Service Quality Assessment for Cloud-based Distributed Data Services

The issue of less-than-100% reliability and trust-worthiness of third-party controlled cloud components (e.g., IaaS and SaaS components from different vendors) may lead to laxity in the QoS guarantees offered by a service-support system S to various applications. An example of S is a replicated data service to handle customer queries with fault-tolerance and performance goals. QoS laxity (i.e., SLA violations) may be inadvertent: say, due to the inability of system designers to model the impact of sub-system behaviors onto a deliverable QoS. Sometimes, QoS laxity may even be intentional: say, to reap revenue-oriented benefits by cheating on resource allocations and/or excessive statistical-sharing of system resources (e.g., VM cycles, number of servers). Our goal is to assess how well the internal mechanisms of S are geared to offer a required level of service to the applications. We use computational models of S to determine the optimal feasible resource schedules and verify how close is the actual system behavior to a model-computed \u27gold-standard\u27. Our QoS assessment methods allow comparing different service vendors (possibly with different business policies) in terms of canonical properties: such as elasticity, linearity, isolation, and fairness (analogical to a comparative rating of restaurants). Case studies of cloud-based distributed applications are described to illustrate our QoS assessment methods. Specific systems studied in the thesis are: i) replicated data services where the servers may be hosted on multiple data-centers for fault-tolerance and performance reasons; and ii) content delivery networks to geographically distributed clients where the content data caches may reside on different data-centers. The methods studied in the thesis are useful in various contexts of QoS management and self-configurations in large-scale cloud-based distributed systems that are inherently complex due to size, diversity, and environment dynamicity

Optimization and Disruption in Physical Retail Shopping Environment

Every year, queues cost brick-and-mortar retailers billions in lost revenues, and consumers are growing more impatient about standing in line. To survive the competition from e-commerce, stores need new innovations that can help kill queues (Worldline, 2020). If you have ever waited in a long line at the grocery store, for luggage at an airport etc. then you have an image of it and you know the pain it brings when you have to wait for someone. Hence from these we understand that it is important to optimize checkout at retail environment(store or complex) and for this to be 100% efficient, the system to be proposed needs to be efficient and effective. Bringing us to this research that we decide to conducted, which we shall solve it by applying our main theory which is the Queuing Theory. From these theory we decided to bring out two methods in other to solve this, firstly we will need to synchronise the result of our research (i.e. The System) with the retail environment for this optimization to be optimal, but from our research we also discovered that there are cases where the retail environment will not collaborate with us, hence looking at this situation, we decided to implement a digital disruptive system for it to be used at retail environment. The slight difference here is that, the retail environment(store or complex) will not be in collaboration with us and hence we needed our system to be scalable and adaptable for it to provide the ability to the system to work without the needs of collaborating with the retail environment(store or complex). Doing both of these cases, it will help us to increase the optimization of shopping in retail environment (store or complex). The main aims of our research was to Optimize Queue in Retail Environment both in Rwanda and Norway since many people are still doing their shopping physically hence we did research on 4 theory which help us through out our research. Namely: 1. Queuing Theory 2. Microservices Theory 3. Software Design Theory 4. Qualitative Research Theor

CHARTING PROGRESS IN THE SOFTWARE ACQUISITION PATHWAY

The Department of the Navy (DON) recently implemented the Department of Defense (DOD) Software Acquisition Pathway (SWP), a software acquisition strategy for custom application and embedded software. The purpose of the SWP is to enable rapid and iterative delivery of high-priority software capability to the intended user. But while the SWP uses an agile software development approach, neither the DOD nor the DON have yet provided comprehensive governance tools and methods for SWP programs to iteratively plan, track, and assess acquisition outcomes in agile environments. To close this gap, the author systematically researched commercial software engineering management and digital product development practices as well as prior DOD software acquisition reform studies. Based on the results, the author showed that Earned Value Management is incompatible with the SWP and recommended alternative techniques to measure cost and schedule performance. Additionally, the author recommended a phased approach to manage DON SWP custom application programs, whereby a minimal, unitless work breakdown structure is used to track progress until demonstrating the minimum viable product to the user in a testing environment; product-based metrics are then tracked until initial release of the custom application software; and then outcome-based goals are iteratively set, tracked, and assessed using the Objectives and Key Results framework for as long as the custom application software is in use.Captain, United States Air ForceApproved for public release. Distribution is unlimited

