czejdo
Abstract:	Recently, the research and practical efforts have intensified in the area of Information Systems (IS) supporting data and application evolution. The need to support IS evolution is caused by a variety of reasons including dynamicity of data sources, changing processing requirements, and using new technologies. In this paper we concentrate on evolution of IS data repositories caused by dynamicity of data sources. Our approach is to capture changes of various data hierarchies and use them as rules to implement evolution of IS data repository. Evolution of hierarchies can be categorized into hierarchy creation, hierarchy deletion, and hierarchy modification.
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Paper Nr:	759
Title:	A RECONFIGURABLE SECURITY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM WITH SERVICE ORIENTED ARCHITECTURE
Authors:	Ing-Yi Chen and Chao-Chi Huang
Abstract:	This paper proposes an Information Security Management System (ISMS), which is essentially a service-oriented mechanism. The system supports distributed process changes in run-time and as needed. In addition, this study uses a Service-Oriented Software Engineering (SOSE) development methodology for designing and building a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) ISMS. These features represent significant improvements upon existing systems because, they allow for a dramatic increase in the ease and efficiency with which system modification can occur. They also allow for the reuse of existing services and their recombination, either with other existing services, or with new software, in order to create new processes. The features afforded by this system hold tremendous potential for use within a range of industries and organizations, especially those that seek to provide on-line services to their customers or product users.
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Paper Nr:	775
Title:	KNOWLEDGE REPRESENTATION AND COST MANAGEMENT FOR SUPPLY CHAINS
Authors:	K. D. Tham
Abstract:	The intent of this research is to make a contribution to SCEM (supply chain event management) and SCM (supply chain management) systems. nowledge representation (KR) of a supply chain is modelled by the “linking” of activity-state-resource clusters that represent activities of the supply chain. A formalization of the costs of resources (i.e., resource cost units) is presented. Traditional overhead costs entities are represented as period and non-period cost resources that may be deployed consistently, unambiguously and with high traceability in Temporal-ABCTM (registered trademark of Nulogy Corporation). KR and cost management enhances the effectiveness and efficiency of SCEM and SCM systems.
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Paper Nr:	793
Title:	GRAPHICAL REPRESENTATIONS OF MESSAGE EXCHANGES INTO WEB SERVICE-BASED APPLICATIONS
Authors:	Rene Pegoraro, João M. Rosário and Khalil Drira
Abstract:	Web service-based application is an architectural style, where a collection of Web services communicate to each other to execute processes. With the popularity increase of Web service-based applications and since messages exchanged inside of this applications can be complex, we need tools to simplify the understanding of interrelationship among Web services. This work present a description of a graphical representation of Web service-based applications and the mechanisms inserted among Web service requesters and providers to catch information to represent an application. The major contribution of this paper is to discus and use HTTP and SOAP information to show a graphical representation similar to a UML sequence diagram of Web service-based applications.
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Paper Nr:	833
Title:	AS-IS CONTINUOUS REPRESENTATION IN ORGANIZATIONAL ENGINEERING
Authors:	Nuno Castela and José Tribolet
Abstract:	If the organizational model was a trustworthy and updated representation of the organizations, in all of its aspects and perspectives, it could be permanently used as support base to most operational and management tasks, using all its capacities for capturing, representing and distributing organizational knowledge. However, the use of this model is normally restricted in time in order to support some organizational activities, instead of being a solid foundation to support the organizational daily activities acting as an organizational knowledge repository. This is a result of the difficulty to maintain the model updated and aligned with the reality. The research in Organizational Engineering is already mature in defining modeling artefacts, modelling languages and the necessary views to adequate the model to the users, promoting its usage in a continuous baseline. This paper propose a process to maintain the As-Is Organizational Model updated. The strategy presented considers the organizational model as a representation of the organizational conscience, continuously aligned with the reality.
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Paper Nr:	835
Title:	STRATEGIC INFORMATION REQUIREMENTS ELICITATION - Definition of Aggregated Business Entities
Authors:	Gianmario Motta and Giovanni Pignatelli
Abstract:	This paper presents a universal meta-model for Strategic Information Requirements Elicitation and a methodology to generate and use strategic information models. The framework fits the methodological gap that exists in the Strategic Information Requirements and supports the analyst in (a) define structured high level information requirements and (b) assess informational support from a variety of perspectives. The meta-model enhance the e-TOM Aggregate Business Entity concept by the adding the concepts of specialization and decomposition. The methodology uses several perspective to assure the robustness of information requirements, their coverage on the IT infrastructure and the ownership of information. Specifically the methodology includes various steps, namely the selection, customization, refinement and validation of the ABEs, evaluation of the informative support and sensitivity analysis. The model can be used for analysis, audit and strategic planning and may be leaned to CASE tools.
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Paper Nr:	842
Title:	AUTOMATING TEST CASE GENERATION FOR REQUIREMENTS SPECIFICATION FOR PROCESSES ORCHESTRATING WEB SERVICES
Authors:	Krzysztof Sapiecha and Damian Grela
Abstract:	In the paper it is showed that under some assumptions a process orchestrating Web services (BPEL process) may be considered as an embedded system. Following this analogy a new method for automating test case generation for requirements specification for processes defined in BPEL is given.
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Rejecteds

Paper Nr:	483
Title:	A Model Transformation Framework for Model Driven Engineering
Authors:	Hongming Liu, Adam Steele, Xiaoping Jia and Lizhang Qin
Abstract:	Model Driven Engineering (MDE) is a model-centric software development approach aims at improving the quality and productivity of software development processes. While some progresses in MDE have been made, there are still many obstacles in realizing the full benefits of model driven engineering. These obstacles include incompleteness in existing modeling notations, inadequate in tools support, and the lack of effective model transformation mechanism. This paper presents a new model driven engineering framework, which is based on a formal modeling notation -- Z-based Object-Oriented Modeling notation (ZOOM). It includes a set of supporting tools aiming at delivering the benefits in practical applications of model driven engineering. In particularly, this proposal focuses on one key aspect of MDE -- model transformation. A template based model transformation framework using Hierarchical Relational Meta-model (HRM) is introduced. This framework aims to provide a simple, effective, and practical way to define model transformations. The potential benefits of the proposed model transformation framework include: 1) readability and rigorousness of meta-model definitions; 2) simplicity of transformation definition; and 3) extensibility of transformation templates. The architecture and design of the framework is discussed and comparisons with related research work are provided to show the benefits of this framework.

Area 4 - Software Agents and Internet Computing

Full Papers

Paper Nr:	305
Title:	USING BIT-EFFICIENT XML TO OPTIMIZE DATA TRANSFER OF XFORMS-BASED MOBILE SERVICES
Authors:	Jaakko Kangasharju and Oskari Koskimies
Abstract:	We consider here the case of XForms applications on small mobile devices. The aim is to find out whether a schema-aware binary XML format is better suited to this area than generic compression applied to regular XML. We begin by limiting the potential areas of improvement through considering the features of the binary format, and then proceed to measure effects in the identified areas to determine whether a binary format would be effective.
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Paper Nr:	437
Title:	EFFICIENT NEIGHBOURHOOD ESTIMATION FOR RECOMMENDATION MAKING
Authors:	Li-Tung Weng, Yue Xu, Yuefeng Li and Richi Nayak
Abstract:	Recommender systems produce personalized product recommendations during a live customer interaction, and they have achieved widespread success in e-commerce nowadays. For many recommender systems, especially the collaborative filtering based ones, neighbourhood formation is an essential algorithm component. Because in order for collaborative-filtering based recommender to make a recommendation, it is required to form a set of users sharing similar interests to the target user. “Best-k-neighbours” is a popular neighbourhood formation technique commonly used by recommender systems, however as tremendous growth of customers and products in recent years, the computation efficiency become one of the key challenges for recommender systems. Forming neighbourhood by going through all neighbours in the dataset is not desirable for large datasets containing million items and users. In this paper, we presented a novel neighbourhood estimation method which is both memory and computation efficient. Moreover, the proposed technique also leverages the common “fixed-n-neighbours” problem for standard “best-k- neighbours” techniques, therefore allows better recommendation quality for recommenders. We combined the proposed technique with a taxonomy-driven product recommender, and in our experiment, both time efficiency and recommendation quality of the recommender are improved.
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Paper Nr:	438
Title:	WEB INFORMATION RECOMMENDATION MAKING BASED ON ITEM TAXONOMY
Authors:	Li-Tung Weng, Yue Xu, Yuefeng Li and Richi Nayak
Abstract:	Recommender systems have been widely applied in the domain of ecommerce. They have caught much research attention in recent years. They make recommendations to users by exploiting past users’ item preferences, thus eliminating the needs for users to form their queries explicitly. However, recommender systems’ performance can be easily affected when there are no sufficient item preferences data provided by previous users. This problem is commonly referred to as cold-start problem. This paper suggests another information source, item taxonomies, in addition to item preferences for assisting recommendation making. Item taxonomy information has been popularly applied in diverse ecommerce domains for product or content classification, and therefore can be easily obtained and adapted by recommender systems. In this paper, we investigate the implicit relations between users’ item preferences and taxonomic preferences, suggest and verify using information gain that users who share similar item preferences may also share similar taxonomic preferences. Under this assumption, a novel recommendation technique is proposed that combines the users’ item preferences and the additional taxonomic preferences together to make better quality recommendations as well as alleviate the cold-start problem. Empirical evaluations to this approach are conducted and the results show that the proposed technique outperforms other existing techniques in both recommendation quality and computation efficiency.
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Paper Nr:	732
Title:	ENHANCING ENTERPRISE COLLABORATION USING CONTEXT-AWARE SERVICE BASED ON ASPECTS
Authors:	Khouloud Boukadi, Chirine Ghedira and Lucien Vincent
Abstract:	In fast changing markets, dynamic collaboration ability involves establishing and "enacting" business relationships in an adaptive way taking into account context changes. This relies on using adaptable and flexible IT platforms. Service orientation can address this challenge. Accordingly, collaborative processes can be implemented as a composition of a set of services. However, combining "directly" elementary IT services is a hard task and presents risks in both service provider and user sides. In this paper we present a high-level structure called Service Domain which orchestrates a set a of related IT services based on BPEL specifications. To ensure the Service Domain adaptability to context changes our approach aims to prove the benefits of bringing Aspect Oriented Programming.
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Paper Nr:	732
Title:	ENHANCING ENTERPRISE COLLABORATION USING CONTEXT-AWARE SERVICE BASED ON ASPECTS
Authors:	Khouloud Boukadi, Chirine Ghedira and Lucien Vincent
Abstract:	In fast changing markets, dynamic collaboration ability involves establishing and "enacting" business relationships in an adaptive way taking into account context changes. This relies on using adaptable and flexible IT platforms. Service orientation can address this challenge. Accordingly, collaborative processes can be implemented as a composition of a set of services. However, combining "directly" elementary IT services is a hard task and presents risks in both service provider and user sides. In this paper we present a high-level structure called Service Domain which orchestrates a set a of related IT services based on BPEL specifications. To ensure the Service Domain adaptability to context changes our approach aims to prove the benefits of bringing Aspect Oriented Programming.
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Paper Nr:	735
Title:	TRUSTED INFORMATION PROCESSES IN B2B NETWORKS
Authors:	Chintan Doshi and Liam Peyton
Abstract:	The design, implementation and management of inter-organizational business processes that operate across the Internet have to address a number of issues that do not normally arise for business processes that operate solely within an organization. A framework is needed which supports traditional business process management and which also has the technical infrastructure in place to address federated identity management, privacy compliance and performance management. In this paper, we examine how this can be accomplished in an architecture with built in event logging and privacy auditing that deploys processes defined in the Business Process Execution Language standard (BPEL) into a "Circle of Trust" (CoT) architecture as specified by the Liberty Alliance standard for federated identity management. A sample business process scenario is implemented in the proposed framework and evaluated.
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Paper Nr:	772
Title:	INTEGRATION ARCHITECTURES BASED ON SEMANTIC WEB SERVICES: FAD OR MODEL FOR THE FUTURE? - Findings of a Comprehensive SWOT Analysis
Authors:	Daniel Bachlechner
Abstract:	Web services brought about a revolution by taking a remarkable step toward seamless integration of distributed software components. The importance of Web services as a cornerstone of service-oriented integration architectures is recognized and widely accepted by experts from industry and academia. Current Web service technology, however, operates at the syntactic level and, hence, requires human interaction to a large extent. Semantic Web services pledge the automation of core Web service tasks, such as discovery, selection, composition, and execution, thus enabling interoperation between systems and keeping human intervention to a minimum. Within the scope of this work, we discuss the capabilities of integration architectures based on Semantic Web services as well as relevant environmental factors. The discourse is based on the findings of a SWOT analysis that was conducted in early 2007. In order to best assess the relevance and applicability of integration architectures based on Semantic Web services in an organisational context, particular importance was attached to differences in the viewpoints of practitioners and researchers.
