Developing a distributed electronic health-record store for India

The DIGHT project is addressing the problem of building a scalable and highly available information store for the Electronic Health Records (EHRs) of the over one billion citizens of India

A semi-automatic verification tool for software requirements specification documents

Most software problems arise from deficiencies in the manner in which software requirements are elicited and expressed. Ensuring that the Software Requirements Specification document (SRS) has the necessary quality is crucial to the success of any software development project, since its information is used across all project stages. In this paper, we present a semiautomatic verification tool for SRS documents based on a comprehensive quality model.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativ

A semi-automatic verification tool for software requirements specification documents

Most software problems arise from deficiencies in the manner in which software requirements are elicited and expressed. Ensuring that the Software Requirements Specification document (SRS) has the necessary quality is crucial to the success of any software development project, since its information is used across all project stages. In this paper, we present a semiautomatic verification tool for SRS documents based on a comprehensive quality model.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativ

A generic framework for hybrid simulation in healthcare

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University, 11/01/2010.Healthcare problems are complex; they exhibit both detail and dynamic complexity. It has been argued that Discrete Event Simulation (DES), with its ability to capture detail, is ideal for problems exhibiting this type of complexity. On the other hand, System Dynamics (SD) with its focus on feedback and nonlinear relationships lends itself naturally to comprehend dynamic complexity. Although these modelling paradigms provide valuable insights, neither of them are proficient in capturing both detail and dynamic complexity to the same extent. It has been argued in literature that a hybrid approach, wherein SD and DES are integrated symbiotically, will provide more realistic picture of complex systems with fewer assumptions and less complexity. In spite of wide recognition of healthcare as a complex multi- dimensional system, there has not been any reported study which utilises hybrid simulation. This could be attributed to the fact that due to fundamental differences, the mixing of methodologies is quite challenging. In order to overcome these challenges a generic theoretical framework for hybrid simulation is required. However, there is presently no such generic framework which provides guidance about integration of SD and DES to form hybrid models. This research has attempted to provide such a framework for hybrid simulation which can be utilised in healthcare domain. On the basis of knowledge induced from literature, three requirements for the generic framework have been established. It is argued that the framework for hybrid simulation should be able to provide answers to Why (why hybrid simulation is required), What (what information is exchanged between SD and DES models) and How (how SD and DES models are going to interact with each other over the time to exchange information) within the context of implementation of hybrid simulation to different problem scenarios. In order to meet these requirements, a three-phase generic framework for hybrid simulation has been proposed. Each phase of the framework is mapped to an established requirement and provides guidelines for addressing that requirement. The proposed framework is then evaluated theoretically based on its ability to meet these requirements by using multiple cases, and accordingly modified. It is further evaluated empirically with a single case study comprising of Accident and Emergency department of a London district general hospital. The purpose of this empirical evaluation is to identify the limitations of the framework with regard to the implementation of hybrid models. It is realised during implementation that the modified framework has certain limitations pertaining to the exchange of information between SD and DES models. These limitations are reflected upon and addressed in the final framework. The main contribution of this thesis is the generic framework for hybrid simulation which has been applied within healthcare context. Through an extensive review of existing literature in hybrid simulation, the thesis has also contributed to knowledge in multi-method approaches. A further contribution is that this research has attempted to quantify the impact of intangible benefits of information systems into tangible business process improvements. It is expected that this work will encourage those engaged in simulation (e.g., researchers, practitioners, decision makers) to realise the potential of cross-fertilisation of the two simulation paradigms

A requirement-driven approach for modelling software architectures

Throughout the software development lifecycle (SDLC) there are many pitfalls which software engineers have to face. Regardless of the methodology adopted, classic methodologies such as waterfall or more modern ones such as agile or scrum, defects can be injected in any phase of the SDLC. The main avenue to detect and remove defects is through Quality Assurance (QA) activities. The planned activities to detect, fix and remove defects occur later on and there is less effort spent in the initial phases of the SDLC to either detect, remove or prevent the injection of defects. In fact, the cost of detecting and fixing a defect in the later phases of the SDLC such as development, deployment, maintenance and support is much higher than detecting and fixing defects in the initial phases of the SDLC. The software architecture of the application also has an incidence on defect injection whereby the software architecture can be regarded asthe fundamental structures of a software system. The impact of detecting and fixing defects later on is exacerbated for software architecture which are distributed, such as service-oriented architectures or microservices. Thus, the aim of this research is to develop a semi-automated framework to translate requirements into design with the aim of reducing the introduction of defects from the early phases of the SDLC. Part of the objectives of this work is to conceptualize a design for architectural paradigms such as object-oriented and service-oriented programming. The proposed framework uses a series of techniques from Natural Language Processing (NLP) and a blend of techniques from intelligent learning systems such as ontologies and neural networks to partially automate the translation of requirements into a design. The novelty focuses on moulding the design into an architecture which is better adapted for distributed systems. The framework is evaluated with a case study where the design and architecture from the framework is compared to a design and architecture which was drawn by a software architect. In addition, the evaluation using a case study aims to demonstrate the use of the framework and how each individual design and architecture artefacts fair