A Case Study of Casework Tinkering

Citizens with complex problems are often in touch with different welfare services and administrative systems in order to receive the help, they need. Sometimes these services overlap and sometimes they conflict. The lack of ready-made services to match the complex, multiple, and often shifting needs of citizens with complex problems presents a challenge to caseworkers in the welfare system. In this article, we zoom in on the management of a single user´s case, in order to examine in detail how caseworkers nevertheless make casework ‘work’. We employ the concept of ‘tinkering’ to highlight the ad hoc and experimental way in which caseworkers work towards adjusting services to the unique case of such citizens. Tinkering has previously been used in studies of human-technology relations, among others in studies of care-work in the welfare system. In this paper, we employ the concept to capture and describe a style of working that, although not a formally recognized method, might be recognizable to many caseworkers in the welfare system. We show how tinkering involves the negotiation of three topics of concern, namely the availability of services, the potentials of services to be adjusted to the particular problems of the citizen, and finally, the potential for interpreting these problems and the citizen’s needs in a way that they match the service. We further demonstrate that casework tinkering involves both short-term and long-term negotiation of services. Firstly, tinkering is involved in the continual adjustment and tailoring of services to the immediate needs of the citizen, but secondly, it also speaks to a more proactive process of working towards a more long-term goal

The Shifting Frontiers of Law: Access to Justice and Underemployment in the Legal Profession

The article examines two interrelated issues attracting attention from the legal academy, the profession, and policy makers: i) the crisis of access to justice among ordinary Canadians, and ii) the increasing number of qualified and underemployed lawyers. This article sets out to understand the interrelated factors underlying these two trends, and explores long-term, accessible solutions to address the misalignment between the supply of underemployed law graduates and a demand for affordable legal services. In response to these twin problems, we examine how legislative reform, open source networks, and the automation of legal work can allow lawyers to create more cost-effective delivery mechanisms for legal services, while allowing clients to choose, and work with, lawyers in a more informed manner. While the alternatives we explore are a radical shift from the traditional methods of the legal profession, they are in line with emerging technological realities, and are realistic market solutions to the access to justice problem. To conclude, we focus on the legal academy’s important role in motivating budding lawyers to think critically about how the legal profession, as a social institution, can be ameliorated to ensure that claims for justice do not fall outside of its purview

Earned value performance measurement : an alternative approach to measuring information systems project progress.

A research report submitted to the Faculty of Commerce, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Master of Commerce.Information Systems (IS) project management is fundamental to organlzations who are involved in the development of information systems, yet IS projects can fail for any number of reasons, and insome cases can result in consi derable financial losses for the organisations that undertake them. One pattern of failure is .hat the IS project takes on a life of its own, continuing to absorb valuable resources without reaching its cbjective. A significant number of these projects will ultimately fail, potentially weakening an organisation's competitive position while siphoning off resources that could be spent developing and implementing successful systems. Earned value performance measurement (EVPM) is a management technique that relates resource planning to schedules and to technical performance requirements. It is formed on a platform of fundamental project management, but with earned value performance measurement, with its focus being the continuous measurement of actual achievement against a detailed performance plan, thus providing a basis for problem identification, corrective actions, and management replanning, whilst providing the information necessary to be able to predict the final costs and fmal schedule forecasts for the project. The purpose of this study is to highlight the earned value performance measurement system, and propose it as an alternative approach that can be used for controlling the IS software development effort.AC 201

Experiences in the use of the structured systems analysis and design methodology (SSADM) in a service organisation

The purpose of this research is to examine the historical development of an information systems methodology in a large West Australian organisation and to detail the experiences and satisfaction levels of information systems practitioners\u27 in using the methodology. The methodology under examination is SSADM (Structured Systems Analysis and Design Methodology) in a service organisation in which I am an employee. The participants of this research are involved in the systems development process as Systems Analysts, Project Leaders, Programmers, Project Manager, and development review and consulting personnel. There were 26 participants involved in this research study ranging in age from 25 to 55 years old

DNA profiling of single sperm cells and single skin flakes in forensics using micromanipulation and whole genome amplification.

In forensic DNA profiling, the occurrence of complex mixed profiles is currently a common issue. Cases involving intimate swabs or skin flake tape liftings are prone to mixed profiles, because of more than one donor contributing to a DNA sample. By DNA profiling of single spermatozoa and skin flakes, problems associated with mixed profile could ideally be overcome. However, PCR is not a sensitive enough method to generate DNA profiles by STRs on single cells. Moreover, high quality intact DNA is required, but is not always available in skin flakes due to degradation. Additionally, single skin flakes are difficult to discriminate from other similar looking particles on tape liftings used to secure DNA samples from evidence. The main purpose of this study was to develop a method that enables DNA profiling of single sperm cells and skin flakes. After studying multiple whole genome amplification (WGA) protocols, REPLI-g Single Cell WGA was selected due to its suitability in the pre-amplification step of template DNA. Micromanipulation was used to isolate single spermatozoa. Furthermore, micromanipulation in combination with REPLI-g Single Cell WGA resulted in successful DNA profiling of single spermatozoa by using autosomal STRs as well as X- and Y-chromosomal STRs. The single spermatozoa DNA profiling method described in this thesis was successfully used to identify male contributors from mock intimate swabs with a mixture of semen from multiple male contributors. Different dyes were analysed to develop a staining method to discriminate skin flakes from other particles including particles such as those from hair cosmetic products. From all dyes tested, Orange G was the only dye which successfully discriminated skin flakes from hair product particles. Also, an alkaline based lysis protocol was developed that allowed PCR to be carried out directly on the lysates of single skin flakes. Furthermore, REPLI-g Single Cell WGA was tested on single skin flakes. In contrast to the single spermatozoa, REPLI-g Single Cell WGA was not successful in DNA profiling of single skin flakes. The single skin flake DNA profiling method described in this thesis was successfully used in correctly identifying contributors from mock mixed DNA evidence. Additionally, a small amplicon-based NGS method was tested on single skin flakes. Compared to the PCR and CE approach, the small amplicon-based NGS method improved DNA profiling of single skin flakes, giving a significant increase in allele recovery. In conclusion, this study shows circumventing mixtures is possible by DNA profiling of single spermatozoa, using micromanipulation and WGA. Furthermore, DNA profiling of single skin flakes has been improved by the staining of tape liftings methodology with Orange G, alkaline lysis, direct-PCR and a small amplicon-based NGS approach. Nonetheless, future work is required to assess the performance of the single spermatozoa method on mock swabs with more diluted semen. Also, commercially available NGS kits should be tested with single skin flakes and compared with the in-house NGS method