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Short Papers

Paper Nr:	82
Title:	INTEGRATING A STANDARD COMMUNICATION PROTOCOL INTO AN E-COMMERCE ENVIRONMENT BASED ON INTELLIGENT AGENTS
Authors:	David Vallejo, José Jesus Castro-Schez, Javier Alonso Albusac Jiménez and González-morcillo Carlos
Abstract:	Communication among intelligent agents which take part in negotiation protocols is not frequently considered as an important topic in the negotiation stage. These mechanisms are often designed for specific problems, without taking into account the interoperability among agents involved. In this paper, we suggest a standard communication protocol to ensure the interoperability among intelligent agents based on fuzzy logic in an E- Commerce environment. Moreover, this environment is integrated into a FIPA-compliant multi-agent system, formalizing the communication among agents at message and payload levels. The standard messages and the protocols used are described in depth, together with a detailed example.
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Paper Nr:	132
Title:	CONSUMER-TO-CONSUMER TRUST IN E-COMMERCE - Are there Rules for Writing Helpful Product Reviews
Authors:	Georg Peters, Matthias Damm and Richard Weber
Abstract:	Since the emergence of the Internet online shopping has rapidly grown and replaced parts of traditional face-to-face shopping in real shops in cities and shopping centres. The role of the sales assistant has been supplemented or even taken over by online information like buyers guides, product reviews or product related discussion groups. For example, Amazon offers its customers the possibility to write product reviews which will be published on the product site. However, a potential buyer is confronted with a similar problem as in physical shops: Can I trust the recommendation of the sales assistant in a physical shop respectively can I trust the recommendations - the product reviews of former buyers published by the Internet shop. So, at Amazon's readers of the product reviews can classify a review as helpful or not. In our paper we analyse if there are relationships between the formal structure of a product review and the degree readers classify a review as helpful. We present the results of a case study on the Germany's Amazon shop and derive "writing rule" for good product reviews out of our analysis.
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Paper Nr:	243
Title:	USE OF SEMANTIC TECHNOLOGY TO DESCRIBE AND REASON ABOUT COMMUNICATION PROTOCOLS
Authors:	Miren I. Bagüés, Idoia Berges∗, Jesús Bermúdez, Alfredo Goñi and Arantza Illarramendi
Abstract:	Nowadays there is a tendency to enhance the functionality of Information Systems by appropriate information agents. Those information agents communicate through communication acts expressed in an Agent Communication Language. Moreover, the aim is to achieve interoperation of those agents through standard communication protocols in a distributed environment such as that supported by the Semantic Web. In this paper we present a proposal to describe those protocols using a Semantic Web language. Two are the main features of that proposal. On the one hand, the communication acts that appear in the communication protocols are described by terms belonging to a communication acts ontology called CO M M ON T. On the other hand, protocols are represented by state transition systems described using OWL-DL language. This type of description provides the means to reason about the communication protocols in such a way that several kinds of structural relationships can be detected, namely if a protocol is a prefix, a suffix or an infix of another protocol and that relationship taken in a sense of equivalence or specialization. Furthermore, equivalence and specialization relationships can also be detected for complete protocols. Those relationships are captured by subsumption of classes described with a Semantic Web language.
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Paper Nr:	253
Title:	FRAMEWORK FOR BUILDING OF A DYNAMIC USER COMMUNITY (EPH) - Sharing of Context-Aware, Public Interest Information or Knowledge through Always-on Services
Authors:	Zoran Constantinescu and Monica Vlădoiu
Abstract:	ePH aims to be a framework around a user-centred digital library core that stores regional information and knowledge and that boosts a self-developing community of transnational users around it. The digital library's content will be accessible through always-on context-aware services (location-based included). The users can get it or enhance it, according to their location: at home or office by using a computer, on road with a specific GPS-based device in the car, or off-line, off-road via mobile phone. The digital library will contain: public interest information (drugstores, hospitals, general stores, gas stations, entertainment places, restaurants, travel/accommodation, weather, routes etc.), historical/touristic/cultural information and knowledge, users' personal "war stories" (tracks, touristic tours, impressions, photos, short videos and so on), and users’ additions, comments or updates to the content. This content will come alive to ePH users based on their contextual interest (e.g. geo-location). Our plan is to develop (as open source) the ePH system for our county of origin and to provide an easy-to-use how-to recipe to clone it for other regions.
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Paper Nr:	293
Title:	AN INTER-ORGANIZATIONAL PEER-TO-PEER WORKFLOW MANAGEMENT SYSTEM - P2P based Virtual Organization Concept
Authors:	Aibrahim Aldeeb, Keeley Crockett and Martin Stanton
Abstract:	Current inter-organizational cooperation technologies and approaches do not adequately support cross- organizational workflow. These approaches concentrate on automating the public workflow in isolation from the internal workflow management systems inside the cooperating organization. Integrating Peer-to-peer (P2P) and workflow technology enables virtual enterprises to dynamically form and dismantle partnerships between organizations workflow management systems. In addition, P2P workflow based systems support various forms of workflow interoperability e. g capacity sharing, chained execution, subcontracting, case transfer, loosely coupled and public to private approach. This paper describes a novel peer-to-peer inter-organizational workflow management framework (P2P inter-org WFMS), which includes workflow advertisement, workflow interconnection, and workflow cooperation. Each organization acts as a workflow peer (WFP) in a virtual enterprise. Sun Microsystems’s JXTA P2P networking environment is used for prototype implementation. XPDL (XML Process Definition Languages) is used for process definition as it offers portability between different Process Design tools. The internal WFMS in each organization is being implemented using TIBCO Business Studio ™.
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Paper Nr:	312
Title:	A NOVEL APPROACH TO MODEL AND EVALUATE DYNAMIC AGILITY IN SUPPLY CHAINS
Authors:	Vipul Jain and Lyès Benyoucef
Abstract:	In this paper, we propose a novel approach to model agility and introduce Dynamic Agility Index (DALi) through fuzzy intelligent agents. Generally, it is difficult to emulate human decision making if the recommendations of the agents are provided as crisp, numerical values. The multiple intelligent agents used in this study communicate their recommendation as fuzzy numbers to accommodate ambiguity in the opinion and the data used for modeling agility attributes for integrated supply chains. Moreover, when agents operate based on different criteria pertaining to agility like flexibility, profitability, quality, innovativeness, pro-activity, speed of response, cost, robustness etc for integrated supply chains, the ranking and aggregation of these fuzzy opinions to arrive at a consensus is complex. The proposed fuzzy intelligent agents approach provides a unique and unprecedented attempt to determine consensus in these fuzzy opinions and effectively model dynamic agility. The efficacy of the proposed approach is demonstrated with the help of an illustrative example.
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Paper Nr:	419
Title:	WEB 2.0 MASHUPS FOR CONTEXTUALIZATION, FLEXIBILITY, PRAGMATISM AND ROBUSTNESS
Authors:	Thorsten Hampel, Tomas Pitner and Jonas Schulte
Abstract:	In current Web 2.0 developments the word “mashups” stands for a totally new way of flexible application bringing together several Web 2.0 services. Mashups form a serious new trend in web development by contextualizing existing services and bringing customizable applications to the user. Out of this, a new style of web-based applications arises. To get a better understanding of the phenomena of mashups, this paper observes and interprets the way the development of web based applications and appropriate background systems changed. It presents several state of the art Web 2.0 technologies and points out why the evaluation of Web 2.0 applications currently moves from web-based APIs to web services. We will present a short taxonomy of mashups as flexible, pragmatic, and robust web applications. Further, their new form of flexibility and customization will be illustrated with the help of our mistel Framework.
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Paper Nr:	431
Title:	A WEIGHTED APPROACH FOR OPTIMISED REASONING FOR PERVASIVE SERVICE DISCOVERY USING SEMANTICS AND CONTEXT
Authors:	Luke Steller, Shonali Krishnaswamy, Simon Cuce, Jan Newmarch and Seng Loke
Abstract:	There is an increased imperative for pervasive service discovery architectures, to aid mobile users for time critical tasks in service rich ad-hoc environments. As such, there is a need for an innovative technology for semantically-driven pervasive service discovery by enabling semantic reasoning engines to function in an effective and efficient manner on resource-constrained mobile devices and by incorporating context-awareness to provide relevant services to the user. We outline several optimisation and branch ranking strategies for pervasive reasoning to meet this goal and provide a performance evaluation of our approach.
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Paper Nr:	453
Title:	PARTNER SELECTION FOR VIRTUAL ORGANIZATION - Supporting the Moderator in Business Networks
Authors:	Heiko Thimm, Kathrin Thimm and Karsten B. Rasmussen
Abstract:	More and more companies improve their sustainability by belonging to company networks. When a specific inquiry is directed towards the company network required is a selection of companies that partner- up in a mixture of supplementing or even overlapping companies to form a virtual organization. The selection of partners is a challenging task for the network moderator and poor results - producing less value for the participating selected companies - as well as unintelligible results - that confuse the companies - can jeopardize the network. Therefore, we outline a web-based solution where the information technology supports the moderator by providing not only an optimized solution of the selected companies but also makes the management process transparent and traceable thus building a firmer future ground for the network.
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Paper Nr:	469
Title:	LEARNING TECHNOLOGY SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE BASED ON AGENTS AND SEMANTIC WEB
Authors:	Alejandro Canales and Ruben Peredo
Abstract:	The paper presents a new Learning Technology System Architecture that is implemented using agents and semantic Web. The architecture is divided into client and server parts to facilitate adaptivity in various configurations such as online, offline and mobile scenarios. The implementation of this approach to architecture is discusses in SiDeC (authoring tool) and Evaluation System, which are researching, evaluating and developing an integrated system for Web-Based Education, with powerful adaptivity for the management, authoring, delivery and monitoring of such material.
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Paper Nr:	496
Title:	WHAT CAN CONTEXT DO FOR TRUST IN MANETS?
Authors:	Eymen Ben Bnina, Olivier Camp, Chung Tien Nguyen and Hella Ben Ayed Kaffel
Abstract:	The global performance of a mobile ad hoc networks (manet) greatly depends on, both, the cooperation of participating nodes and the environment in which the nodes evolve. The willingness of a node to cooperate can be illustrated by the trust assessed to the node. Yet, existing trust models, designed for reliable wired networks, do not take into consideration possible communication failures between client and server. We believe, that in the case of ad hoc networks such factors should be considered when computing trust. In this article, we show how an interaction can be decomoposed in three separate phases : two communication phases for transporting the request to the server and the response back to the client, and one execution phase which represents the actual execution of the service by the server. We propose to define the communication environment using contextual attributes and to consider this context when assessing trust to a server. We discuss the possible uses of context in the field of trust computation in manets and define contextual attributes that seem important to consider when modelling and computing trust.
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Paper Nr:	546
Title:	DEVELOP ADAPTIVE WORKPLACE E-LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS BY USING PERFORMANCE MEASUREMENT SYSTEMS
Authors:	Weijia Ran and Maggie M. Wang
Abstract:	Workplace learning is an environmental contextual and dynamic procedure. Needs and desires in workplace learning arise from actions and practices in working environment; learning contents consist of explicit and tacit knowledge dynamically created and intertwined with working and practicing. The development of an effective workplace E-learning system is faced with several problems: 1) How to specify and update learning needs and desires in contextual and dynamic workplace settings? 2) How to activate and formalize knowledge sharing and contribution procedure for collecting knowledge emerged during practices in working communities? 3) How to organize and store knowledge pieces in a way that reflects workplace learning needs and supports adaptive learning content delivery? 4) How to incessantly update and adjust learning contents to keep up with the changing working context? In order to solve these problems, we propose an adaptive workplace learning model, in which the performance measurement result is used as an indication of working proficiency, a reflection of learning needs, and a sign of the level and quality of knowledge shared and contributed for achieving specific performance, with a view to organizing learning contents and effectively guiding learning and knowledge sharing process.
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Paper Nr:	643
Title:	A MULTIAGENT SYSTEM FOR JOB-SHOP SCHEDULING
Authors:	Claudio Cubillos, Leonardo Espinoza and Nibaldo Rodriguez
Abstract:	The present work details the design and implementation of a multiagent system devoted to the dynamic Job Shop Scheduling problem. The agent system tackles the planning and scheduling of jobs and their corresponding operations on a set of available machines. The system has been modeled with the PASSI agent-based software development methodology and implemented over the JADE agent platform.
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Paper Nr:	658
Title:	CONTEXTUAL SEMANTIC SEARCH - Capturing and using the User’s Context to Direct Semantic Search
Authors:	Caio D'Agostini, Renato Fileto, Mario Antonio R. Dantas and Fernando O. Gauthier
Abstract:	One orthodox perspective of the semantic Web depends on establishing a unified representation of ontology for an universe of discourse. However this expectation is unrealistic, because different people have different views of the world, making it impossible to devise a unified knowledge view that satisfies everyone in certain cases. One solution for this problem is to allow different users’ views of consensual knowledge formalized in an ontology, and keep track of the mappings between these views and the underlying ontology. This work proposes to collect context information from the users interactions with a semantic search system, in order to gradually build individual users’ views mapped to an ontology. This approach allows the user to pose queries based on keywords or his personal knowledge view. In addition, each personalized knowledge view captures the preferences of a single, specific user, enabling the system to provide better search results, based on its previous experience with that user.
