Annual Report 2014

This report highlights salient features and activities across the spectrum of NPS research activities conducted on behalf of both Navy and Marine Corps topic sponsors during the 2014 fiscal year. Each of the 90 research projects’ executive summary included herein outlines key results. While most of the summaries detail final results, some projects have multi-year project lengths and, therefore, progress to date is reported

Cost-Based Automatic Recovery Policy in Data Centers

Today's data centers either provide critical applications to organizations or host computing clouds used by huge Internet populations. Their size and complex structure make management difficult, causing high operational cost. The large number of servers with various different hardware and software components cause frequent failures and need continuous recovery work. Much of the operational cost is from this recovery work. While there is significant research related to automatic recovery, from automatic error detection to different automatic recovery techniques, there is currently no automatic solution that can determine the exact fault, and hence the preferred recovery action. There is some study on how to automatically select a suitable recovery action without knowing the fault behind the error. In this thesis we propose an estimated-total-cost model based on analysis of the cost and the recovery-action-success probability. Our recovery-action selection is based on minimal estimated-total-cost; we implement three policies to use this model under different considerations of failed recovery attempts. The preferred policy is to reduce the recovery action-success probability when it failed to fix the error; we also study different reduction coefficients in this policy. To evaluate the various policies, we design and implement a simulation environment. Our simulation experiments demonstrate significant cost improvement over previous research based on simple heuristic models

A Model for the Evaluation of IS/IT Investments

Evaluation is a vital--yet challenging--part of IS/IT management and governance. The benefits (or lack therefore) associated with IS/IT investments have been widely debated within academic and industrial communities alike. Investments in information technology may or may not result in desirable outcomes. Yet, organizations must rely on information systems to remain competitive. Effective evaluation serves as one pathway to ensuring success. However, despite a growing multitude of measures and methods, practitioners continue to struggle with this intractable problem. Responding to the limited success of existing methods, scholars have argued that academicians should first develop a better understanding of the process of IS/IT evaluation. In addition, scholars have also posited that IS/IT evaluation practice should be tailored to fit a given organization\u27s particular context. Of course, one cannot simply tell practitioners to be contextual when conducting evaluations and then hope for improved outcomes. Instead, having developed an improved understanding of the IS/IT evaluation process, researchers should articulate unambiguous guidelines to practitioners. The researcher addressed this need using a multi-phase research methodology. To start, the researcher conducted a literature review to identify and describe the relevant contextual elements operating in the IS/IT evaluation process: the purpose of conducting the evaluation (why); the subject of the evaluation (what); the specific aspects to be evaluated (which); the particular evaluation methods and techniques used (how); the timing of the evaluation (when); the individuals involved in, or affected by, the evaluation (who); and the environmental conditions under which the organization operates (where). Based upon these findings, the researcher followed a modeling-as-theorizing approach to develop a conceptual model of IS/IT evaluation. Next, the conceptual model was validated by applying it to multiple case studies selected from the extant literature. Once validated, the researcher utilized the model to develop a series of methodological guidelines to aid organizations in conducting evaluations. The researcher summarized these guidelines in the form of a checklist for professional practitioners. The researcher believes this holistic, conceptual model of IS/IT evaluation serves as an important step in advancing theory. In addition, the researcher\u27s guidelines for conducting IS/IT evaluation based on organizational goals and conditions represents a significant contribution to industrial practice. Thus, the implications of this study come full circle: an improved understanding of evaluation should result in improved evaluation practices