Investigations into Elasticity in Cloud Computing

The pay-as-you-go model supported by existing cloud infrastructure providers is appealing to most application service providers to deliver their applications in the cloud. Within this context, elasticity of applications has become one of the most important features in cloud computing. This elasticity enables real-time acquisition/release of compute resources to meet application performance demands. In this thesis we investigate the problem of delivering cost-effective elasticity services for cloud applications. Traditionally, the application level elasticity addresses the question of how to scale applications up and down to meet their performance requirements, but does not adequately address issues relating to minimising the costs of using the service. With this current limitation in mind, we propose a scaling approach that makes use of cost-aware criteria to detect the bottlenecks within multi-tier cloud applications, and scale these applications only at bottleneck tiers to reduce the costs incurred by consuming cloud infrastructure resources. Our approach is generic for a wide class of multi-tier applications, and we demonstrate its effectiveness by studying the behaviour of an example electronic commerce site application. Furthermore, we consider the characteristics of the algorithm for implementing the business logic of cloud applications, and investigate the elasticity at the algorithm level: when dealing with large-scale data under resource and time constraints, the algorithm's output should be elastic with respect to the resource consumed. We propose a novel framework to guide the development of elastic algorithms that adapt to the available budget while guaranteeing the quality of output result, e.g. prediction accuracy for classification tasks, improves monotonically with the used budget.Comment: 211 pages, 27 tables, 75 figure

An Investigation into Factors Affecting the Chilled Food Industry

With the advent of Industry 4.0, many new approaches towards process monitoring, benchmarking and traceability are becoming available, and these techniques have the potential to radically transform the agri-food sector. In particular, the chilled food supply chain (CFSC) contains a number of unique challenges by virtue of it being thought of as a temperature controlled supply chain. Therefore, once the key issues affecting the CFSC have been identified, algorithms can be proposed, which would allow realistic thresholds to be established for managing these problems on the micro, meso and macro scales. Hence, a study is required into factors affecting the CFSC within the scope of Industry 4.0. The study itself has been broken down into four main topics: identifying the key issues within the CFSC; implementing a philosophy of continuous improvement within the CFSC; identifying uncertainty within the CFSC; improving and measuring the performance of the supply chain. However, as a consequence of this study two further topics were added: a discussion of some of the issues surrounding information sharing between retailers and suppliers; some of the wider issues affecting food losses and wastage (FLW) on the micro, meso and macro scales. A hybrid algorithm is developed, which incorporates the analytic hierarchical process (AHP) for qualitative issues and data envelopment analysis (DEA) for quantitative issues. The hybrid algorithm itself is a development of the internal auditing algorithm proposed by Sueyoshi et al (2009), which in turn was developed following corporate scandals such as Tyco, Enron, and WorldCom, which have led to a decline in public trust. However, the advantage of the proposed solution is that all of the key issues within the CFSC identified can be managed from a single computer terminal, whilst the risk of food contamination such as the 2013 horsemeat scandal can be avoided via improved traceability

Adapting omnichannel strategies to answer post-pandemic consumers' evolved in-store shopping expectations