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Paper Nr:	685
Title:	GET READY FOR MASHABILITY! - Concepts for Web 2.0 Service Integration
Authors:	Pavel Drasil, Tomas Pitner, Thorsten Hampel and Marc Steinbring
Abstract:	Mashups represent – beside the ease-of-use, high interactivity and social networking factors – another significant phenomenon of Web 2.0. However, this "mashing process" is mostly based upon ad-hoc approaches and techniques, rather than upon an in-depth analysis of the "mashing potential" of the services. Therefore, the first goal of this paper is to provide a conceptual foundation for the mashups – to identify services being typically integrated into mashups, and propose classification criteria forming a "Mash-Tree" that were subsequently applied to selected services – representatives of each classification category. We concentrate mainly on mashing of Web 2.0 services; integration in an enterprise environment is behind the scope of this paper. Secondly, the mashing potential is studied from three perspectives – technical aspects of mashability, business models for mashups, and potential legal issues concerning services themselves as well as the data in them. We hope that the proposed mashup conceptualization together with our analysis of mashability can help to develop future Web 2.0 mashups that not only better meet stakeholders' expectations but also respect legal terms and are technologically sound.
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Paper Nr:	725
Title:	MAKING USE OF MOBILE DEVICES IN E-COMMERCE - Overcoming Organizational Barriers through User Participation
Authors:	Jan V. Brocke, Bettina Thurnher and Dietmar Winkler
Abstract:	Mobile devices offer great potentials for the design of business processes. However, realizing these potentials in practice is still problematic. While technologies are nowadays widely available, the problems still lie in the management of organizational change. In this paper, we analyze the contribution of user participation to the successful implementation of mobile business processes. We present the results of five case studies conducted in the IT-Service sector. The work gives empirical evidence that user participation (a) leads to reduced adoption and transition barriers and (b) improvements of business metrics.
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Paper Nr:	766
Title:	MODULARIZATION OF WEB-BASED COLLABORATION SYSTEMS FOR MANUFACTURING INNOVATION
Authors:	Kwangyeol Ryu, Seokwoo Lee and Honzong Choi
Abstract:	Unpredictable customer needs strongly require for manufacturing enterprises to produce quality products satisfying cost and time constraints. To cope with such dynamically changing manufacturing environment and to get higher competitiveness, the manufacturing industry needs to be equipped with advanced technologies including IT as well as substantial infrastructure. On the one hand “i-Manufacturing” is the name of the project funded by the Korea government, but on the other it is the strategy for achieving manufacturing innovation in Korea. The most basic but important concept of the i-Manufacturing is “collaboration”. As a part of the i-Manufacturing project, we are developing various kinds of web-based collaboration systems, referred to as hub systems. Along with increase in the number of collaboration systems and users every year, we have to modularize function modules for easy and synthetic application of systems to other conglomerates or industries. Here, collaboration systems we developed are currently being used by more than 300 companies in Korea. In this paper, therefore, we first introduce the i-Manufacturing project and collaboration systems we have developed. The system architecture and composition of function modules which has multi-level framework will be described in detail before concluding the paper.
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Paper Nr:	795
Title:	A SOFTWARE AGENT FOR CONTENT BASED RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THE WWW
Authors:	Gulden Uchyigit
Abstract:	The evolution of the WWW has led to an explosion of information and consequentially a significant increase on usage. This avalanche effect has resulted in such uncertain environment in which we find it difficult to clarify what we want, or to find what we need. In this paper we introduce RecSys which aims to confront the problem by developing a software agent which intelligently learns users interests, and hence makes recommendations of resources on WWW based on the user’s profile. The system employs multiple TFIDF vectors to represent various domains of user’s interests. It continuously and progressively learns users profile from both implicit and explicit feedback. This is achieved by extraction and refinement of featured keywords within the learning examples. Several heuristics were also adapted to improve the overall performance of the system.
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Paper Nr:	796
Title:	TRANSPARENCY IN CITIZEN-CENTRIC SERVICES - A Traceability-based Approach on the Semantic Web
Authors:	Ivo D. Santos and Edmundo Madeira
Abstract:	The search for effective strategies to increase the transparency in public administration processes is becoming a key issue for governments and for the success of the new citizen-centric services and applications. Also, the application of service-oriented architectures, semantics and ontologies is gaining momentum as an alternative to fulfill the inherent e-Government interoperability and dynamism demands. Considering the challenges introduced by this new scenario, this paper contributes proposing an approach to monitor and audit composite e-Government services. The solution is based on a set of Traceability Policies modeled and implemented over a semantically-enriched and service-oriented middleware (CoGPlat).
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Paper Nr:	821
Title:	APPLICATION OF KNOWLEDGE HUB AND RFID TECHNOLOGY IN AUDITING AND TRACKING OF PLASTERBOARD FOR ENVIRONMENT RECYCLING AND WASTE DISPOSAL
Authors:	A. S. Atkins, L. Zhang, H. Yu and B. P Naylor
Abstract:	The traditional disposal of waste in landfill sites is causing serious environmental concerns due to the amount of hectares consumed by this method and the waste of resources which results from not being proactive in effective recycling. The construction industry, for example, contributes approximately 108mt of the total 335mt of waste annually produced in the United Kingdom of which 50-80% could be reusable or recyclable. Construction waste is composed of at least 1mt of plasterboard waste which has resulted in serious problems because of the emission of hydrogen sulphide gas which is odorous and causes a health hazard to people living near disposal sites. Consequently, this material can only be disposed of in licensed and special designed sites. Plasterboard can be recycled and some countries, for example Japan, Canada, United States and, recently, the United Kingdom, are using this technology to obviate the issue of landfill. This paper outlines knowledge hub using Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) linked to Computer Aided Design (CAD) systems for providing auditing and monitoring systems for environmental recycling and/or licensed disposal of plasterboard waste.
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Paper Nr:	54
Title:	AN ADAPTIVE AND DEPENDABLE SYSTEM CONSIDERING INTERDEPENDENCE BETWEEN AGENTS
Authors:	Keinosuke Matsumoto, Tomoaki Maruo, Akifumi Tanimoto and Naoki Mori
Abstract:	A multiagent system (MAS) has recently gained public attention as a method to solve competition and cooperation in distributed systems. However, MAS’s vulnerability due to the propagation of failure prevents it from being applied to a large-scale system. This paper proposes an approach to improve the efficiency and reliability of distributed systems. The approach monitors messages between agents to detect undesirable behaviours such as failures. Collecting the information, the system generates global information of interdependence between agents and expresses it in a graph. This interdependence graph enables us to detect or predict undesirable behaviours. This paper also shows that the system can optimize performance of a MAS and improve adaptively its reliability under complicated and dynamic environment by applying the global information acquired from the interdependence graph to a replication system.
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Paper Nr:	265
Title:	AGENT-ORIENTED COMPUTING FOR BUSINESS PROCESS MANAGEMENT – WHAT, WHY AND HOW
Authors:	Maggie M. Wang, Kuldeep Kumar and Weijia Ran
Abstract:	Agent-oriented computing has been addressed for seeking significant advances on complex process management systems. However, recent research on this problem is experience-driven, ad-hoc, and without a cohesive theoretical base. This study aims to examine the key problems and solutions for complex process management as well as the mechanism of why and how agent-oriented computing can be applied in developing complex process management solutions.
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Paper Nr:	271
Title:	IMPROVING PERFORMANCE OF BACKGROUND JOBS IN DIGITAL LIBRARIES USING GRID COMPUTING
Authors:	Marco Fernands, Pedro Almeida, Joaquim Arnaldo Martins and Joaquim Sousa Pinto
Abstract:	Digital libraries are responsible for maintaining very large amounts of data, which must typically be processed for storage and dissemination purposes. Since these background tasks are usually very demanding regarding CPU and memory usage, especially when dealing with multimedia files, centralized architectures may suffer from performance issues, affecting the responsiveness to users. In this paper, we propose a grid service layer for the execution of background jobs in digital libraries. A case study is also presented, where we evaluate the performance of a grid application.
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Paper Nr:	281
Title:	ONLINE SHOPPING AGENTS: AN EXPLORATORY STUDY OF USERS’ PERCEPTIONS OF SERVICE QUALITY
Authors:	Calin Gurau
Abstract:	The use of online shopping agents has increased dramatically in the last 10 years, as a result of e-commerce development. Despite the importance of these online applications, very few studies attempted to identify and analyse the main factors that influence the users’ perception regarding the service quality of online shopping agents, and consequently, the elements that determine the users’ choice of online shopping agents. The present study attempts to fill this literature gap, identifying on the basis of primary data analysis, the various circumstantial or personal factors that can determine the choice of a specific searching strategy and shopping agent.
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Paper Nr:	284
Title:	USING PREPAID CARDS IN E-BUSINESS - Libreaire, an e-Books Online Store
Authors:	Omar Nouali and Abdelghani Krinah
Abstract:	In this paper, we present an electronic business application and its related architecture. The developed system consists of a sample e-books sells website that involves shopping in a virtual store. The framework has been conceived as a prototype system which illustrates how Java technology especially Servlets can assist developers on building and deploying e-commerce applications. The problematic of E-payment is also discussed along with selection of the most adequate solution to the proposed architecture. The adopted model allows for business process logic to be handled at the server side, in a simple and secured way.
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Paper Nr:	286
Title:	SOPPA - SERVICE ORIENTED P2P FRAMEWORK FOR DIGITAL LIBRARIES
Authors:	Marco Fernands, Pedro Almeida, Joaquim Arnaldo Martins and Joaquim Sousa Pinto
Abstract:	P2P and SOA paradigms provide new opportunities for the development of new digital libraries and the redesign of existing ones. This paper describes the work being conducted to create a framework for the creation of digital libraries, which relies on a P2P network and service-enabled peers to achieve high modularity, reusability and performance in dynamic environments. While this framework supports data and metadata storage and management, this paper focuses on its service oriented approach.
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Paper Nr:	295
Title:	THE DECENTRALIZED DATA CENTER - In the Age of Service Oriented Architecture
Authors:	Jackson He, Enrique Castro-Leon and Simón Viñals Larruga
Abstract:	The adoption of SOA in business computing environments is growing due to the promise of significant cost reduction in the planning, deployment and operation of IT projects. However, the organic transformation from legacy enterprise applications to SOA applications only has been seen mostly in large enterprises data center where services are centralized. Patterns of adoption of SOA, in combination with emerging technologies lead us to believe that the traditional data center owned by a large organization, i.e., the traditional monolithic data center, will evolve into a more federated form. This new dynamic will affect large and small business alike.
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Paper Nr:	372
Title:	AN OVERVIEW OF PLC NETWORK PERFORMANCE IN PRESENCE OF HOUSEHOLDS INTERFERENCE
Authors:	Haroldo Zattar, Jakson Bonaldo and Gilberto Carrijo
Abstract:	This paper presents an overview of PLC. In addition the paper shows the performance of a PLC using an experimental LAN network in presence of different types of noise caused by households. This paper also presents the experimental results to find the best TCP window size to be used in a PLC network. The performance investigation was accomplished in the Telecommunication laboratory of Federal University of Mato Grosso, Brazil.
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Paper Nr:	474
Title:	AUTOMATIC GENERATION OF SEMANTIC ANNOTATIONS FOR SUPPORTING TECHNOLOGY MONITORING ON THE WEB
Authors:	Tuan-Dung Cao, Rose Dieng-kuntz, Marc Bourdeau and Bruno Fiès
Abstract:	Automatic generation of semantic annotations of Web document can be useful to support technology monitoring on the Web. In this article, we present the main components of the OntoWatch technology monitoring system relying on a semantic Web approach: the O’Watch ontology dedicated to watch and an ontology-based algorithm for automatic search and annotation of Web documents.
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Paper Nr:	494
Title:	IMPROVING THE LOCATION OF MOBILE AGENTS ON SELF-AWARE NETWORKS
Authors:	Ricardo Lent
Abstract:	Business applications are evolving on the Internet from centralised to distributed architectures demanding higher quality group communication facilities. Such communications are often time sensitive and prone to disruptions or unacceptable latency because of the high variability of Internet traffic and capacity across the network. Self-aware networks offer mesh networking facilities with adaptive routing able to cope with changes in network conditions, such as variations in traffic load and link or node failure. Further quality improvement can be achieved by relaying critical application tasks to software agents able to migrate to alternate hosts and take advantage of new location facilities for their communications. The paper examines the concurrent use of self-aware networking and software agent mobility to offer improved communication facilities to time-critical group communications. A host selection algorithm for agent migration is proposed to find suitable locations for agents and evaluated in a simulation study.
