TCitySmartF: A comprehensive systematic framework for transforming cities into smart cities

A shared agreed-upon definition of "smart city" (SC) is not available and there is no "best formula" to follow in transforming each and every city into SC. In a broader inclusive definition, it can be described as an opportunistic concept that enhances harmony between the lives and the environment around those lives perpetually in a city by harnessing the smart technology enabling a comfortable and convenient living ecosystem paving the way towards smarter countries and the smarter planet. SCs are being implemented to combine governors, organisations, institutions, citizens, environment, and emerging technologies in a highly synergistic synchronised ecosystem in order to increase the quality of life (QoL) and enable a more sustainable future for urban life with increasing natural resource constraints. In this study, we analyse how to develop citizen- and resource-centric smarter cities based on the recent SC development initiatives with the successful use cases, future SC development plans, and many other particular SC development solutions. The main features of SC are presented in a framework fuelled by recent technological advancement, particular city requirements and dynamics. This framework - TCitySmartF 1) aims to aspire a platform that seamlessly forges engineering and technology solutions with social dynamics in a new philosophical city automation concept - socio-technical transitions, 2) incorporates many smart evolving components, best practices, and contemporary solutions into a coherent synergistic SC topology, 3) unfolds current and future opportunities in order to adopt smarter, safer and more sustainable urban environments, and 4) demonstrates a variety of insights and orchestrational directions for local governors and private sector about how to transform cities into smarter cities from the technological, social, economic and environmental point of view, particularly by both putting residents and urban dynamics at the forefront of the development with participatory planning and interaction for the robust community- and citizen-tailored services. The framework developed in this paper is aimed to be incorporated into the real-world SC development projects in Lancashire, UK

Good practice guide

Summary with good practices from the Interreg ITRACT project on smart mobility in rural areas

Business Intelligence And Geographic Information System Lifecycle Architecture Using Cloud Computing For Smart Community

Business Intelligence (BI) is a technique and IT tool that supports business decision making. BI is considered a unique source of competitive advantage in the market place and it can combine data, multimedia, and transactions all in one application to address people\u27s needs. Using BI applications can increase both operational efficiency and customer satisfaction. In addition, BI improves planning that provides the foundation for top successful performances in the future. Geographic Information Systems (GIS) deliver productivity tools that are highly beneficial for businesses. These benefits include: visualization, business capacity, analysis, and interpreting data to understand relationships, patterns, and trends. Another benefit is a new feature can report drivers who speed, accelerate hard, and make sudden stops. Nowadays, GIS is responsible for developing standard, strategy, and policy that emphasize coordination and cooperation among organizations and businesses in order to maximize cost effectiveness. Smart card technology is the name that describes plastic cards with an embedded computer chip. Basically, smart cards are usually the most cost-effective solution because it increases the level of processing power, memory, and flexibility. Therefore, implementing a smart card in a driver\u27s license can help to build control in a community. However, the general objective of the study is to investigate the feasibility of integrating Cloud Computing, BI, and GIS to build smart community. The research focuses on enhancing GIS tools and build control in community. The proposed system is a new approach in Information Technology that can lower business cost and build policy in organization. The research is nonexperimental study used qualitative method to answer certain research questions posed for the study. The result obtained from analysis exists GIS showed that enhance GIS can build control in the community. Furthermore, there is a feasibility integrating BI, Cloud and GIS to build smart community. On the bases of these finding, IT synergy will influence the business workflow process and performance of organization. Organizations can achieve many benefits from the integrating Cloud Computing approach, BI and GIS in decision making

Self-Control in Cyberspace: Applying Dual Systems Theory to a Review of Digital Self-Control Tools

Many people struggle to control their use of digital devices. However, our understanding of the design mechanisms that support user self-control remains limited. In this paper, we make two contributions to HCI research in this space: first, we analyse 367 apps and browser extensions from the Google Play, Chrome Web, and Apple App stores to identify common core design features and intervention strategies afforded by current tools for digital self-control. Second, we adapt and apply an integrative dual systems model of self-regulation as a framework for organising and evaluating the design features found. Our analysis aims to help the design of better tools in two ways: (i) by identifying how, through a well-established model of self-regulation, current tools overlap and differ in how they support self-control; and (ii) by using the model to reveal underexplored cognitive mechanisms that could aid the design of new tools.Comment: 11.5 pages (excl. references), 6 figures, 1 tabl

Cloud computing and context-awareness: A study of the adapted user experience

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.Today, mobile technology is part of everyday life and activities and the mobile ecosystems are blossoming, with smartphones and tablets being the major growth drivers. The mobile phones are no longer just another device, we rely on their capabilities in work and in private. We look to our mobile phones for timely and updated information and we rely on this being provided any time of any day at any place. Nevertheless, no matter how much you trust and love your mobile phone the quality of the information and the user experience is directly associated with the sources and presentation of information. In this perspective, our activities, interactions and preferences help shape the quality of service, content and products we use. Context-aware systems use such information about end-users as input mechanisms for producing applications based on mobile, location, social, cloud and customized content services. This represents new possibilities for extracting aggregated user-centric information and includes novel sources for context-aware applications. Accordingly, a Design Research based approach has been taken to further investigate the creation, presentation and tailoring of user-centric information. Through user evaluated experiments findings show how multi-dimensional context-aware information can be used to create adaptive solutions tailoring the user experience to the users’ needs. Research findings in this work; highlight possible architectures for integration of cloud computing services in a heterogeneous mobile environment in future context-aware solutions. When it comes to combining context-aware results from local computations with those of cloud based services, the results provide findings that give users tailored and adapted experiences based on the collective efforts of the two