Using and evaluating CASE tools : from software engineering to phenomenology

CASE (Computer-Aided Systems Engineering) is a recent addition to the long line of "silver bullets" that promise to transform information systems development, delivering new levels of quality and productivity. CASE is particularly intriguing because information systems (IS) practitioners spend their working lives applying information technology (IT) to other people's work, and now they are applying it to themselves. CASE research to date has been dominated by accounts of tool development, normative writings (for example practitioner success stories) and surveys recording IT specialists' perceptions. There have been very few in-depth studies of tool use, and very few attempts to quantify benefits, therefore the essence of the CASE process remains largely unexplored, and the views of stakeholders other than the IT specialists have yet to be heard. The research presented here addresses these concerns by adopting a hybrid research approach combining action research, grounded theory and phenoinenology and using both qualitative and quantitative data in order to tell the story of a system developer's experience in using CASE tools in three information systems projects for a major UK car manufacturer over a four year period. The author was the lead developer on all three projects. Action research is a learning process, the researcher is an explorer. At the start of this project it was assumed that the tools would be the focus of the work. As the research progressed it became evident that the tools were but part of a richer organisational context in which culture, politics, history, external initiatives and cognitive limitations played important roles. The author continued to record experiences and impressions of tool use in the project diary together with quality and productivity metrics. But the diary also became home to a story of organisational developments that had not originally been foreseen. The principal contribution made by the work is to identity the narrow positivistic nature of CASE knowledge, and to show via the research stories the overwhelming importance of organisational context to systems development success and how the exploration of context is poorly supported by the tools. Sixteen further contributions are listed in the Conclusions to the thesis, including a major extension to Wynekoop and Conger's CASE research taxonomy, an identification of the potentially misleading nature of quantitative IS assessment and further evidence of the limitations of the "scientific" approach to systems development. The thesis is completed by two proposals for further work. The first seeks to advance IS theory by developing further a number of emerging process models of IS development. The second seeks to advance IS practice by asking the question "How can CASE tools be used to stimulate awareness and debate about the effects of organisational context?", and outlines a programme of research in this area

Sistemas de informação para executivos (EIS). Uma experiência de aplicação

Tese submetida à Universidade Portucalense para obtenção do grau de Mestre em Informática, elaborada sob a orientação de Prof. Doutor Reis Lima e Eng. Jorge S. Coelho.A informação é cada vez mais um recurso estratégico das organizações. Desde que, a partir dos anos 60, se começaram a utilizar os computadores na automatizaçãoindustrial e na gestão operacional das organizações que se começaram a construir bases de dados(e ficheiros tradicionais) onde setem vindo a acumular quantidades enormes de informação. Mas o potencial desta informação tem, muitas vezes, permanecido escondido. E o aumento da competiçãoe da liberalização dos mercados tem conduzido a necessidades crescentes de informação para decisão. A informação é, também, uma vantagem competitiva. Neste contexto, vimos assistindo ao desenvolvimento de um conjunto de tecnologias para o fornecimento de informação para apoio à decisão : Executive Information Systems (EIS), Decision Support Systems (DSS), On-Line Analytical Processing (OLAP), Data Warehousing e Data Mining. Este trabalho descreve o estádio de desenvolvimento actual deste tipo de tecnologia, as principais tendências e perspectivas da sua evolução, a actual oferta de mercado e os principais cuidados a ter na selecção destas ferramentas e no desenvolvimento de projectos para a sua introdução nas organizações. Far-se-á ainda a descrição de uma experiência concreta de aplicação numa Direcção de uma grande empresa de telecomunicações

Quantitative functional complexity analysis of commercial software systems

Digitisation of this thesis was sponsored by Arcadia Fund, a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin

Writing and animating Z specifications.

The work presented in this thesis is concerned with the issues involved in writing and demonstrating formal specifications of information systems written in Z. The use of Z in software development, to enhance productivity and improve software quality, is not without its problems. Whilst the notation itself is highly developed, ways of systematically using Z to create specifications are, by contrast, poorly documented. Also, given that most commissioners of software are not skilled in reading Z, ways of demonstrating the important features of a formal Z specification to a customer are needed if the effective validation of the specification against user requirements is to take place. In this thesis we present a systematic approach, known as OPERATOR, for developing Z specifications and evaluate it against the issues identified for writing formal specifications. We also look at various ways of demonstrating Z specifications. We describe how Z specifications may be animated using Crystal, but go on to present a prototype CASE tool, known as Zappa, that may be used to create and demonstrate faithful animations of Z specifications. The thesis starts with a thorough review of software engineering and of the development and rise of formal methods. The development of the OPERATOR approach is then given along with a review of animation, a description of the Crystal technique, and the development of the CASE tool Zappa. An evaluation of the research against the stated aims is presented and areas where future research is needed are pointed out