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Paper Nr:	698
Title:	FLIGHT SIMULATION ENVIRONMENTS APPLIED TO AGENT-BASED AUTONOMOUS UAVS
Authors:	Ricardo Gimenes, Daniel C. Silva, Luís Paulo Reis and Eugénio Oliveira
Abstract:	Developed countries have made significant efforts to integrate Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) operations in controlled aerial space due to a rising interest of using UAVs for civilian as well as military purposes. This paper focuses on looking for reliable solutions and a way to validate an autonomous multiagent control system through a different variety of Flight Simulations. This study has two main lines, the first being the use of multiagent systems in UAVs, aiming at a fully autonomous control. The second and focal line is a survey about the variety of simulation systems dedicated to aerodynamics and aircrafts, comparing them and their feasibility to validate the developed multiagent control system. One critical factor is hazard situations, like emergency landing without runway or equipment failure, which should be predicted in an automated system. Most flight simulators are not realistic enough to validate a multiagent algorithm in hazard situations. At the same time, it is impossible to predict every type of failure in real world. The boundaries of simulation should be very well enclosured in order to present results using simulation.
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Paper Nr:	726
Title:	EVALUATION OF SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION - Experiments for a Business Site and a New Evaluation Measure
Authors:	Julia Maria Schulz, Ralph Kölle, Christa Womser-Hacker and Thomas Mandl
Abstract:	This paper reports experiments on search engine optimization (SEO) for a business site. Several search terms have been optimized for three web search engines. From the business site, 300 pages have been selected for optimization. In three phases several on- and off-page modifications have been carried out and the results have been monitored. The results show that search engines do react to modifications and that the target pages are ranked higher on average. The variance of the improvements is extremely large which means that there is no guarantee that SEO activities are beneficial for one single page. We suggest a new evaluation measure for the success of SEO which takes typical Web user behavior into account.
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Paper Nr:	750
Title:	A SOA-BASED MULTI-AGENT APPLICATION FOR THE CROSSLINGUAL COMMUNICATION PROBLEM
Authors:	Hercules Antonio Do Prado, Aluizio H. Filho, MIRIAM SAYÃO and Fénelon Do Nascimento Neto
Abstract:	We present a multi-agent system (MAS) approach to deal with the communication mediation among communities with disparate levels of language. Service-oriented architecture (SOA) is adopted as the basis for designing our proposal that has double purpose: (a) to present an alternative to the crosslingual communication problem and (b) to study an agent organization under the SOA specifications. A case is presented in which the communication among food consumers and experts in food quality/safety is carried out by means of agents’ organizations. We specify two basic sets of elements: application agents, responsible for the logical information, and components that are in charge of persistency, interface, and communication among the software artifacts.
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Paper Nr:	777
Title:	COLLABORATION ACROSS THE ENTERPRISE - An Ontology-based Approach for Enterprise Interoperability
Authors:	Aggelos Liapis, Stijn Christiaens, Pieter De Leenheer and Robert Meersman
Abstract:	In the current competitive industrial context, enterprises must react swiftly to market changes. In order to face this problem, enterprises must increase their collaborative activities. This implies at one hand high communication between their information systems and at the other hand the compatibility of their practices. An important amount of work must be performed towards proper practices of standardization and harmonization. This is the concept of Interoperability. Interoperability of enterprises is a strategic issue, caused as well as enabled by the continuously growing ability of integration of new legacy and evolving systems, in particular in the context of networked organisations. of the reconciliation of the communicated business semantics is crucial to success. For this, non-disruptive re-use of existing business data stored in “legacy” production information systems is an evident prerequisite. In addition the integration of a methodology as well as the scalability of any proposed semantic technological solution are equally evident prerequisites. Yet on all accounts current semantic technologies as researched and developed for the so-called Semantic Web may be found lacking. In this paper we present a methodology, which has resulted in the implementation of a highly customizable collaborative environment focussed to support ontology-based enterprise interoperability. The main benefit of this environment is its ability to integrate with legacy systems, rescuing enterprises from having to adapt or upgrade their existing systems in order to interoperate with their partners.
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Paper Nr:	799
Title:	A DISTRIBUTED SOFTWARE ENVIRONMENT FOR COLLABORATIVE WEB COMPUTING
Authors:	Antonio Pintus, Raffaella Sanna and Stefano Sanna
Abstract:	This paper describes an extensible core software element of a distributed, peer-to-peer system, which provides several facilities in order to help the implementation of collaborative, Web-based, distributed information storing and retrieval applications based on a decentralized P2P model. Moreover, after an architectural introduction of the core distributed software module, the Core Node, this paper describes a real application, named DART Node, based on it and designed and implemented within the DART (Distributed Agent-based Retrieval Tools) project, which carries out the idea of the design and implementation of a distributed, semantic and collaborative Web search engine, including mobile devices integration use cases.
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Paper Nr:	838
Title:	A GENERAL SYSTEM FOR MONITORING AND CONTROLLING VIA INTERNET
Authors:	Adrián Peñate Sánchez, Ignacio Solinis Camalich, Alexis Quesada Arencibia and Jose Carlos Rodríguez Rodríguez
Abstract:	The main aim of the project, presented in this paper, is to create a system that will give a solution to the variety of situations we can encounter in industrial plants control; to achieve this goal we have given the system different automation, remote control and remote monitoring functionalities. Industrial installations can be composed of several plants; for this reason we offer a solution capable of defining a central office that is in control of all plants, each plant with its own controller. Apart from the problem of geographically disperse locations, it is also of the essence to offer automation for the tasks that take place in the plants. In order to achieve an automation system capable of giving answer to a range of situations, as wide as possible, we have designed an engine so that the user may create its own rule based system, defining himself the rules by means of an interface that abstracts the user from the formal definition of the rules.
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Area 5 - Human-Computer Interaction

Full Papers

Paper Nr:	106
Title:	NATURAL LANGUAGE INTERACTION BASED ON AUTOMATICALLY GENERATED CONCEPTUAL MODELS
Authors:	Diana Perez-Marin, Ismael Pascual-Nieto and Pilar Rodriguez
Abstract:	In this paper, we present a new form of interaction between students and free-text scoring tools based on the use of automatically generated conceptual models. Traditionally, students have worked with free-text scoring tools by typing free-text answers to the open-ended questions shown on the system’s interface. Students could not personalize the aspect of the interface or visually acknowledge the level of progress they have made after answering the questions. In contrast, with this new form of interaction they are able to input natural language text and look at their generated conceptual model, which can be defined as a network of concepts and the relationships among them. In the conceptual model, each node has a background colour that indicates how well it has been understood by the student. The conceptual model can be represented in several formats such as concept maps, tables, charts, diagrams or textual summaries. The results of two experiments carried out with a group of students and teachers show how they like this new possibility.
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Paper Nr:	258
Title:	DIAMOUSES - An Experimental Platform for Network-based Collaborative Musical Interactions
Authors:	Alexandraki Chrisoula, Panayotis Koutlemanis, Petros Gasteratos, Demosthenes Akoumianakis, Milolidakis Giannis, Vellis George and Kotsalis Dimitris
Abstract:	DIAMOUSES is an on-going research and development project aiming to establish a platform supporting distributed and collaborative music performance. DIAMOUSES is designed to host a variety of application scenarios, including music rehearsal, music improvisation and music education, thus offering a tailorable enterprise-wide solution for organizations offering network-based music performance services. This paper presents the architectural underpinnings of DIAMOUSES and elaborates on the set-up and the results of a recent pilot experiment in music rehearsal.
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Paper Nr:	262
Title:	WISDOM ON THE WEB: ON TRUST, INSTITUTION AND SYMBOLISMS - A Preliminary Investigation
Authors:	Emma M. Ibrahim, Nor M. Noor and Shafie Mehad
Abstract:	Trust in W-MIE is fairly new and risks associated with it are novel to users. Consequently, the question on how to design technological artefact, in this case the information that is perceived trustworthy which can be understood, rationalized and control as part of the interface design strategy is not well understood. This becomes our primary aim of this research. We seek to explicate the role of trust from the explicit institutional theory and semiotic paradigm to maximise the ‘goodness of fit’ for future construction of sensitive information system within a culture or domain through the analysis of its social context, pragmatic and semantic levels of signification. We contend that institutional design features could make the alignment between formal and informal signs of trust to match their meanings through shared norms, assumptions, beliefs, perceptions and actions. In this preliminary study, we used card sorting to explore on users trust perception of institutional signs operationalized in web based information for Islamic content sharing sites. These institutional signs are conceptualized under the four dimensions of institutional symbolisms: content credibility, emotional assurance, brand/reputation and trusted third party. The results were cross referenced with the initial framework for its similarities and differences.
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Paper Nr:	264
Title:	GENERIC STRATEGIES FOR MANIPULATING GRAPHICAL INTERACTION OBJECTS: AUGMENTING, EXPANDING AND INTEGRATING COMPONENTS
Authors:	Demosthenes Akoumianakis, Giannis Milolidakis, Dimitris Kotsalis and George Vellis
Abstract:	This paper presents the notion of (user interface development) platform administration and argues for its increasing importance in the context of modern interactive applications. Platform administration entails strategies for manipulating diverse interaction components. Four such strategies are elaborated – namely augmentation, expansion, integration and abstraction – which collectively constitute the ingredients of a platform administration process. The paper describes both the rationale for these strategies in the context of user interface development and their implementation details, as currently realized in an ongoing R&D project.
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Paper Nr:	280
Title:	ENABLING END USERS TO PROACTIVELY TAILOR UNDERSPECIFIED, HUMAN-CENTRIC BUSINESS PROCESSES - “Programming by Example” of Weakly-Structured Process Models
Authors:	Todor Stoitsev, Stefan Scheidl, Felix Flentge and Max Mühlhäuser
Abstract:	Enterprises face the challenge of managing underspecified, human-centric business processes, which are executed in distributed teams in a rather informal, ad-hoc manner. This gave hibernating CSCW and ad-hoc workflow research a new push recently. However, there is still the need to clearly perceive end users as the actual drivers of business processes and to enable them to proactively tailor these processes according to their actual expertise and problem solving strategies. This paper presents the design and evaluation of a prototype for end-user development of weakly-structured process models through email-integrated task management. The presented CTM (Collaborative Task Manager) prototype uses “programming by example” to leverage user experience with standard email and task management applications and to extend user skills towards the definition of reusable process structures. By closely correlating to the actual user work practices and software environment, the tool provides a “gentle slope of complexity” for end users engaging in process tailoring activities.
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Paper Nr:	291
Title:	TTLS: A GROUPED DISPLAY OF SEARCH RESULTS BASED ON ORGANIZATIONAL TAXONOMY USING THE LCC&K INTERFACE
Authors:	Vicki Mordechai, Ariel Frank and Offer Drori
Abstract:	One of the major problems in the process of Information Retrieval (IR) arises at the stage where the user reviews the results list. This paper presents the latest research in a series of research works that aims at finding the most vital information components, within a list of search results, so as to assist the user in high-quality decision making as to which of the resulting documents are included within the sought after results of the search task We propose here a new model for displaying the results named TTLS (Taxonomy Tree & LCC&K Snippet). The experimentation setup included execution of different search tasks by a group of 60 participants. The tasks were performed via the BASE and TTLS interfaces. From the resulting times comparison it is clear that the execution times of tasks done via the TTLS interface is shorter that those done via the BASE interface. It can be seen that in the BASE interface it was needed to open more documents in order to locate the relevant information than in the TTLS interface. It turns out that the majority of users (77%) prefer to use the TTLS interface.
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Paper Nr:	452
Title:	MICROFORMATS BASED NAVIGATION ASSISTANT - A Non-intrusive Recommender Agent: Design and Implementation
Authors:	Anca-Paula Luca and Sabin-Corneliu Buraga
Abstract:	The multiple ways in which we rely on the information available on the web to solve increasingly more tasks encountered in day-to-day life has led to the question whether machines can help us parse the amounts of data and bring the interesting closer to us. This kind of activity, most often, requires machines to understand human defined semantics which, fortunately, can be easily done in today’s web through semantic markup. The purpose of the proposed project is to build a flexible tool that understands the behaviour of a user on the web and filters out the irrelevant data, presenting to the user only the information he/she is most interested in, while being as discreet as possible: the user is required no preference settings, no explicit feedback.
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Paper Nr:	488
Title:	CULTURAL DIFFERENCES BETWEEN TAIWANESE AND GERMAN WEB USER - Challenges for Intercultural User Testing
Authors:	Anna Karen Schmitz, Thomas Mandl and Christa Womser-Hacker
Abstract:	Measuring the performance of a user with a web site reveals that the culture of a user is an important factor. A test of Taiwanese and German students resulted in various significant differences in effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction. Task design and results of the experiment are presented. Human-computer interaction can be evaluated by different means. The paper discusses how methods need to be interpreted in international user test settings. For example, time might not be a valid measure in long-term oriented cultures for all interaction tasks.
