The development of a post-test diagnostic system for rocket engines

An effort was undertaken by NASA to develop an automated post-test, post-flight diagnostic system for rocket engines. The automated system is designed to be generic and to automate the rocket engine data review process. A modular, distributed architecture with a generic software core was chosen to meet the design requirements. The diagnostic system is initially being applied to the Space Shuttle Main Engine data review process. The system modules currently under development are the session/message manager, and portions of the applications section, the component analysis section, and the intelligent knowledge server. An overview is presented of a rocket engine data review process, the design requirements and guidelines, the architecture and modules, and the projected benefits of the automated diagnostic system

Audit-based Compliance Control (AC2) for EHR Systems

Traditionally, medical data is stored and processed using paper-based files. Recently, medical facilities have started to store, access and exchange medical data in digital form. The drivers for this change are mainly demands for cost reduction, and higher quality of health care. The main concerns when dealing with medical data are availability and confidentiality. Unavailability (even temporary) of medical data is expensive. Physicians may not be able to diagnose patients correctly, or they may have to repeat exams, adding to the overall costs of health care. In extreme cases availability of medical data can even be a matter of life or death. On the other hand, confidentiality of medical data is also important. Legislation requires medical facilities to observe the privacy of the patients, and states that patients have a final say on whether or not their medical data can be processed or not. Moreover, if physicians, or their EHR systems, are not trusted by the patients, for instance because of frequent privacy breaches, then patients may refuse to submit (correct) information, complicating the work of the physicians greatly. \ud \ud In traditional data protection systems, confidentiality and availability are conflicting requirements. The more data protection methods are applied to shield data from outsiders the more likely it becomes that authorized persons will not get access to the data in time. Consider for example, a password verification service that is temporarily not available, an access pass that someone forgot to bring, and so on. In this report we discuss a novel approach to data protection, Audit-based Compliance Control (AC2), and we argue that it is particularly suited for application in EHR systems. In AC2, a-priori access control is minimized to the mere authentication of users and objects, and their basic authorizations. More complex security procedures, such as checking user compliance to policies, are performed a-posteriori by using a formal and automated auditing mechanism. To support our claim we discuss legislation concerning the processing of health records, and we formalize a scenario involving medical personnel and a basic EHR system to show how AC2 can be used in practice. \ud \ud This report is based on previous work (Dekker & Etalle 2006) where we assessed the applicability of a-posteriori access control in a health care scenario. A more technically detailed article about AC2 recently appeared in the IJIS journal, where we focussed however on collaborative work environments (Cederquist, Corin, Dekker, Etalle, & Hartog, 2007). In this report we first provide background and related work before explaining the principal components of the AC2 framework. Moreover we model a detailed EHR case study to show its operation in practice. We conclude by discussing how this framework meets current trends in healthcare and by highlighting the main advantages and drawbacks of using an a-posteriori access control mechanism as opposed to more traditional access control mechanisms

Reengineering of the Defense Biometric Identification System (DBIDS) equipment tracking database

The Defense Manpower Data Center (DMDC) manages the Defense Biometric Identification System (DBIDS). DBIDS captures personal and biometric information to manage DoD-wide access, control, and personnel accountability. DBIDS equipment is installed globally, and managed by a central office on the Monterey peninsula. Program managers track data about the numbers and type of equipment installed at each site. Program managers were tracking DBIDS data using a single Microsoft Excel workbook comprised of several, interlinking worksheets (DBIDS Master Plan Spreadsheet). Data updates were error-prone and difficult, requiring close coordination to keep the number of "current" versions of the spreadsheet to a minimum. This thesis initially focused on reviewing the business rules and processes surrounding DBIDS document, and then transitioned into designing, developing, and implementing of a relational database solution to improve problem areas identified during the initial review. After implementation of the database, this thesis explored the effects of making such a change within an organization. This was attempted by identifying and measuring changes in performance and accuracy of the system; by measuring pre- and post-user satisfaction through the qualitative methods of questionnaires and interviews; and finally using this analysis to improve the project through maintenance and growth iterations.http://archive.org/details/reengineeringofd109454607Outstanding ThesisUS Navy (USN) author.Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited

