Effect of milling time on the microstructure of NiFe alloy / Lokman Hakim Amran

Nickel-Iron (NiFe) base alloys (permalloy) are commonly used as soft magnetic materials, exhibiting high permeability, low coercivity, low magnetostriction and highsaturation magnetization. This material is often used in electronic industry. The continuous research of this material can improve its characteristics beside find new functionality so that it can give benefits to people. The main objective of this research is to investigate the effect of milling time on the microstructure and properties of NiFe. The experiment was conducted by using pure Nickel (Ni) and Iron (Fe) powders 99.9% purity. The powder mixtures were milled with various milling time of 2 hours, 4 hours and 6 hours in a zirconium oxide jar and ball-to-powder ration (BPR) of 3:1 was used. The milled powder were compacted and annealed in the hot furnace with 600°C annealing temperature and holding time for 1 hour. X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) technique and Energy Dispersive X-Ray (EDX) were used to study the composition of the samples before and after annealing. Electromagnetic testing and hardness testing also was conducted to examine the electroconductivity and hardness of the samples respectively. Besides, microscopic examination was carried out using optical microscope and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) analysis to observe particle morphology of NiFe alloys. The result showed as the milling time increased, the particles and crystallite size of material were decreased less than about 18nm and the fine microstructure of NiFe was achieved. XRD analysis shows the NiFe alloys consisting of Ni, NiFe and Fes04. The highest value of hardness and electrical resistivity obtained are 78.7 HRA and 11. 45 Ohm.m

Kanji Learning Courseware

With the emergence of the Globalization Era, foreign languages studies have become increasingly popular among the people. However, there's a huge barrier in learning Japanese due to the language being both unique and alien to outsiders especially the Kanji script. The Kanji characters consists of over 2000++ characters which in turn might scare them and possibly break their motivation to continue learning. Not to mention the hardship that students have to endure by learning the characters the traditional way. With the 'Kanji Learning Courseware' which uses the Leitner flashcard system and Reisig's "Remembering the Kanji" techniques (to name a few), it may help people particularly students in their Kanji characters' learning. Currently available courseware will be analyzed to gather vital information about the current available features. New features which didn't exist in the current software such as animations to help in writing the characters, pronunciation guide with sound, and many more will be incorporated. It is hoped that the courseware will meet its objectives and probably serve as a catalyst into something even bigger and better in the future

Transformational leadership and turnover intention : mediating role of overall job satisfaction / Azlinda Hakim Lokman Hakim and Hairunnisa Mohamad Ibrahim

Turnover is one of the most critical issue in hotel industry. Turnover in front office department may somehow affect the hotel’s service quality standard and operations that may jeopardize the hotel image and guest expectation. An effective leadership style implemented by the management plays an important role in monitoring and maintaining the service consistency. In hospitality industry, transformational leadership has seen to be the most suitable leadership style that can be implement by the leader. This research will be focusing on transformational leadership among front office employees in Malaysian hotels as independent variable, and overall job satisfaction as mediating variable; which may lead to turnover intention as the outcome variable. A judgmental sampling technique was employed in this study. A total of 250 questionnaires were distributed randomly to both front office employees and managers who are working in selected four and five-star Malaysian hotels. The results of this study showed that the mediating role of overall job satisfaction have significant relationship between transformational leadership and turnover intention. Careful consideration of the best leadership style implemented in the department will justify the level of overall job satisfaction and turnover intention among front office employee

A study on customers’ satisfaction towards services provided by agency at Urban Transformation Center (UTC) Melaka / Muhd Lokman Nul Hakim Lamri

The main objective of this study was to study the level of customer satisfaction towards service provided by agency at UTC Melaka through the service quality model developed by Parasuraman which tangibility, reliability, responsiveness, empathy and assurance. The instrument used to study the level of customer satisfaction was questionnaires which were distributed to 110 respondents at UTC Melaka. The sampling for this study was non-probability due to this study was carried out at public and the researcher did not get the exact population of customers that came to UTC Melaka. The researcher used convenient sampling to distribute questionnaire which the researcher approached the customers randomly at five agencies in UTC Melaka. The result was analyzed by using SPSS version 20.0 and there were two analyses used which were descriptive statistics; to find the level of customer satisfaction using mean and Pearson correlation to find the relationship between service quality (tangibility, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy) and customer satisfaction. The findings showed that the level of customer satisfaction towards service provided by agency at UTC Melaka was high which 3.6588. All the studied factors indicated significant relationship with customer satisfaction. The value of r for tangibility was 0.450, reliability (0.558), responsiveness (0.457), assurance (0.313), and empathy (0.475). As a conclusion customer satisfied with the service provided by agency at UTC Melaka and reliability was the most factor that affect the customer satisfaction