Passenger Flows in Underground Railway Stations and Platforms, MTI Report 12-43

Urban rail systems are designed to carry large volumes of people into and out of major activity centers. As a result, the stations at these major activity centers are often crowded with boarding and alighting passengers, resulting in passenger inconvenience, delays, and at times danger. This study examines the planning and analysis of station passenger queuing and flows to offer rail transit station designers and transit system operators guidance on how to best accommodate and manage their rail passengers. The objectives of the study are to: 1) Understand the particular infrastructural, operational, behavioral, and spatial factors that affect and may constrain passenger queuing and flows in different types of rail transit stations; 2) Identify, compare, and evaluate practices for efficient, expedient, and safe passenger flows in different types of station environments and during typical (rush hour) and atypical (evacuations, station maintenance/ refurbishment) situations; and 3) Compile short-, medium-, and long-term recommendations for optimizing passenger flows in different station environments

Ideas on Customer-oriented Queuing in Service Incident Management

The provision of services hinges considerably on the contribution of the provider and the customer and - if present - on their involved networks. In this working paper we focus on incident management. By understanding the influence of a customer`s contribution to a service, the provider should be able to improve the interaction quality in general. Furthermore the provider should be able to determine and control his effort based on the expected customer`s contribution

Measurements based performance analysis of Web services

Web services are increasingly used to enable interoperability and flexible integration of software systems. In this thesis we focus on measurement-based performance analysis of an e-commerce application which uses Web services components to execute business operations. In our experiments we use a session-oriented workload generated by a tool developed accordingly to TPC-W specification. The empirical results are obtained for two different user profiles, Browsing and Ordering, under different workload intensities. In addition to variation in workloads we also study the applications performance when Web services are implemented using .NET and J2EE. Unlike the previous work which was focused on the overall server response time and throughput, we present Web interaction, software architecture, and hardware resource level analysis of the system performance. In particular, we propose a method for extracting component level response times from the application server logs and study the impact of Web services and other components on the server performance. The results show that the response times of Web services components increase significantly under higher workload intensities when compared to other components. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)

Opnet, Arne, and the Classroom

This paper examines OPNET Technology, Inc\u27s management programs, and Regis University\u27s Academic Research Network (ARNe) needs to find out which OPNET programs can meet the needs of ARNe. The method used was to examine ARNe\u27s needs, and research Microsoft\u27s SMF/MOF management framework, research OPNET\u27s program and module offerings, research OPNET\u27s University Program, and research how OPNET\u27s programs are used at some other universities. The research was used to create a match up between Microsoft\u27s Service Management Functions and OPNET\u27s programs and modules. And it was used to create a list of textbooks, labs, and lab manuals that would work with OPNET\u27s IT Guru and Modeler in a classroom to help teach networking theory. The examination was combined with the research to create an evaluation criteria matrix from which project recommendations could be drawn. The conclusion was that the following OPNET Technology programs and modules could be of benefit to Regis University\u27s ARNe - ACE, Automation module, Commander, DAC module, Flow Analysis module, IT Sentinel, IT Guru, NetDoctor, Report Server, and VNE Server

Lost customers: determinants and process of relationship dissolution

Relationship dynamics and relationship ending have received increased attention by marketing researchers over the last years. The success of businesses depends not only on the acquisition and retention of customers, but also on avoiding their defection. Furthermore, there is a lack of research in the services literature focusing on the decline and ending of customer relationships. By knowing more about the nature, elements, stages and factors involved in the dissolution process it will be easier to prevent churn or regain lost customers. This research presents a literature review about what contributes to and influences this process (switching determinants) suggesting the most and less relevant determinants, according to ample and updated research. This review also provides some preliminary ideas about the process of relationship dissolution that is proposed on the end of the paper