The Influence of Government Regulations on Content Management Systems: An Exploratory Study

The primary focus of this study was to determine why and how small businesses implement content management and to clarify the relationship of content management to regulatory compliance issues presented by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability and Sarbanes-Oxley Act

Modeling building semantics: providing feedback and sustainability

Even minor changes in user activity can bring about significant energy savings within built space. Many building performance assessment methods have been developed, however these often disregard the impact of user behavior (i.e. the social, cultural and organizational aspects of the building). Building users currently have limited means of determining how sustainable they are, in context of the specific building structure and/or when compared to other users performing similar activities, it is therefore easy for users to dismiss their energy use. To support sustainability, buildings must be able to monitor energy use, identify areas of potential change in the context of user activity and provide contextually relevant information to facilitate persuasion management. If the building is able to provide users with detailed information about how specific user activity that is wasteful, this should provide considerable motivation to implement positive change. This paper proposes using a dynamic and temporal semantic model, to populate information within a model of persuasion, to manage user change. By semantically mapping a building, and linking this to persuasion management we suggest that: i) building energy use can be monitored and analyzed over time; ii) persuasive management can be facilitated to move user activity towards sustainability

Run-Time Auditing for Business Processes Data Using Constraints

Business processes involve data that can be modified or up dated by various activities. These data must satisfy the business rules associated to the process. These data are normally stored in a rela tional database, and hence the database has to be analyzed to determine whether the business rules can be satisfied. This paper presents a framework including a run-time auditing layer where the correctness of a database can be analyzed at different check points of a business process according to the data flow. It provides an early detection of incorrect action on stored data. Furthermore, in or der to manage the current business rules, the use of the constraint pro gramming paradigm is proposed and the enlargement of the Constraint Database Management Systems to support business rulesJunta de Andalucía P08-TIC-04095Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología TIN2009-1371

A new auditing mechanism for open source NoSQL database a case study on open source MongoDB database

MongoDB as a NoSQL database management system is relatively new on the database market and it is used in many important projects and products. Security analysis for MongoDB revealed that it doesn’t provide any facilities for auditing actions performed in the database. Recently, MongoDB company tried to rectify the auditing gap by providing MongoDB new enterprise version 2.6 (8th of April 2014). The auditing system logs operations information including; schema data definition language operations and operations related to replica set in addition to operations of authentication and authorization, and eventually general operations. But unfortunately still cannot record Data Manipulation Language (DML). Thus, this study aims to improve the auditing functionality in MongoDB by presenting a new mechanism for auditing NoSQL MongoDB database to include Data Manipulation Language (DML)/ CRUD (Create, Read, Update and delete) operations

Database Management of Vedaranyam Taluk, Nagappattinam District, Tamilnadu using Geographic Information System (GIS)

GIS, known as geographical information system, is the latest tool, a computer system for capturing, storing, checking, integrating, manipulating, analysis in and displacing data related to positions on the Earth’s surface. Typically, a geographical information system or (spatial information system) is used for handling maps of one or another. These might be represented as several different layers each layer holds about a particular kind of feature is linked to a position on the graphically image of a map. With the help of GIS a data base management  including data or demography, occupation, education, health, drinking water, power, telecommunication, roads/transportation, banks& commercial  institutions, agriculture, sanitation, common property resources ,employment, forestry, industries,  marketing facilities, etc.The scope of the work involves  1, data pertaining to geological and geophysical resources, human resources, social and economic infrastructure, etc. should be collected, collected, updated, and retrieval on regular basis, 2, generation of real time, reliable database on natural resources, socio-economic, agro- climatic condition, financial, institutional and environmental data using geo- informatics and 3, data base to cater to the needs of planning sharing information to various user organizations with necessary data analysis, etc and would act as a centralized data base for state govt. department/ institutions/ institutions involved in  development planning