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Paper Nr:	657
Title:	A GUIDED INTERFACE FOR WEB INTERACTION
Authors:	Juan Falgueras, Antonio Carrillo, Daniel Dianes and Antonio Guevara
Abstract:	Many Web sites are for one use only and need to guide users through paths of decisions and data entering. Users use to feel insecure entering data in not well-known sites and don’t mind at all being guided in their first try. Goals Driven User Interfaces (GDUI) are based on an interaction style specially conceived for this type of users (occasional users). The traditional method that still prevails in the field of Web design makes it difficult to create neither usable user interfaces nor GDUI. Modern paradigm of Web use through Web 2.0 applications encourages the development of this interaction style as can be seen in this paper.
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Paper Nr:	674
Title:	DESIGNING MOBILE MULTIMODAL ARTEFACTS
Authors:	Tiago Reis, Marco Sá and Luís Carriço
Abstract:	Users’ characteristics and their different mobility stages sometimes reduce or eliminate their capability to perform paper-based activities. The support of such activities and their extension through the utilization of non paper-based modalities introduces new perspectives on their accomplishment. We introduce mobile multimodal artefacts and an artefact framework as a solution to this problem. We briefly explain the main tools of this framework and detail two versions of the multimodal artefact manipulation tool: a visual centred and eye-free version. The design and evaluation process of the tool is presented including several usability tests.
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Paper Nr:	740
Title:	ANATOMY OF A VISUALIZATION ON-DEMAND SERVER - A Service Oriented Architecture to Visually Explore Large Data Collections
Authors:	Romain Vuillemot, Béatrice Rumpler and Jean-Marie PINON
Abstract:	Facing the relentless information volume increase, users are not only lost in information overload, but also among the various ways to depict it. In this paper, we tackle this issue by providing end-users access to up-to-date visualizations techniques, using remote services coupled to their local interactive environment. The outline of a Visualization On-Demand (VizOD) architecture is introduced, packaging information visualization processes into services reachable over a network. Our goal is to provide end-users flexible and personalized visual overviews of large datasets. We implemented a prototype partially validating our architecture, and discuss preliminary results of our experiments and give future work perspectives.
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Paper Nr:	778
Title:	ISSUES IN IS BASED ENGINEERING ASSET MANAGEMENT - An Australian Perspective
Authors:	Abrar Haider
Abstract:	Asset managing eengineering organisations traditionally take a deterministic view of information systems (IS) adoption. Iinvestments in IS, thus, carry the expectations of high returns in terms of process efficiency and quality of manufacturing/production/service provision output. In theory, IS serve two major benefits to asset managing organisations, i.e. by allowing for real time updated asset related information to stakeholders to assist smooth asset operation; and by providing a broad base of consistent and logically organised information relating to asset lifecycle for informed choices on effectuating asset management regimes. However, the case presented in this paper illustrates that when IS are deployed without accounting for the organisational, social and cultural dimensions of their context , there are little gains. This paper highlights that physically adopted technology needs to be socially composed, which develops organisation-wide consensus about what technology is supposed to accomplish and how it is to be utilised.
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Short Papers

Paper Nr:	10
Title:	ASSESSING THE PROGRESS OF IMPLEMENTING WEB ACCESSIBILITY - An Irish Case Study
Authors:	Vivienne Trulock and Richard Hetherington
Abstract:	In this paper we attempt to gauge the implementation of web accessibility guidelines in a range of Irish websites by undertaking a follow-up study in 2005 to one conducted by McMullin three years earlier (McMullin, 2002). Automatic testing against version 1.0 of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 1.0) using WebXact online revealed that accessibility levels had increased among the 152 sites sampled over the three-year period. Compliancy levels of A, AA and AAA had risen from the 2002 levels of 6.3%, 0% and 0% respectively to 36.2%, 8.6% and 3.3% in 2005. However, manual checks on the same sites indicated that the actual compliance levels for 2005 were 1.3%, 0% and 0% for A, AA and AAA. Of the sites claiming accessibility, either by displaying a W3C or ‘Bobby’ compliance logo, or in text on their accessibility statement page, 60% claimed a higher level than the automatic testing results indicated. When these sites were further manually checked it was found that all of them claimed a higher level of accessibility compliance than was actually the case. As most sites in the sample were not compliant with the WCAG 1.0 for the entire set of disabilities, the concept of ‘partial accessibility’ was examined by identifying those websites that complied with subsets of the guidelines particular to different disabilities. Some disability types fared worse than others. In particular blindness, mobility impairment and cognitive impairment each had full support from at most 1% of the websites in the study. Other disabilities were better supported, including partially-sighted, deaf and hearing impaired, and colour blind, where compliance was found in 11%, 23% and 32% of the websites, respectively.
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Paper Nr:	27
Title:	A DEVELOPMENT PROCESS FOR WEB GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEM - A Case of Study
Authors:	Maria Jose Escalona, Arturo Torres-Zenteno, Javier Jesus Gutierrez, Eliane Martins, Ricardo S. Torres and M. Cecilia C. Baranauskas
Abstract:	This paper introduces a process for developing Web GIS (Geographic Information Systems) applications. This process integrates the NDT (Navigational Development Techniques) approach with some of the Organizational Semiotic models. The use of the proposed development process is illustrated for a real application: the construction of the WebMaps system. WebMaps is a Web GIS system whose main goal is to support harvest planning in Brazil.
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Paper Nr:	58
Title:	A CYBER ORGANIZATION IN THE CYBER WORLD - ICT and e.Total Relationship Management (e.TRM)
Authors:	Mosad Zineldin and Valiantsina Vasicheva
Abstract:	This paper offers suggestions to integrate computer-based technology (CBT) including information and communication technology (ICT) and inter and intra- organizational functions and relationships from a holistic e.TRM paradigm embedding the physical and cyber worlds. It is a conceptual study based on the recent developments of ICT, inter-firm relations: economic (transaction costs economics), socio-psychological (social exchange; inter-organization; and industrial network) as well as relationship management and marketing theories and concepts with application in practice. A new concept and model of Cybernization has been developed and discussed. Some general propositions are presented and some synergy effects of utilizing the e.TRM are highlighted. The paper suggests how these approaches can add impetus to successful management issues, as a powerful competitive weapon in connecting the physical world with the cyber space. This paper provides a model for Cybernity that accommodates the major manifestations of cybernization of an organization and could potentially provide the means to link diverse literature that is available in this area.
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Paper Nr:	58
Title:	A CYBER ORGANIZATION IN THE CYBER WORLD - ICT and e.Total Relationship Management (e.TRM)
Authors:	Mosad Zineldin and Valiantsina Vasicheva
Abstract:	This paper offers suggestions to integrate computer-based technology (CBT) including information and communication technology (ICT) and inter and intra- organizational functions and relationships from a holistic e.TRM paradigm embedding the physical and cyber worlds. It is a conceptual study based on the recent developments of ICT, inter-firm relations: economic (transaction costs economics), socio-psychological (social exchange; inter-organization; and industrial network) as well as relationship management and marketing theories and concepts with application in practice. A new concept and model of Cybernization has been developed and discussed. Some general propositions are presented and some synergy effects of utilizing the e.TRM are highlighted. The paper suggests how these approaches can add impetus to successful management issues, as a powerful competitive weapon in connecting the physical world with the cyber space. This paper provides a model for Cybernity that accommodates the major manifestations of cybernization of an organization and could potentially provide the means to link diverse literature that is available in this area.
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Paper Nr:	104
Title:	LEARNING OBJECT REENGINEERING BASED ON PRINCIPLES FOR USABLE USER INTERFACE DESIGN
Authors:	Robertas Damasevicius and Lina Tankeleviciene
Abstract:	We analyze the problem of reengineering of Learning Objects (LO) for web-based education. Such reengineering must be based on sound methodological background and design principles. We apply methods adopted from software engineering domain for redesigning the structure and user interface of LOs and aim both at usability and accessibility of learning material. We evaluate usability of a LO from the user interface point of view, following the user interface development principles common both for Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and e-Learning domains. We propose the LO reengineering framework based on the user interface usability principles. In a case study, we demonstrate how these principles and recommendations can be used to reengineer a LO to improve its learnability, understandability and usability in general.
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Paper Nr:	130
Title:	A COOPERATIVE METHOD FOR SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT AND MAINTENANCE USING WORKFLOW TECHNOLOGIES
Authors:	Jose L. Leiva, Jose L. Caro, Antonio Guevara and Arenas MªAngeles
Abstract:	Reverse engineering has arisen as a fundamental alternative in all reengineering processes. Its objective is to recover design specifications and workflows (WF) to construct a representation of the system with a high degree of abstraction. This paper describes the basic aspects of the EXINUS tool, enabling the generation of process specifications and user interfaces in an organisation or business. The main advantage is the possibility of modelling specifications of both the organisation’s current status and new methods generated in the system. We also propose a cooperative work system in which users participate in system development, using the advantages of the proposed tool. This methodology provides a high degree of reliability in the development of the new system, creating competitive advantages for the organisation by reducing times and costs in the generation of the information system (IS).
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Paper Nr:	135
Title:	CULTURE SENSITIVE EDUCATIONAL GAMES CONSIDERING COMMON SENSE KNOWLEDGE
Authors:	Junia Anacleto, Eliane Nascimento Pereira, Alexandre Mello Ferreira, Fabiano Cutigi Ferrari and João Fabro
Abstract:	When an 8th grade science teacher discusses the subject “contraceptive methods”, s/he has to consider situations and facts that are known by teenagers to better understand their behavior and define his/her approach. Suppose that the teacher says “the rhythm method is not one of the most efficient contraceptive methods”. But does the teacher really know which contraceptive methods are considered by that group of students? It is proposed here a framework to instance web game supported by common sense knowledge to approach the called “transversal themes” of the school curriculum in our country, like sexual education, ethic and healthcare. The quiz game framework called “What is it?” is presented as a support for teachers in contextualizing the content to the students’ local culture, promoting a more effective and significant learning.
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Paper Nr:	268
Title:	APPLYING KANSEI ENGINEERING TO DETERMINE EMOTIONAL SIGNATURE OF ONLINE CLOTHING WEBSITES
Authors:	Nor M. Noor, Anitawati Mohd Lokman and Mitsuo Nagamachi
Abstract:	The integration of cognitive, semantic and affective elements is crucial in the conception and development of designed products. IT artefact design and development has ignored the importance of affective elements until recent years within the HCI community. Current literature reflects two main foci in the area: emotional design and its evaluation. Of the two, the later is widely researched and reported. In our paper, we present our research attempt to establish the design method for organizing the emotional design requirements of E-Commerce (EC) websites by applying Kansei engineering (KE). We proposed a Kansei EC website design method and demonstrated the method by conducting the semantic evaluation of pre-selected online clothing websites using 40 Kansei words as descriptors of emotional sensation which was organized as a 5-point Semantic Differential (SD) scale to form the Kansei checklist. 120 participants were asked to rate 35 pre-selected online clothing websites using the Kansei checklist. Cluster analysis and Partial Least Square method were then performed to identify the Kansei word cluster and from this result we uncover the relationship between Kansei word cluster and online clothing website design.
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Paper Nr:	283
Title:	FORM INPUT VALIDATION - An Empirical Study on Irish Corporate Websites
Authors:	Mary Levis, Markus Helfert and Malcolm Brady
Abstract:	The information maintained about products, services and customers is a most valuable organisational asset. Therefore, it is important for successful electronic business to have high quality websites. A website must however, do more than just look attractive it must be usable and present useful, usable information. Usability essentially means that the website is intuitive and allows visitors to find what they are looking for quickly and without effort. This means careful consideration of the structure of information and navigational design. According to the Open Web Applications Security Project, invalidated input is one of the top ten critical web-application security vulnerabilities. We empirically tested Twenty one Irish Corporate Website. The findings suggested that one of the biggest problems is that many failed to use mechanisms to validate even the basic user data input at the source of collection to validate user input in order to ensure reliability and therefore potentially resulted in a database full of useless information.
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Paper Nr:	306
Title:	THE IMPORTANCE OF USABILITY CRITERIA ON LEARNING MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS: LESSONS LEARNED
Authors:	Fabiano Cutigi Ferrari and Junia Anacleto
Abstract:	This paper points to the importance of guaranteeing usability in Learning Management Systems (LMS) in order to achieve success in performing learning tasks in this kind of environment. The paper presents the results from a case study in which learners had to perform several learning tasks on the TIDIA-Ae LMS. It is presented usability problems observed during the performance of the case study learning tasks, as well as the difficulties that learners faced with in some tasks due to those problems and the actions taken in order to make viable the execution of the learning activity tasks. By this paper, it is intended (i) to call LMS developers’ attention to the importance of usability in the development of tools to support the learning process; (ii) to point to interactive problems which should be avoided in LMS systems and (iii) to show some problems which can appear during a learning activity execution supported by computer and possible ways to deal with them.