Natural Ventilation Performance of Kedah Vernacular House

As processed energy becoming more expensive, people have started to look for natural sources for option to provide their needs and comfort. Natural ventilation is one of the passive approaches that have recently become one of the important approaches in building design. However, architecturally, this approach is not considered new as a lot of previous buildings before industry era are totally depending on natural sources to ventilate their indoor spaces. Therefore this study was done to look into how these architectural details in Malay vernacular houses may affect the air movement performance around them. Two case studies of vernacular houses were chosen with design elements identified as natural ventilation attributes. Several points were identified inside and outside of the house where the wind speed of their surrounding were taken hourly in daytime for three days. The data were than compared to the building elements of the spaces. Both houses shows how building orientation and position of ventilation openings play the major role in determine the indoor air movement performance. However due to having other unintentionally openings such as gaps on roof design and gaps in flooring construction installation may also allow air flow to sip into the building despite of not having proper opening facing the cross ventilation. Besides that, by having openings at high level at the high roof may also encourage natural air flow via stack effect ventilation. Wide and full height window design may also become one of the most significant element to allow ventilation as proven in this research

A Study on Plant Selection for Green Building Design

Previous researches show that incorporating natural elements in design has proven a significant result in balancing building indoor environment. Using plant as part of the design has been widely accepted to contribute good thermal impact as shown in bioclimatic design, green roofing system and living wall elements. As there are so many species of plants for selection, this research was carried out to analyze types of indoor plants that have the potential to contribute thermal comfort to their surrounding. Based on the fact that plant leaves are the part where transpiration and guttation take place, plants are categorized into seven types based on their leaves architecture. They were then tested on their impact on surrounding temperature and humidity. Result shows that Linear, Lanceolate and Oblong shaped leaves categories are good in lowering the relative humidity while the categories that are good in lowering the temperature are Linear, Lanceolate, Cordate and Oblong shaped leaves categories. The study was carried out through series of relative humidity and air temperature monitoring of several room casings that consist with the plants. Both relative humidity and air temperature of the rooms with plants were recorded lower compared with the one without plant. Different categories of plants do give good result in relative humidity and air temperature. Thus, with a good combination of plant installation inside or onto building, it may contribute towards providing a good thermal comfort to the occupants

Kanji Learning Courseware

With the emergence of the Globalization Era, foreign languages studies have become increasingly popular among the people. However, there's a huge barrier in learning Japanese due to the language being both unique and alien to outsiders especially the Kanji script. The Kanji characters consists of over 2000++ characters which in turn might scare them and possibly break their motivation to continue learning. Not to mention the hardship that students have to endure by learning the characters the traditional way. With the 'Kanji Learning Courseware' which uses the Leitner flashcard system and Reisig's "Remembering the Kanji" techniques (to name a few), it may help people particularly students in their Kanji characters' learning. Currently available courseware will be analyzed to gather vital information about the current available features. New features which didn't exist in the current software such as animations to help in writing the characters, pronunciation guide with sound, and many more will be incorporated. It is hoped that the courseware will meet its objectives and probably serve as a catalyst into something even bigger and better in the future

Bioclimatic Technology in High Rise Office Building Design: A Comparison Study for Indoor Environmental Condition

The shift towards a more sustainable architecture for high-rise building is discussed and illustrated through the work of Ken Yeang and other architects. The claimed benefits of such a bioclimatic design approach are examined in the light of the results of previously conducted research projects, dealing with indoor thermal condition of high-rise office buildings. This paper reports on a study to determine if high-rise buildings designed on bioclimatic principles perform better than conventional designed ones, when situated in a tropical climate such as that in Malaysia. The paper describes a number of case studies which compare Malaysian bioclimatic and conventional building using indoor environmental parameter criteria such as air temperature, relative humidity and air velocity. Building energy index for both types of buildings is presented to illustrate the real energy savings in both types of buildings. The major finding of this work is that, the bioclimatic buildings offering a more comfortable indoor environment, increase satisfaction and show an improvement in energy saving