Mathematics in Software Reliability and Quality Assurance

This monograph concerns the mathematical aspects of software reliability and quality assurance and consists of 11 technical papers in this emerging area. Included are the latest research results related to formal methods and design, automatic software testing, software verification and validation, coalgebra theory, automata theory, hybrid system and software reliability modeling and assessment

Combining SOA and BPM Technologies for Cross-System Process Automation

This paper summarizes the results of an industry case study that introduced a cross-system business process automation solution based on a combination of SOA and BPM standard technologies (i.e., BPMN, BPEL, WSDL). Besides discussing major weaknesses of the existing, custom-built, solution and comparing them against experiences with the developed prototype, the paper presents a course of action for transforming the current solution into the proposed solution. This includes a general approach, consisting of four distinct steps, as well as specific action items that are to be performed for every step. The discussion also covers language and tool support and challenges arising from the transformation

Avaliação de sistemas hipermídia adaptativos educacionais: uma aplicação em engenharia biomédica

Tese (doutorado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro Tecnológico. Programa de Pós-Graduação em Engenharia Elétrica.A idéia central dos Sistemas Hipermídia Adaptativos Educacionais (SHAE) é a expectativa de oferecer a cada estudante uma interface modelada de acordo com suas características específicas. Tais sistemas são dinâmicos e multivariáveis e precisam de projetos e avaliações que envolvem equipes multidisciplinares devido à diversidade de domínios, situações, condições e estratégias pedagógicas. Um projeto consistente exige uma linguagem unificadora de descrição das estruturas sem ambigüidades, a integração dos aspectos construtivos e pedagógicos, bem como a mensuração das características de qualidade internas, externas e em uso do sistema. Neste sentido, este trabalho apresenta uma metodologia de avaliação multidimensional que permite desenvolver especificações formais e calcular os atributos de qualidade de sistemas educacionais na área de Engenharia Biomédica. No trabalho são apresentados os conceitos de Teoria das Categorias para modelagem da arquitetura, navegação adaptativa e requisitos funcionais da avaliação de um Tutorial de Neuroanatomia. A metodologia é composta por representações formais categóricas, utilização de métricas do processo avaliativo da norma ISO/IEC 14598 e a proposição de medidas da qualidade dos componentes educacionais. Os resultados permitiram concluir que a formalização fornece a generalidade necessária para especificação. A avaliação multidimensional oferece flexibilidade na estimação da qualidade global através da investigação dos atributos computacionais e educacionais do sistema.The central idea of Adaptive Educational Hypermedia Systems (SHAE) is expected to provide to each student an interface modeled according to their specific characteristics. Such systems are dynamic and multivariable and need projects and evaluations that involve multidisciplinary teams due to the diversity of domains, situations, conditions and teaching strategies. A consistent project demands a unifying language to describe the structures unambiguously, the integration of constructive and educational aspects, as well as the measurement of the characteristics of quality internal, quality external and quality in use. Thus, this work presents a multidimensional evaluation methodology that allows the development of formal specifications and calculates the attributes of quality of educational systems in Biomedical Engineering area. In the work we present the concepts of Category Theory for modeling the architecture, navigation, adaptive and functional requirements of an evaluation of Neuroanatomy Tutorial. The methodology comprises formal categorical representations, use of metrics of the evaluation process of the ISO / IEC 14598 and the proposition of quality measurements for the educational components. The results showed that the formalization provides the generality necessary for specification. The multidimensional evaluation provides flexibility for estimating the global quality through investigating of attributes computational and educational of the system

Emerging Informatics

The book on emerging informatics brings together the new concepts and applications that will help define and outline problem solving methods and features in designing business and human systems. It covers international aspects of information systems design in which many relevant technologies are introduced for the welfare of human and business systems. This initiative can be viewed as an emergent area of informatics that helps better conceptualise and design new world-class solutions. The book provides four flexible sections that accommodate total of fourteen chapters. The section specifies learning contexts in emerging fields. Each chapter presents a clear basis through the problem conception and its applicable technological solutions. I hope this will help further exploration of knowledge in the informatics discipline

A context-aware model to improve usability of information presented on mobile devices

Online information access on mobile devices is increasing as a result of the growth in the use of Internet-enabled handheld (or pocket-size) devices. The combined influence of recent enabling technologies such as Web 2.0, mobile app stores and improved wireless networks have driven the increase in online applications that allow users to access various types of information on mobile devices regardless of time and location. Examples of such applications (usually shortened to app) include: social media, such as FacebookTM App and TwitterTM App, banking applications such as (Standard Bank South Africa)TM Mobile Banking App and First National Bank (FNB) BankingTM App, and news application such as news 24TM App and BBCTM News App. Online businesses involved in buying, selling and business transaction processing activities via the Internet have exploited the opportunity to extend electronic commerce (e-commerce) initiatives into mobile commerce (m-commerce). Online businesses that interact with end user customers implement business to consumer (B2C) m-commerce applications that enable customers to access and browse product catalogue information on mobile devices, anytime, anywhere. Customers accessing electronic product catalogue information on a mobile device face a number of challenges such as a long list of products presented on a small screen and a longer information download time. These challenges mainly originate from the limiting and dynamic nature of the mobile apps operating environment, for example, dynamic location, bandwidth fluctuations and, diverse and limited device features, collectively referred to as context. The goal of this research was to design and implement a context-aware model that can be incorporated into an m-commerce application in order to improve the presentation of product catalogue information on m-commerce storefronts. The motivation for selecting product catalogue is prompted by literature which indicates that improved presentation of information in m-commerce (and e-commerce) applications has a positive impact on usability of the websites. Usable m-commerce (and e-commerce) websites improve efficiency in consumer behaviour that impacts sales, profits and business growth. The context-aware model aimed at collecting context information within the user environment and utilising it to determine optimal retrieval and presentation of product catalogue in m-commerce. An integrated logical context sensor and Mathematical algorithms were implemented in the context-aware model. The integrated logical context sensor was responsible for the collection of different types of predetermined context information such as device specification or capabilities, connection bandwidth, location and time of the day as well as the user profile. The algorithms transformed the collected context information into usable formats and enabled optimal retrieval and presentation of product catalogue data on a specific mobile device. Open-source implementation tools were utilised to implement components of the model including: HTML5, PhP, JavaScript and MySQL database. The context-aware model was incorporated into an existing m-commerce application. Two user evaluation studies were conducted during the course of the research. The first evaluation was to evaluate the accuracy of information collected by the context sensor component of the model. This survey was conducted with a sample of 30 users from different countries across the world. In-between the context sensor and main evaluation surveys, a pilot study was conducted with a sample of 19 users with great experience in mobile application development and use from SAP Next Business and Technology, Africa. Finally an overall user evaluation study was conducted with a sample of 30 users from a remote area called Kgautswane in Limpopo Province, South Africa. The results obtained indicate that the context-aware model was able to determine accurate context information in real-time and effectively determine how much product information should be retrieved and how the information should be presented on a mobile device interface. Two main contributions emerged from the research, first the research contributed to the field of mobile Human Computer Interaction. During the research, techniques of evaluating and improving usability of mobile applications were demonstrated. Secondly, the research made a significant contribution to the upcoming field of context-aware computing. The research brought clarity with regard to context-aware computing which is lacking in existing, current research despite the field’s proven impact of improving usability of applications. Researchers can utilise contributions made in this research to develop further techniques and usable context-aware solutions