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Paper Nr:	313
Title:	USABILITY CHALLENGES IN EMERGING MARKETS
Authors:	Maryam Aziz, Chris Riley and Graham Johnson
Abstract:	Understanding emerging cultures and adapting new services accordingly is one of the biggest challenges faced by modern businesses today. Several user-centred approaches are employed during the life-cycle of service adoption. These approaches mainly involve design and evaluation of a service based on specific requirements of the target market. This paper describes an on-going multi-method case study which involves the evaluation of a self-service ATM system with a fingerprint sensor used for identification purposes as based in the financial sector of Pakistan. The paper is positioned to assess the validity of traditional usability evaluation methods in the context of emerging markets. These methods include one-on-one observations, in-depth interviews and sensor performance data analysis. The methods ensure both objective and subjective assessment of sensor use throughout. However, several difficulties faced with sensor evaluation such as participant recruitment, lack of participants’ response and the impact on the local culture’s user attitude towards sensor use are discussed. The paper also presents the preliminary findings and draws implications for both researchers and practitioners based on our experience.
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Paper Nr:	321
Title:	COMPARING COLOR AND TEXTURE-BASED ALGORITHMS FOR HUMAN SKIN DETECTION
Authors:	Aura Conci, E. Nunes, Juan J. Pantrigo and Angel Sanchez
Abstract:	Locating skin pixels in images or video sequences where people appear has many applications, specially those related to Human-Computer Interaction. Most work on skin detection is based on modelling the skin on different color spaces. This paper explores the use of texture as a descriptor for the extraction of skin pixels in images. For this aim, we analyzed and compared a proposed color-based skin detection algorithm (using RGB, HSV and YCbCr representation spaces) with a texture-based skin detection algorithm which uses a measure called Spectral Variation Coefficient (SVC) to evaluate region features. We showed the usefulness of each skin segmentation feature (color versus texture) under different experiments that compared the accuracy of both approaches (i.e. color and texture) under the same set of hand segmented images.
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Paper Nr:	323
Title:	MOTIVATING SOFTWARE ENGINEERS - A Theoretically Reflective Model
Authors:	Nathan Baddoo, Sarah Beecham, Tracy Hall, Hugh Robinson and Helen Sharp
Abstract:	We present a model of motivation for software engineers. Our model suggests that software engineers are motivated by two sets of factors, intrinsic and extrinsic motivators, where a subset of intrinsic motivators are aspects inherent in the job that software engineers do. It shows that software engineers are orientated towards these particular sets of motivators because of their characteristics, which in turn are mediated by individual personality traits and environmental factors. Our model shows that the external outcomes of software engineers’ motivation are benefits like staff retention, increased productivity and reduced absenteeism. Our model is derived from a Systematic Literature Review of motivation in software engineering. We have constructed this model by engaging in practices that reflect good principles of model building as prescribed by operational research and scientific management discipline. We evaluate our model for theoretical efficacy and show that our model, in comparison to other attempts at modeling software engineers’ motivation, reflects a wide range of the classic concepts that underpin the subject area of motivation. We argue that, this theoretical efficacy validates the model and therefore improves confidence in its use. We suggest that our model serves as a valuable starting point for managers wanting to understand how to get the best out of software engineers, and individuals wanting to understand their own motivation or who are embarking on career choice.
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Paper Nr:	340
Title:	EFFECTIVENESS AND PREFERENCES OF ANTHROPOMORPHIC USER INTERFACE FEEDBACK IN A PC BUILDING CONTEXT AND COGNITIVE LOAD
Authors:	Pietro Murano, Christopher Ede and Patrik O'brian Holt
Abstract:	This paper describes an experiment and its results concerning research that has been going on for a number of years in the area of anthropomorphic user interface feedback. The main aims of the research have been to examine the effectiveness and user satisfaction of anthropomorphic feedback in various domains. The results are of use to all interactive systems designers, particularly when dealing with issues of user interface feedback design. Currently the work in the area of anthropomorphic feedback does not have any global conclusions concerning its effectiveness and user satisfaction capabilities. This research is investigating finding a way for reaching some global conclusions concerning this type of feedback. The experiment detailed, concerns the specific software domain of software for in-depth learning in the specific context of PC building. Anthropomorphic feedback was compared against an equivalent non-anthropomorphic feedback. The results were not statistically significant to suggest one type of feedback was better than the other. It was also the aim to examine the types of feedback in relation to Cognitive Load Theory. The results suggest that the feedback types did not negatively affect Cognitive Load.
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Paper Nr:	345
Title:	E-RETAIL: INTERACTION OF INTELLIGENT SELLING SPACE WITH PERSONAL SELLING ASSISTANT
Authors:	Alain Derycke, Thomas Vantroys, Benjamin Barby and Philippe Laporte
Abstract:	With the availability of nomadic computing, and its new interaction user devices connected through wireless networks, it is obvious that the traditional way of delivering commerce will evolve towards “pervasive-commerce”. This paper presents our approach based on Intelligent Selling Space to augment interaction in store department, and with the seller equipped with a personal assistant. For that purpose, we defined interaction patterns and a generic infrastructure based on OSGi and UPnP. Our approach is currently evaluated in a hypermarket.
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Paper Nr:	361
Title:	PERSONAL AND SOCIAL INFORMATION MANAGEMENT WITH OPNTAG
Authors:	Lee Iverson, Maryam N. Razavi and Vanesa Mirzaee
Abstract:	We examine the principles of personal information management in a social context and introduce OpnTag, an open source web application for note taking and book marking developed to experiment with these principles. We present the design motivation and technical structure of OpnTag, along with a discussion of how it supports our design philosophy. We also describe a few examples of how it is actually used, how this usage has improved our understanding of Social-Personal information management (SPIM) principles, and our plans for future enhancements.
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Paper Nr:	384
Title:	WEBTIE: A FRAMEWORK FOR DELIVERING WEB BASED TRAINING FOR SMES
Authors:	Parveen K. Samra, Richard Gatward, Anne James and Virginia King
Abstract:	A yearlong pilot project undertaken in the UK set about delivering online training to 100 Small to Medium sized Enterprises (SMES), which equated to 500 employees, all within Manufacturing. The ‘Cawskills Project’ delivered online IT training directly to employees. The findings from the project have informed the development of a generic but adaptive model for SMES to facilitate the need for training by considering the operational demands, resources constraints and infrastructure. This paper presents a model, which brings together principles of teaching and learning practices evident in classroom based education along with the learning requirements of SMES and employees. The incorporation of online learning aims to deliver training content, which is Just in Time (JIT) and proposes training events informed by SME’S strategic direction.
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Paper Nr:	422
Title:	IMPROVING ORGANIZATIONAL COLLABORATION BASED ON DOCUMENT TAGGING CONCEPT
Authors:	Cláudio M. Sapateiro, Bruno Vilhena and Pedro Moura
Abstract:	During work processes many collaboration structures rely on documents sharing to feed information needs. To this share be effective involved parties have also to share some common understanding of the meanings of the information that is being exchanged. Personal and communities information and knowledge structures are highly implicit and tends to be invisible to others. In this work we propose a classification of the user’s personal electronic assets inspired in the evolving web 2.0 applications concepts: tagging and social bookmarking. By adopting this approach we may profile users/communities knowledge domains and by externalizing this information improve collaboration structures.
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Paper Nr:	426
Title:	COMMUNICATION-BASED MODELLING AND INSPECTION IN CRITICAL SYSTEMS
Authors:	Marcos S. Guimarães, M. Cecilia C. Baranauskas and Eliane Martins
Abstract:	Safety-critical systems are systems whose failure would provoke injury or death to human beings. In avionic systems we have seen some significant evolution related to the aircraft cockpits. The Personal Air Vehicle (PAV) represents a new generation of small aircrafts being conceived to extend personal air travel to a much larger segment of the population proposing new concepts of interaction and communication in aviation. In this domain, communication is a critical factor especially among the users while running the system through its interfaces. This paper presents a technique for modelling and inspecting communication in the user interface of the avionics domain; a case study illustrates the proposal for artefacts of the PAV domain.
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Paper Nr:	468
Title:	COGNITIVE MODELING OF INTERACTIONS DURING A NEGOTIATION PROCESS
Authors:	Charlène FLOCH, Nathalie Chaignaud and Alexandre Pauchet
Abstract:	This article presents a study on human negotiations in order to improve the BDIGGY model of agent with negotiation skills. This study is based on logs of real negotiation rounds, obtained through a psychological experiment. We propose an utterance model including performatives applied to mental states and a dialog model using timed automata, both based on the BDI concepts.
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Paper Nr:	470
Title:	MODELING HUMAN INTERACTION TO DESIGN A HUMAN-COMPUTER DIALOG SYSTEM
Authors:	A. Loisel, Nathalie Chaignaud and J-Ph. Kotowicz
Abstract:	This article presents the Cogni-CISMeF project, which aims at improving the health information search engine CISMeF, by including a conversational agent that interacts with the user in natural language. To study the cognitive processes involved during information search, a bottom-up methodology was adopted. An experiment has been set up to obtain human dialogs related to such searches. The analysis of these dialogs underlines the establishment of a common ground and accommodation effects to the user. A model of artificial agent is proposed, that guides the user by proposing examples, assistance and choices.
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Paper Nr:	491
Title:	COMPLEX USER BEHAVIORAL NETWORKS AT ENTERPRISE INFORMATION SYSTEMS
Authors:	Peter Géczy, Noriaki Izumi, Shotaro Akaho and Kôiti Hasida
Abstract:	We analyze human behavior on a large-scale enterprise information system. Employing a novel framework that efficiently captures complex spatiotemporal dimensions of human dynamics in electronic spaces we present vital findings about knowledge workers’ behavior on enterprise intranet portal. Browsing behavior of knowledge workers resembles a complex network with significant concentration on navigational starters. Common browsing strategy utilizes the knowledge of the starting navigation point and recollection of the traversal pathway to the target. Complex traversal network topology has a small number of behavioral hubs concentrating and disseminating the browsing pathways. Human browsing network topology, however, does not match the link topology of the web environment. Knowledge workers generally underutilize the available resources, have focused interests, and exhibit diminutive exploratory behavior.
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Paper Nr:	503
Title:	AN INTERFACE ENVIRONMENT FOR LEARNING OBJECT SEARCH AND PRE-VISUALISATION
Authors:	Laura S. Garcia, Rodrigo Octávio de Oliveira Mello, Alexandre Ibrahim Direne and Marcos Sfair Sunye
Abstract:	Learning Objects – LOs – were devised in order to cut down on production costs and time, as well as to facilitate the distribution and reuse of didactic contents by means of a series of functions, such as reutilization, traceability, interoperability, durability and easy editing. Our main objective in the present paper is to propose an interface environment for LO search and pre-visualization. The distinctive feature of such environment is both the easy access to all search refinement functions available, thus allowing users to fulfil their search objectives without requiring much cognitive effort, and the well-structured LO pre-visualization. We started the project by defining a set of criteria to assess LO research and solutions, and one of such works was used as our starting point for the interface environment. Our theoretical foundation relies on HCI (Human-Computer Interaction), and the major outcome of the present project is a nonfunctional prototype (in storyboard) of the interface environment proposed, which in turn solves the majority of the problems we came across when revising the pertinent literature.
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Paper Nr:	661
Title:	ASSISTIVE TECHNOLOGIES AND TECHNIQUES FOR WEB BASED EGOV IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
Authors:	Heiko Hornung, M. Cecilia C. Baranauskas and Claudia A. Tambascia
Abstract:	Electronic government (eGov) is intended to serve the whole spectrum of the population. To be able to access services and thus benefit from eGov, many users require assistive technologies and techniques (ATT). This demand is implied by auditory, visual or other impairments but also by low literacy skills. Thus, in the context of this paper the term ATT is interpreted in a broader sense compared to the classic definitions of the term “assistive technology” that relate to impairments or other special needs. This paper explores the range of ATT on the background of the special conditions found in developing countries. We investigate which types of users benefit from ATT in which ways and discuss which categories of users have requirements that are not yet covered by the current stage of development of ATT. The reasons for the remaining problems regarding access may be due to factors related to the country context or due to current technological limitations. Some lessons learned from our findings will be presented which indicate directions for further research.
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Paper Nr:	662
Title:	A 3D USER INTERFACE FOR THE SEMANTIC NAVIGATION OF WWW INFORMATION
Authors:	Manuela Angioni, Roberto Demontis, Massimo Deriu and Franco Tuveri
Abstract:	The automatic creation of a conceptual knowledge map using documents coming from the Web is a very relevant problem because of the difficulty to distinguish between valid and invalid contents documents. In this paper we present an improved search engine GUI for displaying and organizing alternative views of data, by the use of a 3D graphical interface, and a method for organizing search results using a semantic approach during the storage and retrieval of information. The presented work deals with two main aspects. The first one regards the semantic aspects of knowledge management, in order to support the user during the query composition and to supply to him information strictly related to his interests. The second one argues the advantages coming from the adoption of a 3D user interface, to provide alternative views of data.
