The knowledge management in small and medium enterprises and the quality management approaches in service-oriented architecture

The thesis is organized into two different sections: the first one deals with the knowledge management (KM) in small and medium enterprises (SMEs), the second one deals with the quality management approaches in Service Oriented Architecture (SOA). The first research topic arises from the awareness that knowledge fertilization is crucial for SMEs competitiveness and to improve network collaboration. Nevertheless, while there is an abundance of studies describing how large companies are successfully exploiting knowledge management practices, regarding SMEs the framework is still fragmented. The Ph.D. program has been aimed at publishing two journal articles: the first one is a literature review, which provides the state of art of KM in SMEs and the second one is an empirical paper, which addresses the research questions emerging from the analysis of the literature review. The research questions concern the barriers hindering the spread of KM practices in SMEs, the main knowledge management systems (KMSs) adopted by SMEs and the impact of the use of KM practices on SME performance; they were subsequently addressed through a field analysis conducted on a sample of SMEs, adopting fuzzy set theory as methodology. Therefore the first section of this thesis is structured as a collection of these two published articles. The second section deals with the quality management approaches in Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA), this research topic arises from the needs to investigate services quality techniques since there is a vast literature concerning the software quality metrics within an object-oriented environment, but this framework cannot be applied to SOA systems. This study attempted to fill this gap presenting the results of a literature review on this topic; the outcomes of the review provide a valuable understanding of the best researched areas and the areas of SOA quality which are poorly investigated. In order to give an answer to one of the retrieved research questions emerging from the analysis of the literature review and concerning the lack of case studies, an empirical analysis on SOA services performance has been carried out in an important telecommunications company by an efficiency analysis. Finally the work’ conclusions are presented which sum up both the knowledge management prospect that the SOA prospect

FlexMonitorWS : a solution for monitoring Web services with a focus on QoS attributes

Orientador: Cecília Mary Fischer RubiraDissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de ComputaçãoResumo: Serviços Web são usados como uma das formas de se obter uma Arquitetura Orientada a Serviços (SOA). Com aspectos interoperáveis, dinâmicos e distribuídos, tais serviços agregam valores de negócio, são unidades de software com alta coesão e são utilizados para integração entre aplicações empresariais. Em um contexto de SOA, provedores de serviços devem oferecer garantias de funcionamento de seus serviços. Esta garantia é realizada através de atributos de Quality of Service (QoS) inseridos em contratos do tipo SLA (Service Level Agreement). Atributos de QoS podem ter flutuações ou mudança de estado ao longo do tempo, dado que um serviço opera em um ambiente de alta dinamicidade e alta imprevisibilidade que são propriedades inerentes ao contexto SOA. Diante deste cenário, há uma clara necessidade de se conhecer as variações que ocorrem nos atributos de QoS. Para isso, é fundamental aplicar uma monitoração que possibilite conhecer os valores de atributos de QoS para compreender o contexto geral do ambiente que opera o serviço. Uma boa solução de monitoração deve oferecer meios flexíveis de monitorar diferentes atributos de QoS (e.g. disponibilidade, desempenho e confiabilidade), de diferentes modos de operar, considerando diferentes alvos ligados ao serviço (e.g. servidor, rede e aplicação servidora). Por meio de uma Revisão Sistemática da Literatura identificamos que as soluções encontradas não apoiam a flexibilidade na monitoração. Face a este contexto, esta dissertação propôs a FlexMonitorWS uma solução de monitoração de serviços Web e de recursos de infraestrutura de TI ligada ao serviço Web. A FlexMonitorWS adota técnicas de Linhas de Produtos de Software para criar uma família de monitores a partir da variabilidade de software existente em sistemas de monitoração de serviços Web. Três estudos de caso foram executados para avaliar a viabilidade da ferramenta, obtendo-se resultados satisfatórios na entrega de valores de atributos de QoS e na compreensão do ambiente que opera o serviço Web. Ao final, apresentamos conclusões, contribuições e direções para trabalhos futurosAbstract: Web services are used as a way of obtaining a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA). With interoperable, dynamic and distributed aspects such services add business values are software units with high cohesion and are used to integrate business applications. In a SOA context, service providers must offer guarantees of the servces operations. This warranty is carried out by attributes Quality of Service (QoS) type contracts entered into SLA (Service Level Agreement). QoS attributes can have fluctuations or changes of state over time, given that a service operates in an environment of high dynamics and high unpredictability inherent in the SOA context properties. Given this scenario, there is a clear need to understand the fluctuations in the QoS attributes. Therefore, it is essential to apply a monitoring which allows to know the QoS attributes values to understand the overall context of the environment that operates the service. A good monitoring solution must offer flexible ways to monitor different QoS attributes (e.g. performance, availability and reliability) in different ways to operate, considering different targets linked to the service (e.g. server, network and server application). By analyzing existing solutions through a Systematic Literature Review identified that solutions do not support the flexibility in monitoring. Against this background, this thesis proposed a solution FlexMonitorWS monitoring of Web services and IT infrastructure resources connected to the Web services. FlexMonitorWS adopts techniques from Software Product Lines to create a monitors family from the existing variability in the Web services monitoring systems. Three case studies were performed to assess the tool feasibility, obtaining satisfactory results in delivering QoS attributes values and understanding to environment that operates the Web service. In the end, conclusions, contributions and directions for future work are presentedMestradoCiência da ComputaçãoMestre em Ciência da Computaçã