Modelling interdependencies between the electricity and information infrastructures

The aim of this paper is to provide qualitative models characterizing interdependencies related failures of two critical infrastructures: the electricity infrastructure and the associated information infrastructure. The interdependencies of these two infrastructures are increasing due to a growing connection of the power grid networks to the global information infrastructure, as a consequence of market deregulation and opening. These interdependencies increase the risk of failures. We focus on cascading, escalating and common-cause failures, which correspond to the main causes of failures due to interdependencies. We address failures in the electricity infrastructure, in combination with accidental failures in the information infrastructure, then we show briefly how malicious attacks in the information infrastructure can be addressed

Post-disaster Information Infrastructure: The 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake

Government reports and members of the media blame information systems as the culprit of what has been characterized as faulty responses to disasters such as Virginia Tech and Hurricane Katrina. In the process they propose information and communication technologies (ICTs) as solutions to disaster response. Calls for new ICTs following recent American disasters reveal a poor understanding of the socially situated nature of ICTs. Disaster-related research does not expound a sophisticated understanding of ICTs either. As a consequence, information systems are seen as an unproblematic means of informing the right people with the right information at the right time. In my dissertation, I will challenge these simplistic notions of information systems as solutions to disaster response by proposing two case studies of ???information environments??? from the period following the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. I will introduce an analytical framework from the social studies of information which situates information systems in the social environment. The theoretical construct, the ???information environment,??? is meant to overcome the limitations of studying ICTs from a purely technical perspective

On the enterprise modelling of an educational information infrastructure

In this report, we present the outcomes of exercising a design trajectory in respect of the modelling of an educational information infrastructure. The\ud infrastructure aims to support the organisation of teaching and learning activities, independently of any particular didactic policy. The design trajectory focuses on capturing invariant structures of relations between entities in educational organisation into Enterprise object models that underlie the design of the intended educational infrastructure.\ud An early-developed prototype of the infrastructure has emphasised the need for an Educational Model Space to determine the modelling and problem domain context apriori to modelling. In this space, educational requirements have been elaborated towards the Open Distributed Processing (ODP) Enterprise Viewpoint object models expressed in terms of the Unified Modelling Language (UML).\ud Recursive structures have been used to capture the dynamic needs of education. Furthermore, these structures are uniform for the planning, performance and evaluation activities of education. The Enterprise models developed can be used to derive the Information Viewpoint models and to further optimise the prototype of the infrastructure. In this work, we have managed to fruitfully combine educational and computer science modelling inputs by using ODP and UML as a bridge for this interdisciplinary collaboration