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Paper Nr:	666
Title:	A USER-INTERFACE ENVIRONMENT SOLUTION AS AN EDUCATIONAL TOOL FOR AN ONLINE CHESS SERVER ON THE WEB
Authors:	Juliano Picussa, Laura S. García, Juliana Bueno, Márica R. Ferreira, Alexandre I. Direne, Luis C. E. de Bona, Fabiano Silva, Marcos A. Castilho and Marcos Sunye
Abstract:	This article describes an interaction and interface environment for a public online chess server, on the web, as an educational tool. The main purpose of the environment is to improve chess teaching in Brazilian public schools. The vast majority of such chess online servers considerer and take for granted that users are specialists rather than learners. The solution describes in this article is inserted in an education environment, aiming at providing users with direct access to the contextually significant actions by means of strategic and operational help.
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Paper Nr:	676
Title:	PROMOTING COMMUNICATION AND PARTICIPATION THROUGH ENACTMENTS OF INTERACTION DESIGN SOLUTIONS - A Study Case for Validating Requirements for Digital TV
Authors:	Elizabeth S. Furtado, Albert Schilling, Fabricio fava and Liadina Camargo
Abstract:	This paper discusses the use of theatrical techniques in two experiments to attain the following objectives of interaction design: to communicate the cross-cultural users’ needs and expectations for iDTV (interactive Digital TeleVision) services and to explore new ideas in a participatory way. These two objectives are particularly important when systems are involved that are unknown to people, and professionals need to gather the requirements of such systems. In the first experiment, we showed the implication of stories told through theater in order to communicate the purposes of iDTV services to the audience. In the second experiment, we used role-playing in participatory interaction design sessions to explore new ideas with users. The results are described by discussing the strengths and weaknesses of this approach.
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Paper Nr:	703
Title:	AN INTERACTIVE INFORMATION SEEKING INTERFACE FOR EXPLORATORY SEARCH
Authors:	Hogun Park, Sung Hyon Myaeng, Gwan Jang, Jong-wook Choi, Sooran Jo and Hyung-chul Roh
Abstract:	As the Web has become a commodity, it is used for a variety of purposes and tasks that may require a great deal of cognitive efforts. However, most search engines developed for the Web provide users with only searching and browsing capabilities, leaving all the burdens of manipulating information objects to the users. In this paper, we focus on an exploratory search task and propose a framework for human-Web interactions. Based on the framework, we designed and implemented a new information seeking interface that helps users reduce cognitive burdens. The new human-Web interface provides a personal workspace that can be created and manipulated cooperatively with the system, which helps users conceptualize their information seeking tasks and record their trails for future uses. This interaction tool has been tested for its efficacy as an aid for an exploratory search.
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Paper Nr:	729
Title:	EMPIRICAL MULTI-ARTIFACT KNOWLEDGE MODELING FOR DIALOGUE SYSTEMS
Authors:	Porfírio Filipe and Nuno Mamede
Abstract:	This paper presents a knowledge modeling approach to improve domain-independency in Spoken Dialogue Systems (SDS) architectures. We aim to support task oriented dialogue management strategies via an easy to use interface provided by an adaptive Domain Knowledge Manager (DKM). DKM is a broker that centralizes the knowledge of the domain using a Knowledge Integration Process (KIP) that merges on-the-fly local knowledge models. A local knowledge model defines a semantic interface and is associated to an artifact that can be a household appliance in a home domain or a cinema in a ticket-selling domain. We exemplify the reuse of a generic AmI domain model in a home domain and in a ticket-selling domain redefining the abstractions of artifact, class, and task. Our experimental setup is a domain simulator specially developed to reproduce an Ambient Intelligence (AmI) scenario.
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Paper Nr:	779
Title:	IS BASED ASSET MANAGEMENT - An Evaluation
Authors:	Abrar Haider
Abstract:	Information systems (IS) for engineering asset lifecycle management act as strategy translators as well as enablers. Therefore, the real value of IS relies upon how effectively these systems are mapped to asset lifecycle management processes, and how effectively they are synchronised with other IS in the organisation. On the other hand, engineering asset managing organisations adopt a traditional technology-centred approach to asset management, where technical system implementation command most resources and are considered first, whereas skills, process maturity, and other organisational factors are only considered relatively late and sometimes only after the systems are operational. This paper provides an evaluation of the IS implemented to support asset lifecycle in an asset managing organisation.
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Paper Nr:	803
Title:	TRADITIONAL LEARNING VS. e-LEARNING - Some Results from Training Call Centre Personnel
Authors:	Mark Miley, James Redmond and Colm Moore
Abstract:	An analysis of the evaluation results on call centre trainees (n1 = 129, n2 = 176)) who underwent a Traditional Classroom course and an e-Learning course, showed little difference in performance. A survey questionnaire was completed by a subset of the same trainees (n = 43) later. The respondents expressed a subjective preference for the Traditional Classroom approach, but the analysis of the questionnaire responses indicated that they favoured e-Learning aspects slightly more. Although both courses were dissimilar in duration (7 hours vs. 1 hour) an argument can be made for blended learning. Despite the widely expressed preference for the traditional classroom mode, it appears that the e-Learning mode can be equally acceptable, perhaps if the duration is much shorter as happened here. When triangulated against the SPOT+ study (n = 2000), the results were similar.
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Paper Nr:	819
Title:	A COLLABORATIVE WEB SYSTEM TO IMPROVE CITIZENS-ADMINISTRATION COMMUNICATION
Authors:	Victor M. R. Penichet, Manuel Tobarra, María D. Lozano Perez, Jose A. Gallud and F. Montero
Abstract:	One of the public administration dreams is to improve the quality of service and the simplification of procedures and tasks. Administrative procedures in town councils, intelligent agents, workflow processes and Web-based computing are some issues which can be mixed to get a user-oriented system able to support feedback between citizens and their Town Council. Notifications by means of e-mails and messages in user’s intranet facilitate user-to-civil servant and system-to-user communication and collaboration. In this paper, a Complaints and Suggestions Web-Based Collaborative Procedure (CS-WCP) is presented as an advanced e-administration solution. All the administrative procedure steps are well analyzed by workflow modelling, and then every task is coordinated. Intelligent agents allow performing some tasks, which used to be done in a manual manner, in an automatic way. This system allows people with different cultures, religions, knowledge, nature and necessities to interact with the local administration in an easy and intuitive way.
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Paper Nr:	140
Title:	E-MAIL VISUALISATION - A Comparative Usability Evaluation
Authors:	Saad Alharbi and Dimitris Rigas
Abstract:	As the number of e-mail accounts and messages grow rapidly, traditional e-mail clients that are used nowadays have become difficult to use. Therefore, this paper shows how the usability of e-mail clients can be improved using information visualisation. An experimental e-mail visualisation tool was developed in order to organise e-mail messages in the inbox. It visualises messages based on the date of receiving messages with senders’ e-mail addresses. An experiment was carried out to test whether information visualisation could significantly enhance the usability of e-mail clients. The performance of 30 users was observed in a standard e-mail client and the proposed prototype. The results showed that information visualisation could significantly improve the effectiveness and the efficiency of e-mail clients.
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Paper Nr:	251
Title:	THE USE OF 3D VISUALISATION AND INTERACTION TO MARKET A NEW NEAR-NET-SHAPE PIN TOOLING APPLICATION
Authors:	Kevin Badni
Abstract:	This paper describes the methodologies used to create an interactive 3D multimedia application. The application was required to fulfil a business need of representing as close to reality as possible, how a new product technology worked. A number of IT solutions for the application were researched and described within this paper. The construction of the application is then discussed with the methodology behind a stereolithography parsing system and the algorithms used to detect collisions being described in detail. The application has been successfully implemented by the business to build an engaged client basis.
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Paper Nr:	278
Title:	MULTICHANNEL EMOTION ASSESSMENT FRAMEWORK - Gender and High-Frequency Electroencephalography as Key-Factors
Authors:	Jorge Teixeira, Vasco Vinhas, Eugénio Oliveira and Luís Paulo Reis
Abstract:	While affective computing and the entertainment industry still maintain a substantial gap between themselves, biosignals are subject of digital acquisition through low budget technologic solutions at neglectable invasive levels preventing users from focusing their awareness in the equipment. The integration of electroencephalography, galvanic skin response and oximeter in a multichannel framework constitutes an effort in the path to identify emotional states via biosignals expression. In order to induce and detect specific emotions, gender specific sessions were defined based on the International Affective Picture System and performed in a controlled environment. Results granted by distinct analysis techniques showed that high frequency EEG waves are strongly related to emotions and are a solid ground to perform accurate emotion classification. They have also given strong indications that females are more sensitive to emotion induction. On the other hand, one might conclude that the attained success levels concerning relating emotions to biosignals are extremely encouraging not only to the continuation of this research topic but also to the application of these results in domains such as multimedia entertainment, advertising and medical treatments.
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Paper Nr:	288
Title:	A PERSONALIZED RECOMMENDER SYSTEM FOR WRITING IN THE INTERNET AGE
Authors:	M. P. Melguizo, O. M. Ramos, Toine Bogers, Lou Boves and A. van den Bosch
Abstract:	With the advent of Internet, writing and finding information to plan and structure the text have become increasingly intertwined. We think that it is necessary to develop systems able to support the task of finding relevant information, without interfering with the writing process. The Proactive Recommender System À Propos is being developed in order to support writers in finding relevant information during writing. We present our research findings and raise the question whether the tendency to interleave (re)search and writing implies a need for developing more comprehensive models of the cognitive processes involved in writing scientific and policy papers.
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Paper Nr:	309
Title:	A CONSIDERATION METHOD OF INFORMATION CONTENT TO BE APPLIED FOR THE DEMENTIA SITUATION AND THE “YUBITSUKYI” SYSTEM
Authors:	Masahiro Aruga, Shuichiro Ono and Shuichi Kato
Abstract:	The communication among the blind deaf persons and others became more easy than before using the “YUBITSUKI” system. When they become dementia it is estimated that the “YUBITSUKI” system shows some information processing signal of the situation corresponding to the dementia situation. Therefore, it is important that the structure model of information process and information content applied to this situation are made clear. In this paper, firstly the outline of the “YUBITSUKI” system working is described and the necessity of analysis of information structure of such communicating situation is shown. As a result, it is described that it is important for the new information content different from the Shannon’s ordinary information content to be introduced into the analysis of information process of dementia and its communicating structure with the “YUBITSUKI” system, and an example of consideration with regard to the elements of the new information content is proposed on the basis of discussing Peirce’s semiotic and other concepts of some information elements.
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Paper Nr:	315
Title:	FLEXIBILITY, COMPLETENESS AND SOUNDNESS OF USER INTERFACES - Towards a Framework for Logical Examination of Usability Design Principles
Authors:	Steinar Kristoffersen
Abstract:	The paper is concerned with automatic usability assessment, based on heuristic principles. The objective is to lay the ground, albeit still rather informally, of a program of assessing the usability of an interactive system using formal methods. Further research can then extend this into an algebra of interactive systems.
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Paper Nr:	359
Title:	FACTORS INFLUENCING THE LEARNING PERFORMANCE OF u-LEARNING SYSTEMS
Authors:	DongMan Lee and SangHee Lee
Abstract:	This study examines the factors that are associated with user satisfaction of ubiquitous learning (u-Learning), where in four major factors are identified that influence interaction and learning performance. A survey of 226 u-Learning users was conducted and the data collected was used to test theoretically expected relationships. To verify the research model, the validity through the model’s factor and reliability analyses was inspected. The results of the analyses, by LISREL, are as follows. First, the ubiquitous characteristics such as pervasive connectivity and context awareness had significant influence on the effectiveness of the u-Learning systems. Second, the learner's characteristics such as academic motivation and flow played an important role in the effectiveness of u-Learning systems. Third, the learner's interaction factors had an important influence regarding the performance of u-Learning systems.
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Paper Nr:	359
Title:	FACTORS INFLUENCING THE LEARNING PERFORMANCE OF u-LEARNING SYSTEMS
Authors:	DongMan Lee and SangHee Lee
Abstract:	This study examines the factors that are associated with user satisfaction of ubiquitous learning (u-Learning), where in four major factors are identified that influence interaction and learning performance. A survey of 226 u-Learning users was conducted and the data collected was used to test theoretically expected relationships. To verify the research model, the validity through the model’s factor and reliability analyses was inspected. The results of the analyses, by LISREL, are as follows. First, the ubiquitous characteristics such as pervasive connectivity and context awareness had significant influence on the effectiveness of the u-Learning systems. Second, the learner's characteristics such as academic motivation and flow played an important role in the effectiveness of u-Learning systems. Third, the learner's interaction factors had an important influence regarding the performance of u-Learning systems.
