20,548 research outputs found
Semantic discovery and reuse of business process patterns
Patterns currently play an important role in modern information systems (IS) development and their use has mainly been restricted to the design and implementation phases of the development lifecycle. Given the increasing significance of business modelling in IS development, patterns have the potential of providing a viable solution for promoting reusability of recurrent generalized models in the very early stages of development. As a statement of research-in-progress this paper focuses on business process patterns and proposes an initial methodological framework for the discovery and reuse of business process patterns within the IS development lifecycle. The framework borrows ideas from the domain engineering literature and proposes the use of semantics to drive both the discovery of patterns as well as their reuse
Investigating information systems with mixed-methods research
Mixed-methods research, which comprises both quantitative and qualitative components, is widely perceived as a means to resolve the inherent limitations of traditional single method designs and is thus expected to yield richer and more holistic findings. Despite such distinctive benefits and continuous advocacy from Information Systems (IS) researchers, the use of mixed-methods approach in the IS field has not been high. This paper discusses some of the key reasons that led to this low application rate of mixed-methods design in the IS field, ranging from misunderstanding the term with multiple-methods research to practical difficulties for design and implementation. Two previous IS studies are used as examples to illustrate the discussion. The paper concludes by recommending that in order to apply mixed-methods design successfully, IS researchers need to plan and consider thoroughly how the quantitative and qualitative components (i.e. from data collection to data analysis to reporting of findings) can be genuinely integrated together and supplement one another, in relation to the predefined research questions and the specific research contexts
CHORUS Deliverable 2.2: Second report - identification of multi-disciplinary key issues for gap analysis toward EU multimedia search engines roadmap
After addressing the state-of-the-art during the first year of Chorus and establishing the existing landscape in
multimedia search engines, we have identified and analyzed gaps within European research effort during our second year.
In this period we focused on three directions, notably technological issues, user-centred issues and use-cases and socio-
economic and legal aspects. These were assessed by two central studies: firstly, a concerted vision of functional breakdown
of generic multimedia search engine, and secondly, a representative use-cases descriptions with the related discussion on
requirement for technological challenges. Both studies have been carried out in cooperation and consultation with the
community at large through EC concertation meetings (multimedia search engines cluster), several meetings with our
Think-Tank, presentations in international conferences, and surveys addressed to EU projects coordinators as well as
National initiatives coordinators. Based on the obtained feedback we identified two types of gaps, namely core
technological gaps that involve research challenges, and “enablers”, which are not necessarily technical research
challenges, but have impact on innovation progress. New socio-economic trends are presented as well as emerging legal
challenges
Managing knowledge for capability engineering
The enterprises that deliver capability are trying to evolve into through-life businesses
by shifting away from the traditional pattern of designing and manufacturing successive
generations of products, towards a new paradigm centred on support, sustainability and
the incremental enhancements of existing capabilities from technology insertions and
changes to process. The provision of seamless through-life customer solutions depends
heavily on management of information and knowledge between, and within the different
parts of the supply chain enterprise.
This research characterised and described Capability Engineering (CE) as applied in the
defence enterprise and identified to BAE Systems important considerations for
managing knowledge within that context.
The terms Capability Engineering and Through Life Capability Management (TLCM),
used synonymously in this thesis, denote a complex evolving domain that requires new
approaches to better understand the different viewpoints, models and practices.
The findings and novelty of this research is demonstrated through the following
achievements:
Defined the problem space that Requirements Engineers can use in through-life
management projects.
Made a contribution to the development of models for Systems Architects to
enable them to incorporate ‘soft’ systems within their consideration.
Independently developed a TLCM activity model against which BAE Systems
validated the BAE Systems TLCM activity model, which is now used by UK
Ministry of Defence (MoD).
Developed, and published within INCOSE1, the INCOSE Capability
Engineering ontology. Through the novel analysis of a directly applicable case study, highlighted to
Functional Delivery Managers the significance of avoiding the decoupling of
information and knowledge in the context of TLCM.
Through experimentation and knowledge gained within this research, identified
inadequacies in the TechniCall (rapid access to experts) service which led to the
generation of requirements for an improved service which is now being
implemented by BAE Systems.
The results showed that managing knowledge is distinct when compared to information
management. Over-reliance on information management in the absence of tacit
knowledge can lead to a loss in the value of the information, which can result in
unintended consequences. Capability is realised through a combination of component
systems and Capability Engineering is equivalent to a holistic perspective of Systems
Engineering. A sector-independent Capability Engineering ontology is developed to
enable semantic interoperability between different domains i.e. defence, rail and
information technology. This helped to better understand the dependencies of
contributing component systems within defence, and supported collaboration across
different domains. Although the evaluation of the ontology through expert review has
been accomplished; the ontology, KM analysis framework and soft systems
transitioning approach developed still need to undergo independent verification and
validation. This requires application to other case studies to check and exploit their
suitability.
This Engineering Doctorate research has been disseminated through a number of peer
reviewed publications
An Ontology for Product-Service Systems
Industries are transforming their business strategy from a product-centric to a more service-centric nature by bundling products and services into integrated solutions to enhance the relationship between their customers. Since Product- Service Systems design research is currently at a rudimentary stage, the development of a robust ontology for this area would be helpful. The advantages of a standardized ontology are that it could help researchers and practitioners to communicate their views without ambiguity and thus encourage the conception and implementation of useful methods and tools. In this paper, an initial structure of a PSS ontology from the design perspective is proposed and evaluated
Improving data management through automatic information extraction model in ontology for road asset management
lRoads are a critical component of transportation infrastructure, and their effective maintenance is paramount in ensuring their continued functionality and safety. This research proposes a novel information management approach based on state-of-the-art deep learning models and ontologies. The approach can automatically extract, integrate, complete, and search for project knowledge buried in unstructured text documents. The approach on the one hand facilitates implementation of modern management approaches, i.e., advanced working packaging to delivery success road management projects, on the other hand improves information management practices in the construction industry
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