Reasons for failure of web-based application IT projects – An Empirical Study in Malaysia

Setiap tahun, organisasi rugi berjuta-juta ringgit kerana aplikasi berasaskan sesawang teknologi maklumat projek gagal. Every year, organizations lose millions of dollars due to failure of web-based application information technology (IT) projects

Reasons for failure of web-based application IT projects – An Empirical Study in Malaysia

Setiap tahun, organisasi rugi berjuta-juta ringgit kerana aplikasi berasaskan sesawang teknologi maklumat projek gagal. Every year, organizations lose millions of dollars due to failure of web-based application information technology (IT) projects

Pineapples internal quality inspection approaches and its potential effects in Malaysia

Pineapple (Ananas Comosus L. Metil) is a tropical plant under Bromeliaceous family that is grown in American tropics, subtropics, and warmer regions (U. Nations 2012). Pineapple is the second harvest tropical fruit after banana in the world (S. Ndungu 2014). Pineapple has spiny skin that will turn into yellowish brown from green when ripe. Pineapple is a non-climatic fruit that will stop ripping once it is harvested. Pineapple is famous not only because its taste but also its nutrients for health (M. Farid Hossain 2015, p.84). It contains nutriet that can supply suffiecient requirement of calcium, sodium, potassium, fibre, vitamin C, and so on. Those nutrients can help to build up healthy and growth of bone, enhance body immune system, and decrease high blood pressure for body system

Physicochemical Properties of Whole and Fresh Cut Durian (Durio Zibethinus) Stored At Ambient and Refrigerated Temperatures

This study reports chemical changes occurring in the pulp of both whole and minimally processed (MP) durian (Durio zibethinus) stored at ambient and refrigerated temperatures. In the first part of this study, the pH, total soluble solids, titratable acidity, sugars, organic acids, flavour compounds and sensory properties of five Malaysian durian cultivars (‘D2’, ‘D24’, ‘MDUR78’, ‘D101’ and ‘Chuk’) were determined. There were significant differences in physicochemical characteristics among the cultivars. Analysis using solid-phase microextraction (SPME) coupled to gas chromatography- time of flight mass spectrometry (GC-TOFMS) revealed a total of 22 esters, 14 sulphur compounds, 7 alcohols, 3 aldehydes and 1 ketone in the pulp of the 5 durian cultivars. Sensory properties of four durian cultivars were compared. Twelve descriptors (sweet, fruity, sulphury, alcohol, nutty and green aroma, surface color, sweetness, bitterness, stickiness, moistness and overall aftertaste) were generated. A strong correlation was observed between sensory properties, flavour compounds and physicochemical characteristics of the fruit. In the second part of this study, activities of four cell wall hydrolases, pectinmethylesterase (PME), polygalacturonase (PG), cellulase and β-galactosidase (β-Gal) and physicochemical changes of ripen whole durian fruit (cultivar D24 and an accession from Kampung Bentong, Pahang) stored at 28 + 1 °C (RH 60-80%) for 4 days, were investigated. During storage, significant interaction effect of ‘accession x day of storage’ on weight loss, glucose content, PG and PME enzymes activities were observed. Weight loss increased linearly with an average weight loss of 3.9 and 4.9% per day for durian kampung and D24 respectively. The softer texture observed in the Kampung Bentong accession as compared to the D24, corresponded to its higher PG and cellulase activity. Transmission electron microscopy observations showed middle lamella dissolution and loss of intercellular materials in Kampung Bentong accession after 4 days of storage but not in the D24. The effect of storage temperature on the changes in the physicochemical, microbial and sensory quality of MP durian cultivar D24 was then determined at 28+1 oC for 3 days and 4+2 oC for 35 days. Around 400 g pulp was placed on a polystyrene tray and wrapped with LDPE film for storage. At 28+1 oC, the pulp retained its colour but softened rapidly after 24 h of storage and became acidic (pH 4.71) after 2 days of storage due to the formation of citric, succinic, acetic and lactic acids. Titratable acidity of the pulp that increased significantly after 2 days of storage was correlated to the decrease in pH. Sucrose decreased concomitantly with an increase in glucose and fructose concentrations during storage. For pulp stored at 4+2 oC, no noticeable changes in pH were observed. After 1 week of storage, there was a progressive increase in glucose, fructose and sucrose concentration with concomitant increase in total soluble solids. The firmness increased significantly at the end of storage. The organic acid content remained constant throughout the storage period with a slight increase in tartaric acid. Titratable acidity of the pulp decreased significantly after one-week storage and remained constant thereafter. The MP durian fruit could be kept at 4+2 oC for 14 days with acceptable microbiological quality and without development of off-odour. At ambient temperature, MP durian could only be stored for 1 day, after which the pulp became acidic. The volatile flavour compounds and sensory attributes of MP durian cultivar D24 stored at 4+2 ºC for 42 days were examined. The volatile compounds were extracted by SPME and analysed by GC-TOFMS. During storage of MP durian at 4+2 ºC, diminution of the major ester compounds was observed after 14 days of storage. All ester compounds decreased significantly after 7 days of storage except for ethyl acetate that decreased significantly after 2 weeks of storage. Ethanethiol, 1-propanethiol, and both isomers of 3,5-dimethyl 1,2,4-trithiolane decreased significantly after 7 days of storage. Total sulfur content of the pulp remained unchanged after 42 days of storage. However, sulfur notes perceived by panellists decreased gradually throughout storage. Quantitative Descriptive Analysis (QDA) was carried out using sixteen descriptors to describe the surface colour, odour, flavour and texture of pulp during storage. Results revealed that pulp could be stored for 21 days, after which off flavour developed and the green aroma became too intense and rendered the pulp unacceptable