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Paper Nr:	421
Title:	SUPPORTING UNSTRUCTURED WORK ACTIVITIES IN EMERGENT WORK PROCESSES
Authors:	Cláudio M. Sapateiro and Pedro Antunes
Abstract:	When existing information systems and organizational procedures lacks to support work needs, people engage in informal networks of relations and make use of their tacit knowledge promoting this way the emergence of unstructured work activities. To improve the consistency and effectiveness of such practices we propose a model and a prototype to assist collaboration needs in such scenarios. Our contribution defends the need of the construction of a shared awareness to improve situation understanding and collaboration. Supported on the Reason’s Swiss Cheese model for accidents we propose the use of a collaborative constructed artifact: Situation Matrixes (SM), to relate the different situation dimensions. The information needs in the existing contexts of action where the situation unfolds, will be supplied by different views over the (sub)set of matrixes.
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Paper Nr:	495
Title:	ADAPTED AND CONTEXTUAL INFORMATION IN MEDICAL INFORMATION SYSTEMS
Authors:	Karine Abbas, André Flory and Christine Verdier
Abstract:	Today, due to the integration of the pervasive computing to current information systems, new challenges are involved: the amount of data increases tremendously over time and users are more and more heterogeneous with different needs and roles. These challenges require systems with some adaptation capacities. The personalization and user modelling process are the key elements to propose solutions to these challenges. For that, this paper presents personalized access technique which takes into account the different requirements of personalization for different user’s needs and different contextual situations.
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Paper Nr:	501
Title:	PROTOCOL MODELS OF HUMAN-COMPUTER INTERACTION
Authors:	Ashley Mcneile, E. E. Roubtsova and Gerrit van der Veer
Abstract:	Current approaches to modeling human-computer interaction do not always succeed in producing behaviorally complete models of manageable size and complexity. We argue that the reason for this lies in lack of sup- port for parallel composition of partial behavioral descriptions, and propose the recently developed Protocol Modeling approach as a superior alternative. The semantics of Protocol Modeling support separation and composition of concerns in models of human-computer interaction, and the production of executable models to explore and refine the desired behavior. Protocol Modeling supports a crucial property sought in modeling methods if it is to scale to complex problems, namely the ability to reason about the modeled behavior of the whole based on examination only of a part (sometimes called ”modular” or ”local” reasoning).
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Paper Nr:	663
Title:	MUICSER: A MULTI-DISCIPLINARY USER-CENTERED SOFTWARE ENGINEERING PROCESS TO INCREASE THE OVERAL USER EXPERIENCE
Authors:	Mieke Haesen, Kris Luyten, Karin Coninx, Jan Van den Bergh and Chris Raymaekers
Abstract:	In this paper we present an incremental and user-centered process to create suitable and usable user interfaces. Validation is done throughout the process by prototyping, the prototypes evolve from low-fidelity to the final user interface. Applications developed with this process are more likely to correspond to users’ expectations. Furthermore, the process takes into account the need for sustainable evolution often required by modern software configurations, by combining traditional software engineering with a user-centered approach. We think our approach is beneficial in its scope, since it considers evolving software beyond the deployment stage and supports a multi-disciplinary team.
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Paper Nr:	682
Title:	DISABILITY YOUNG CHILDREN LEARNING PROCESS SUPPORTED WITH MULTIMEDIA SOFTWARE: CASE STUDY
Authors:	Micaela Esteves, Filipe M. Pinto, Audrey silva and Ana Duarte
Abstract:	Throughout technological resources, learning methods have achieved more affective and user-friendly results than in traditional ways, even when the target audience are young children with special needs. Addressing the usability, this paper introduces software directed to young children less than 13 years old with special needs at vision and sound levels. This application intents to explain the definition, the origin and the way it works of some actual electronic devices used in their quotidian, like television, telephone, electricity or personal computer. Along this paper, all the work developed under pedagogical guidelines specially directed to young children with disability it is presented and also the analysis, programming and testing phases are explained.“Disabled persons have the inherent right to respect for their human dignity (…) whatever the origin, nature and seriousness of their handicaps and disabilities, have the same fundamental rights as their fellow-citizens….” (Declaration on the Rights of Disabled Persons, United Nations resolution December 1975).
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Paper Nr:	688
Title:	WALKTHROUGH METHODS FOR IMPROVING THE SYSTEM FIT TO THE USERS’ TASKS WITHIN MANUFACTURING OPERATIONS
Authors:	Taru Salmimaa, Inka Vilpola and Katri Terho
Abstract:	Designing an information system for manufacturing context has challenges, such as efficiency and user requirements. Therefore manufacturing systems should be evaluated with real users before their implementation. The purpose of the evaluation is to ensure that a system supports the work flows and that users are introduced to a new system in the early stages of design. Walkthrough methods provide means to simultaneously review a sequence of actions and involve the users in the design activities. In this paper, a pluralistic walkthrough method was used for evaluating a user interface of a manufacturing system. In the session, the target user groups performed predefined task scenarios with a paper prototype of the system. The results indicate that walkthrough methods could be applicable for the manufacturing systems design, and the results could improve the system design and the user acceptance.
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Paper Nr:	695
Title:	OVERVIEW OF WEB CONTENT ADAPTATION
Authors:	Jeremy Lardon, Mikaël Ates, Christophe Gravier and Jacques FAYOLLE
Abstract:	Nowadays Internet contents can be reached from a vast set of different devices. We can cite mobile devices (mobile phones, PDAs, smartphones) and more recently TV sets through browser-embedding Set-Top Boxes (STB). The diverse characteristics that define these devices (input, output, processing power, available band-width, . . . ) force content providers to keep as many versions as the number of targeted devices. In this paper, we present the research projects that try to address the content adaptaption.
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Paper Nr:	723
Title:	A NEW APPROACH TO THE AUTOMATIC WEB ACCESSIBILITY
Authors:	Juan Manuel Fernández, Vicenç Soler and Jordi Roig
Abstract:	The number of Web pages created in an inaccessible manner is very high, and to convert them to be accessible can be impossible. We present a study of different tools that can help to obtain a total Web Accessibility. With this study, we can see the advantages of the automatic correction and the possibilities that this kind of tools offer. The result of the study shows how the applications adapt the Web pages to both the World Wide Web Consortium HTML grammar and to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. With this study we find an automatic way to improve Web Accessibility and to solve the problems that it can offer to the Web pages authors. This way consists of combining two tools. This combination gives us results that allow disabled people to use a system that can convert the entire Web in an accessible way.
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Paper Nr:	727
Title:	IMPROVING USER SATISFACTION IN THE POST-IMPLEMENTATION PHASE OF A LARGE-SCALE INFORMATION SYSTEM
Authors:	Colman Gantley
Abstract:	This paper presents a framework for identifying and improving user satisfaction for implemented information systems. Frequently, the post-implementation phase of a systems lifecycle is ignored and problems go undetected, which leads to user dissatisfaction. A poorly designed system can become a barrier for users and often they become reluctant to tolerate and use the system. If users resist working with the technology, the potential for the system to generate significant organisational performance gains can be lost, rendering the introduced system a costly mistake. This paper attempts to refine usability beyond just human-computer interaction (HCI). It introduces the Post-Implementation, Usability Synergy (PIUS) framework, which focuses on six different elements, including: training, functionality, reliability, working environment and interfacing, all centred on the actual users of the system, with the aim to enhance user satisfaction towards the new system.
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Paper Nr:	737
Title:	IMPROVING HTML DATA TABLES NAVIGATION - A Method to obtain Information for Visually Impaired People
Authors:	Juan Manuel Fernández, Vicenç Soler and Jordi Roig
Abstract:	Nowadays the broad use of the new technologies based on the Web gives facilities to people all over the world, but for impaired people. This leads us to the field of Web Accessibility and one of the biggest problems in it is the use of data tables on HTML documents. For disabled users, elements such as these and their natural bi-dimensional structure make more difficult to navigate than for the rest of the users. In this paper we present a solution to avoid those difficulties that disabled users find while navigating. The system we propose is based on the way a non-disabled person visualizes the table contents, but avoiding the processing of the images which is the natural procedure.
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Paper Nr:	789
Title:	AN APPROACH TO GUIDELINE INSPECTION OF WEB PORTALS
Authors:	Ivica Mitrovic, Andrina Granic and Nikola Marangunic
Abstract:	Overall research is aiming to design discount evaluation methodology for web portal assessment. A number of problems was identified during testing user tasks in scenario-based usability testing while others were detected through tasks mentally simulated by HCI experts using an inspection method. This paper reports on the experience regarding the latter one. Designed inspection has proved very promising, although obtained comprehensive quantitative and qualitative data revealed the need for some improvements. Revision of the evaluation form along with subsequent assessment with adequate expert sample is needed.
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Paper Nr:	794
Title:	WEB BROWSING FOR VISUALLY IMPAIRED
Authors:	Gulden Uchyigit
Abstract:	Availability of information is no longer an issue. The internet is a vast resource where details relating to any subject are available almost instantaneously; however availability does not equal accessibility. The internet is a highly visual medium and users with visual disabilities including blindness and print impairments have no choice but to use sub-standard screen readers or expensive Braille displays. Poorly designed web pages that do not conform to accessibility standards or have complex layouts are bewildering and users have difficulty in distinguishing between useful and irrelevant information. This paper presents a system which allows visually impaired users to interact with a computer in a more effective manner. The system employs speech synthesis as an inexpensive and portable method of output and uses text analysis methods to ease the process of navigation. The system’s usability and learnability are demonstrated through end-user testing.
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Paper Nr:	813
Title:	AN INFORMATION SYSTEM FOR THE SHORTEST ORIGEN-DESTINATION ROUTE IN A TRANSPORTATION NETWORK
Authors:	J. R. Marcial-Romero, Oscar S. Flores, Hector A. Montes Venegas, Luis N. Vázquez and Israel Hernández Sánchez
Abstract:	There exist several information systems to find and display the shortest origin-destination route in a transportation network. Usually these systems are created by organizations purchasing expensive software aiming to build them easily, quickly and correctly. This goal, however, still remains elusive. In this paper, an information system that finds and displays the shortest origin-destination route in a transportation network is presented. The system is mainly built using free software. In the literature, there were found at least three fast algorithms to obtain the shortest route in a given network. From these three, one was selected for being more efficient and less memory consuming according to the experimental analysis carried out. The functionality of the system is showed using Toluca’s transportation network, one of the largest cities in Mexico.
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Paper Nr:	828
Title:	INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN VIRTUAL ENTERPRISE
Authors:	Stefan Trzcielinski and Aleksander Jurga
Abstract:	There is a common belief expressed in the subject literature that information technology (IT) is critical contingency factor for virtual organization. Therefore our interest was to investigate the relation between the intensity level of IT use and the level of the organization virtuality. In that purpose we elaborated a tree of features describing virtuality and categorized IT tools into two groups taking into considerations the functions which they play or can play in virtual organization and the range of their influence to cope with cooperation of distributed partners. The research sample included 45 firms, mostly small and medium, belonging to six branches. The firms had been chosen according to pre-selection criteria, confirming that they construct a network to run their operations. Some indicators were elaborated to measure the level of virtuality and intensity of use of IT. Next correlation was checked between these two levels. In this paper we present what we have found about the relation.
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Paper Nr:	851
Title:	A REASONED APPROACH TO ERROR HANDLING - Position Paper on Work-in-Progress
Authors:	Tamara Babaian and Wendy Lucas
Abstract:	It is widely acknowledged that Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems are difficult to use. Our own studies have revealed that one of the largest sources of frustration for ERP users is the inadequate support in error situations afforded by these systems. We propose an approach to error handling in which reasoning on the part of the system enables it to behave as a collaborative partner in helping its users understand the causes of errors and, whenever possible, make the necessary corrections. While our focus here is on ERP systems, this approach could be applied to any system for improving its error handling capabilities.
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Paper Nr:	852
Title:	USER PSYCHOLOGICAL APPRAISAL OF ENTERPRISE WEB 2.0-DEPLOYMENT
Authors:	Sacha Helfenstein
Abstract:	Effective exploitation of emerging Web-based social information and communication tools has become the new mandate in contemporary enterprise IT-strategy. However, current assessments and recommendations are generally biased in favouring normative considerations from a technical and business angle; and deficient in their emphasis of the implementation- over the adoption-perspective on technology deployment. The current paper propagates the enhancement of Enterprise Web 2.0-research, discourse, and practice by placing it into the focal point of a multi-disciplinary scientific approach comprising services, design, and, importantly, user science. User psychological insight serves as basis for contending essential human adoption barriers and arising dissonances between technical and human use-related promises of Web 2.0; both of which need to be recognized and productively dealt with in the organizational context of Enterprise Web 2.0.
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