Trends in legislations affecting library and information practice in Uganda

Introduction: legislation and ethics as one of the top five themes that preoccupied LIS scholars and practitioners in the first decade of the 21st century. This is true for Library and Information Science and its related disciplines such as Records, information and archives, archeology and museum study. Objective: This paper attempts to discuss the various trends in legislations relating to the Library and Information Science discipline and profession. Methodology: In this research, reviewing literature was used to define the main concepts of this research. Findings: There is a noticeable attribute that more legislations are likely to be drafted and passed. Indeed, there are noticeable trends in the nature of legislation relating to LIS which include the shift from a more right based form of legislations to legislations concerned with social order; a shift towards embracing changing technologies with in the legislations; thirdly, there is a shift towards the internationalisation; a shift towards open access to LIS material from closed access; the adoption of the Western values of LIS values; and adoption of LIS perspectives in other legislations Conclusion: Professionals cannot afford the comfort of waiting for new developments to be handed down to them but rather equip themselves with competences to; locate and evaluate primary and secondary material, understanding its value as a professional decision-making resource; apply existing legal tenets to various library environments and develop practical compliance; and express professional responsibility, views concerning the legal problems in the library and information sciences in which one is situated

The success-index: an alternative approach to the h-index for evaluating an individual's research output

Among the most recent bibliometric indicators for normalizing the differences among fields of science in terms of citation behaviour, Kosmulski (J Informetr 5(3):481-485, 2011) proposed the NSP (number of successful paper) index. According to the authors, NSP deserves much attention for its great simplicity and immediate meaning— equivalent to those of the h-index—while it has the disadvantage of being prone to manipulation and not very efficient in terms of statistical significance. In the first part of the paper, we introduce the success-index, aimed at reducing the NSP-index's limitations, although requiring more computing effort. Next, we present a detailed analysis of the success-index from the point of view of its operational properties and a comparison with the h-index's ones. Particularly interesting is the examination of the success-index scale of measurement, which is much richer than the h-index's. This makes success-index much more versatile for different types of analysis—e.g., (cross-field) comparisons of the scientific output of (1) individual researchers, (2) researchers with different seniority, (3) research institutions of different size, (4) scientific journals, etc

Is Your Brand Going Out of Fashion? A Quantitative, Causal Study Designed to Harness the Web for Early Indicators of Brand Value

Can Internet search query data be a relevant predictor of financial measures of brand value? Can Internet search query data enrich existing financial measures of brand valuation tools and provide more timely insights to brand managers? Along with the financial based motivation to estimate the value of a brand for accounting purposes, marketers desire to show “accountability” of marketing activity and respond to the customer’s perception of the brand quickly to maintain their competitive advantage and value. The usefulness of the “consumer information processing” framework for brand, consumer and firm forecasting is examined. To develop our hypotheses, we draw from the growing body of work relating web searches to real world outcomes, to determine if a search query for a brand is causal to, and potentially predictive of brand, consumer and firm value. The contribution to current literature is that search queries can predict perception, whereas previous research in this nascent area predicted behavior and events. In this direction, we propose arguments underpinning this research as follows: the theoretical background relative to brand valuation and the theoretical frame based on an in-depth review of how scholars have used search query data as a predictive measure across several disciplines including economics and the health sciences. From a practitioner perspective, unlike traditional valuation methods search query data for brands is more timely, actionable, and inclusive

To What Extent Can Lean Construction Processes and Principles be Utilised in the Design Stage of a BIM Project in the Irish Design and Construction Industry

Although different in many ways, Building Information Modelling (BIM) and Lean Construction are two processes that are having a significant impact on the Design & Construction Industry. In recent years, the Irish AECO industry has seen a tenfold increase across numerous construction disciplines with the adoption of new workflows and processes centred around both BIM and Lean methodologies. Existing literature identifies a strong synergistic relationship between the two processes and highlights the opportunity for Lean processes and principles to be implemented into the design stage workflow. This paper investigated existing literature relating to several lean processes currently implemented in the construction industry and specifically highlights Target Value Delivery (TVD), Last Planner System (LPS) & Set Based Design (SBD) as suitable for implementation during the design stages. The Thematic Analysis method was used for analysing the data sets obtained from the online questionnaire and interviews to help gauge industry awareness and opinion relating to the implementation and potential constraints associated with the side by side implementation of these processes. An interaction matrix that investigated the positive and negative interactions associated with the synergistic relationship between the two processes was carried out as part of this research. Additionally, this paper investigated and collated a list of barriers that exist in today\u27s design and construction industry that continue to prevent a complete and successful BIM project delivery process and specifically highlighted the need to identify the value to project stakeholders when implementing these new processes throughout all project areas of the AECO industry

How the Marsden Fund has failed to achieve its full potential in the ESA panel: evidence of limitations in scope, biased outcomes, and futile applications

We have analysed the scope of proposals funded by the ‘Earth Sciences and Astronomy’ (ESA) panel of the Marsden Fund for the period 2004 to 2013. The scope of proposals funded is very limited and does not reflect the full remit of the panel: the successful projects fail to encompass the quality and quantity of research being undertaken within the Earth sciences community in New Zealand, and a number of sub-disciplines that seek to address fundamental and important problems within the Earth sciences are largely excluded. Moreover, nearly 50% of the funded proposals for the past decade have been made to just two institutions. To address these limitations, we suggest that: (1) a review is undertaken to examine and widen the scope of the panel to encompass sub-disciplines that demonstrably are never or rarely funded; (2) the composition of panel members be examined and modified to reflect a much wider scope of sub-disciplines within the Earth sciences; and (3) a review of the wide discrepancies in funding distributions on an institutional basis be undertaken. We want to ensure that a more representative range of sub-disciplines, in keeping with modern and realistic definitions of the Earth sciences, is funded through this panel, and so we also recommend the formation of a new panel for ‘Environmental and Earth-system Sciences’ that could encompass the research involving modern-day processes so that applications in these sub-disciplines are not pointless. In addition, it is clear that a very substantial increase in funding to the Marsden Fund must be sought

Virtual integration platform for computational fluid dynamics

Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) tools used in shipbuilding industry involve multiple disciplines, such as resistance, manoeuvring, and cavitation. Traditionally, the analysis was performed separately and sequentially in each discipline, which often resulted in conflict and inconsistency of hydrodynamic prediction. In an effort to solve such problems for future CFD computations, a Virtual Integration Platform (VIP) has been developed in the University of Strathclyde within two EU FP6 projects - VIRTUE and SAFEDOR1. The VIP provides a holistic collaborative environment for designers with features such as Project/Process Management, Distributed Tools Integration, Global Optimisation, Version Management, and Knowledge Management. These features enhance collaboration among customers, ship design companies, shipyards, and consultancies not least because they bring together the best expertise and resources around the world. The platform has been tested in seven European ship design companies including consultancies. Its main functionalities along with advances are presented in this paper with two industrial applications