Synthesis Of Buckypaper Supported Ionic Liquid Membrane For Pervaporation Process

Membran cecair berpenyokong adalah salah satu konfigurasi membran cecair yang menggunakan bahan fasa cecair sebagai membran dan diperangkap ke dalam substrat berliang. Sejak kebelakangan ini, idea tentang penggunaan membran cecair berpenyokong dalam proses penyejattelapan telah menarik tumpuan ramai penyelidik. Tetapi penggunaan membran cecair berpenyokong menghadapi masalah ketidakstabilan yang berpunca daripada kehilangan membran cecair. Kajian ini bertujuan untuk membangunkan membran cecair berpenyokong dengan kestabilan yang tinggi dengan menggunakan kertas-bucky sebagai substrat berliang dan diperangkap dengan cecair ionik 1-butil-metilimidazolium tetrafluoroborat [Bmim][BF4] untuk membentuk membran cecair ionik berpenyokong kertas-bucky. Kertas-bucky terdiri daripada kelompok nano-tiub karbon dinding berlapis mampu memerangkap membran cecair ionik secara berkesan disebabkan oleh saiz liang yang kecil and struktur liang yang berliku-liku. Untuk meningkatkan lagi kestabilan membran, [Bmim][BF4] telah dicampur dengan polivinil alkohol sebelum diperangkap dalam kertas-bucky. Struktur membran cecair ionik berpenyokong kertas-bucky yang terhasil didapati berbeza dengan membran asimetrik, di mana fasa membran dan sokongan telah digabungkan dalam satu lapisan. Struktur tersebut membolehkan pembentukan membran simetri yang tipis tanpa menjejaskan sifat mekanikal membran. Prestasi membran cecair ionik berpenyokong kertas-bucky dalam proses penyejattelapan yang melibatkan campuran perduaan yang terdiri daripada etilena glikol dan air menunjukkan keupayaan membran tersebut dalam penyahhidratan larutan akueus etilena glikol. Kewujudan kertas-bucky dan [Bmim][BF4] didapati telah meningkatkan prestasi pemisahan dan kebolehtelapan intrinsik membran. Membran cecair ionik berpenyokong kertas-bucky telah menunjukkan prestasi penyejattelapan yang tinggi dengan fluks penelapan yang bernilai 102 g∙m-2∙j-1, faktor pemisahan setinggi 1014, kebolehtelapan air yang bernilai 13106 GPU dan kememilihan membran untuk air yang bernilai 13 dengan berat air dalam kepekatan larutan suapan sebanyak 10% pada suhu 30 °C dan 5 mmHg tekanan hiliran. Di samping itu, membran cecair ionik berpenyokong kertas-bucky juga mampu untuk memisahkan campuran pertigaan; etil asetat, etanol dan air yang membentuk azeotrop. Fluks penelapan sebanyak 385 g∙m-2∙j-1, faktor pemisahan yang bernilai 247, kebolehtelapan air 4730 GPU dan kememilihan membran untuk air yang bernilai 39 telah diperolehi pada suhu 30 °C dan 5 mmHg tekanan hiliran. Membran cecair ionik berpenyokong kertas-bucky telah mempamerkan prestasi yang tekal dalam operasi selama 120 jam. Pekali resapan etilena glikol dan air pada operasi parameter yang berlainan telah dianggar dengan menggunakan model matematik semi-empirikal berdasarkan pengubahsuaian persamaan Maxwell-Stefan. Dengan merujuk pada pekali resapan yang dianggar, pemisahan membran cecair ionik berpenyokong kertas-bucky dalam proses penyejahttelapan bagi penyahhidratan campuran perduaan etilena glikol/air adalah dikawal oleh proses resapan. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Supported liquid membrane (SLM) is one of the liquid membrane configurations that employ a liquid phase substances as membrane and immobilized in a porous supporting membrane. Recently, the idea of using SLM in pervaporation process has attracted a great deal of research attention. However the use of SLM in pervaporation has always suffered from instability problem which is mainly due to the displacement of liquid membrane. In the present research work, it is aimed to develop a high stability SLM by employing buckypaper (BP) as supporting membrane and immobilized with an ionic liquid 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborate [Bmim][BF4] to form a buckypaper supported ionic liquid membrane (BP-SILM). The BP, which is composed of entangled assemblies of multi-walled carbon nanotubes (CNTs), can effectively entrap the infiltrated the ionic liquid membrane due to its smaller pore size and highly tortuous porous structure. In order to further enhance the membrane stability, the [Bmim][BF4] was blended with polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) prior to the immobilization in the BP. The resulted BP-SILM structure, in which the membrane and support phase were merged into a single layer, was found to be different from that of conventional asymmetric membranes. The BP-SILM structure allows the formation of a thinner symmetric membrane without compromising its mechanical properties. The pervaporation performances of the BP-SILM in the binary mixture of ethylene glycol and water showed an excellent capability to dehydrate ethylene glycol aqueous solutions. The presence of BP and [Bmim][BF4] was observed to significantly enhance the separation performance and the intrinsic membrane permeability. The BP-SILM exhibited high pervaporation performance with a permeation flux of 102 g∙m-2∙h-1, separation factor as high as 1014, water permeance of 13106 GPU and membrane selectivity of 13 for water with 10 wt.% feed concentration of water at 30 °C and 5 mmHg downstream pressure. On the other hand, the BP-SILM was also capable to break ternary azeotropic mixtures of ethyl acetate, ethanol and water. A permeation flux of 385 g∙m-2∙h-1, separation factor of 247, water permeance of 4730 GPU and membrane selectivity of 39 for water were obtained at 30 °C and 5 mmHg downstream pressure. The BP-SILM also demonstrated a robust pervaporation performance over an operation of 120 hours. The diffusion coefficients of ethylene glycol and water at different operating parameter were estimated using a semi-empirical mathematical model based on modified Maxwell-Stefan equation. Based on the estimated diffusion coefficient obtained, the separation of BP-SILM in pervaporation dehydration of ethylene glycol/water binary mixture is more on diffusion control

