Understanding Clients’ Intentions to Explore Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) Features: A Social Capital Theory Perspective

The pervasive post-adoption of on-demand software-as-a-service (SaaS) products via the Internet has provided clients with sufficient convenience and functional flexibility to rent and build the multifunctional services they require. Prior research has called for a deeper understanding of how client firms encourage the exploration of SaaS applications in the workplace. However, exploring the best service combinations depends on the clients’ socially related motivation. Hence, we draw on social capital theory in this study to examine clients’ intentions to explore new SaaS service features. We use service quality to complement structural capital as an indicator, as it is more suitable for assessing the service structure of systems. Drawing on a sample of 246 employees in the IT service departments of small- and medium-sized companies in Taiwan, we generate the following empirical results. First, most of the main effect paths only show significant positive signs for the effect of relational capital on the intention to explore, and the effect of environmental quality on social capital is not supported. Second, we rebuild the mediation model to test the non-supported hypotheses and find that relational capital partially mediates the relationship between service quality and the intention to explore. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discusse

UNDERSTANDING POST-ADOPTION OF ONLINE SHOPPING CONTINUANCE USAGE THROUGH THE SOCIAL EXCHANGE THEORY

Electronic commerce researchers have retention of Consumers post-adoption continuance behavior attendees induce deep trust and service quality of online shopping behavior, thereby contributing to higher revenue and marketing strategy based on social exchange theory. This study provides additional information about the path from the service quality and trust to continuous usage. Also, this study investigates the different tendencies to continuance behavior by habit as a moderating effect within the conceptual model. According to the structural invariance test across moderating effect, it showed that: First, most of main effect paths showed significant positive signs only habit as moderator on trust in service provider is negative support. Second, the habit was supported as a moderator except for the trust in shopping-site to online shopping continuance interaction path. Unexpectedly, the positive moderating effect of habit tendency towards the path of trust in shopping-site to online shopping continuance in not significant. The theoretical and practical implications are discussed

Quantum Meets the Minimum Circuit Size Problem

In this work, we initiate the study of the Minimum Circuit Size Problem (MCSP) in the quantum setting. MCSP is a problem to compute the circuit complexity of Boolean functions. It is a fascinating problem in complexity theory - its hardness is mysterious, and a better understanding of its hardness can have surprising implications to many fields in computer science. We first define and investigate the basic complexity-theoretic properties of minimum quantum circuit size problems for three natural objects: Boolean functions, unitaries, and quantum states. We show that these problems are not trivially in NP but in QCMA (or have QCMA protocols). Next, we explore the relations between the three quantum MCSPs and their variants. We discover that some reductions that are not known for classical MCSP exist for quantum MCSPs for unitaries and states, e.g., search-to-decision reductions and self-reductions. Finally, we systematically generalize results known for classical MCSP to the quantum setting (including quantum cryptography, quantum learning theory, quantum circuit lower bounds, and quantum fine-grained complexity) and also find new connections to tomography and quantum gravity. Due to the fundamental differences between classical and quantum circuits, most of our results require extra care and reveal properties and phenomena unique to the quantum setting. Our findings could be of interest for future studies, and we post several open problems for further exploration along this direction

The Evaluation And Using Intention For Digital Teaching Materials Of Penghu Basalt

The Bureau of Culture of Penghu County produced the Penghu Basalt Digital Teaching Materials, which are supplementary teaching materials for local curriculums in elementary and middle schools in Penghu County. But just what are the teachers’ and students’ opinions of the said teaching materials? Are they willing to use them? Are they suitable? These questions are, indeed, worth further research. The questionnaire survey was conducted to gather the opinions of 142 teachers and 151 students of elementary and middle schools in Penghu County. In addition, using the quasi-experimental and experimental teaching methods, after comparing the pre-test and post-test results to the control group, the learning effectiveness was determined. The results indicate that teachers and students have the highest evaluation for the interface design aspect of this teaching material. The teachers’ evaluation for the teaching materials is significantly higher than the students’. Furthermore, the teaching materials are evaluated highly in terms of attracting attention, generating interest and willingness to use, indicating that the digital teaching materials have potential for promotion in Penghu. After the experimental teaching, only the vocational high school students’ scores before and after the experiment showed significantly improvement, while the scores of the students in the other levels of schools did not. &nbsp

Effect of rehabilitation on a patient suffering from a tuberculous brain abscess with Gerstmann’s syndrome: case report

There are few reports in the literature of tuberculous brain abscess. Tuberculous brain abscess usually occurs in an immunocompromised host. Almost all previously documented cases have involved acquired immune deficiency syndrome. We encountered a 53-year-old right-handed immunocompetent male who was initially suspected of having a cerebrovascular accident due to acute-onset right hemiparesis and paresthesia. A tentative diagnosis of brain tumor versus brain abscess was made on imaging studies. The patient was finally diagnosed with a tuberculous brain abscess based upon deterioration on imaging and a positive tuberculosis culture. The tuberculous brain abscess was located in the left parietal lobe, which resulted in Gerstmann’s syndrome and right-sided apraxia. Stereotactic surgery was performed. He was also given antituberculosis chemotherapy and comprehensive rehabilitation. Considerable improvement was noted after rehabilitation. The patient even returned to a normal life and work. Our case demonstrates that an aggressive intensive inpatient rehabilitation program combined with stereotactic surgery and effective antituberculosis therapy play an important role in improving the outcome for patients with tuberculous brain abscess, Gerstmann’s syndrome, and right-sided apraxia

UNDERSTANDING COMPETITIVE PERFORMANCE OF SOFTWARE-AS-A-SERVICE (SAAS)—THE COMPETITIVE DYNAMICS PERSPECTIVE

Understanding the antecedents and consequences of a firm’s agility in cloud software applications is important. This papers draws on the competitive dynamics perspective to develop a model that explains the relationships between collaboration with vendors, agility, and competitive performance in software-as-a-service (SaaS) context. Collaboration reflects a firm’s ability to leverage interfirm resources, characterized as knowledge sharing and process alignment. Agility is measured by a firm’s strategy-oriented agility and service-oriented agility. This study also investigates the moderating effect of environmental turbulence. The proposed hypotheses are supported by the empirical data. The results show that competitive performance is affected by ability, which, in turn, is impacted by collaboration. Environmental turbulence positively moderates the relationship between agility and performance. Finally, we discuss the implications of our results

Investigating the maxillary buccal vestibule

AbstractBackground/purposeImproper assessment of the maxillary buccal vestibular space can contribute to the fabrication of maxillary dentures with inadequate buccal flange extensions. The purpose of this study was to determine whether a significant difference existed between the anatomic dimensions of the buccal vestibules and the corresponding buccal flanges of maxillary complete dentures in an edentulous population.Materials and methodsThe anterior, middle, and posterior depth and width of the maxillary buccal vestibules in 100 randomly selected subjects were measured with a periodontal probe. Corresponding measurements of the buccal flanges of the subjects' existing dentures were recorded. The differences between buccal vestibule widths and depths and denture flange widths and lengths were statistically compared according to site.ResultsThe difference in the mean depth between the vestibules and the flanges in the posterior area (6.4 mm and 10.3 mm, respectively) was approximately 38% (P < 0.001). The difference in the mean width between the vestibules and the flanges in the posterior area (3.3 mm and 7.9 mm, respectively) was approximately 58% (P < 0.001).ConclusionThe study revealed statistically significant differences between the anatomic depth and width of the buccal vestibules and the corresponding flange dimensions of the existing dentures