Technology-infused omnichannel strategies have solidified their role in the turbulent environment of retailing. The advantages of such retailing approaches have been recognised during the interminable rise of e-commerce in the past decades, but the physical resurgence of consumers after the global pandemic evolved omnichannel expectations to new standards. Now, consumers desire a blend of online convenience in physical stores, driving retailers to adapt their technological capabilities to ensure seamless in-store shopping experiences. Because omnichanneling has become a necessity, retailers need to possess the understanding of providing valuable customer journeys. To offer insights and perspectives around the novel shift in physical retailing, this thesis was conducted as a two-case study, examining two retail giants that have emerged from opposite sides, the physical-first Target and online-dominant Amazon. To gain recent knowledge from the two companies, mainly qualitative secondary data was collected from diverse online sources, which were scrutinised employing content analysis and thematic synthesis. The longitudinal time horizon allowed for a progressive viewpoint to be constructed regarding the evolving dynamics between online and offline channels, and the role of technological implementations. The results of this thesis firstly sum up the expectations of consumers that have evolved pre- and post-pandemic, mainly the pursuit of convenience, continuity, and hedonistic aspects. Furthermore, this thesis explores various innovative technological features and how they can be integrated into physical stores to support seamless omnichannel expectations. In line with the results, the thesis suggests that most widely adapted technologies within case companies are scattered between the many phases of the shopping journey, either designed to complement the shopping experience by enhancing the favoured attributes, make the in-store interactions and steps more autonomous, or automate back-end operations. These technologies can be joined as a part of cohesive omnichannel experiences to contribute to borderless channel integration, all-inclusive offerings, and personalisation. The findings demonstrate that both case companies have explicit connections with theoretical frameworks. Along with the findings and synthesis, this thesis reinforces the discourse of post- pandemic omnichannel experiences and supplies real-life examples of diverse strategic uses of in-store technologies.Teknologiapohjaiset omnikanavastrategiat ovat vakiinnuttaneet asemansa vähittäiskaupan epävakaassa ympäristössä. Tällaisten vähittäismyyntitapojen edut ovat tiedostettu viime vuosikymmeninä verkkokaupankäynnin jatkuvan nousun aikana, mutta kuluttajien fyysinen palaaminen maailmanlaajuisen pandemian jälkeen nosti omnikanavaodotukset uusiin standardeihin. Nykyään kuluttajat mielivät yhdistelmiä verkkokaupan etuja fyysisissä myymälöissä, mikä ajaa vähittäismyyjiä mukauttamaan teknologisia valmiuksiaan varmistaakseen saumattoman ostoskokemuksen myymälässä. Koska omnikanavointi on muodostunut välttämättömyydeksi, vähittäismyyjien on ymmärrettävä, miten tarjota arvokkaita asiakasmatkoja. Tarjotakseen näkemyksiä ja perspektiivejä fyysisen vähittäiskaupan tuoreesta muutoksesta, tämä pro gradu -tutkielma toteutettiin tapaustutkimuksena tarkastellen kahta vastakkaiset lähtökohdat omaavaa vähittäiskaupan jättiläistä, kivijalkalähtöistä Targetia ja verkkovaltaista Amazonia. Molemmista yrityksistä hankittiin ajantasaista tietoa, pääasiassa laadullista sekundääridataa monipuolisista verkkolähteistä, jotka tarkasteltiin sisällönanalyysin ja teemasynteesin avulla. Pitkittäistutkimuksen aikajänne mahdollisti progressiivisen näkökulman muodostamisen verkkokanavien ja fyysisten kanavien välillä muuttuvista dynamiikoista ja toteutettujen teknologioiden roolista. Tämän tutkielman tulokset tiivistävät kuluttajien odotukset, jotka ovat kehittyneet ennen ja jälkeen pandemian, pääasiassa mukavuuden, jatkuvuuden ja hedonististen näkökohtien osalta. Lisäksi tutkielma tutustuu erilaisiin innovatiivisiin teknologiaominaisuuksiin ja siihen, miten niitä voidaan integroida fyysisiin myymälöihin edesauttamaan saumattomia omnikanavaodotuksia. Tulosten mukaisesti tutkielma ehdottaa, että tapaustutkimusyritysten laajimmin omaksutut teknologiat ovat hajallaan monissa ostosmatkan vaiheissa, joko suunniteltu täydentämään ostoskokemusta korostamalla haluttuja piirteitä, itsenäistämään myymälässä tapahtuvat vuorovaikutukset ja ostovaiheet tai automatisoimaan taustaprosesseja. Nämä teknologiat voidaan yhdistää osaksi yhtenäisiä omnikanavakokemuksia edistämään saumattomia kanavaintegraatioita, kaiken kattavaa tarjontaa ja personointia. Tutkimuksen löydökset osoittavat, että molemmilla tapaustutkimusyrityksillä on selviä yhteyksiä teoreettisiin viitekehyksiin. Löydösten ja synteesin ohella tämä tutkielma vahvistaa pandemian jälkeistä omnikanavakokemuksia koskevaa keskustelua ja tarjoaa todellisia esimerkkejä erilaisten myymäläteknologioiden strategisista käyttötavoista

Accounting Information Systems [1st Australasian edition]

At last – the Australasian edition of Romney and Steinbart's respected AIS text! Accounting Information Systems first Australasian edition offers the most comprehensive and student-friendly coverage of Accounting Information Systems in Australia, New Zealand and Asia. Accounting Information Systems has been extensively revised and updated to incorporate local laws, standards and business practices. The text has a new and flexible structure developed especially for Australasian AIS courses, while also retaining the features that make the US edition easy to use. Important concepts such as systems cycles, controls, auditing, fraud and cybercrime, ethics and the REA data model are brought to life by a wide variety of Australasian case studies and examples. With a learning and teaching resource package second to none, this is the perfect resource for one-semester undergraduate and graduate courses in Accounting Information Systems