User-centered Program Analysis Tools

The research and industrial communities have made great strides in developing advanced software defect detection tools based on program analysis. Most of the work in this area has focused on developing novel program analysis algorithms to find bugs more efficiently or accurately, or to find more sophisticated kinds of bugs. However, the focus on algorithms often leads to tools that are complex and difficult to actually use to debug programs. We believe that we can design better, more useful program analysis tools by taking a user-centered approach. In this dissertation, we present three possible elements of such an approach. First, we improve the user interface by designing Path Projection, a toolkit for visualizing program paths, such as call stacks, that are commonly used to explain errors. We evaluated Path Projection in a user study and found that programmers were able to verify error reports more quickly with similar accuracy, and strongly preferred Path Projection to a standard code viewer. Second, we make it easier for programmers to combine different algorithms to customize the precision or efficiency of a tool for their target programs. We designed Mix, a framework that allows programmers to apply either type checking, which is fast but imprecise, or symbolic execution, which is precise but slow, to different parts of their programs. Mix keeps its design simple by making no modifications to the constituent analyses. Instead, programmers use Mix annotations to mark blocks of code that should be typed checked or symbolically executed, and Mix automatically combines the results. We evaluated the effectiveness of Mix by implementing a prototype called Mixy for C and using it to check for null pointer errors in vsftpd. Finally, we integrate program analysis more directly into the debugging process. We designed Expositor, an interactive dynamic program analysis and debugging environment built on top of scripting and time-travel debugging. In Expositor, programmers write program analyses as scripts that analyze entire program executions, using list-like operations such as map and filter to manipulate execution traces. For efficiency, Expositor uses lazy data structures throughout its implementation to compute results on-demand, enabling a more interactive user experience. We developed a prototype of Expositor using GDB and UndoDB, and used it to debug a stack overflow and to unravel a subtle data race in Firefox

Experimental Investigation of Roof Top Solar Chimney for Natural Ventilation

Roof top solar chimney function to create natural ventilation of buildings. It is a solar driven device which induces buoyancy force through the chimney channel to updraft the air out of the building. The design parameter of the rooftop solar chimney would affect the ventilation performance. This research has been carried out experimentally and by computational simulation and focused on evaluating the system performance at various design configuration and operational condition. There are 3 different designs that are compared; first design is the basic rooftop solar chimney which contain absorber plate, room’s air outlet and total air outlet, second design is the basic rooftop solar chimney with additional of ambient air inlet and third design is the basic rooftop solar chimney with extra absorber plate. Experiment is carried out to measure the performance of these three different designs in turn. The parameters that had been measured include the solar radiation, the air velocity of each air apertures, the temperature of the absorber plates, and the temperature of air inlet and outlet of each air apertures. Simulation has also been done to compare the performance for these designs using software name “Energy2d”. Experiment and Simulation Results is gathered and analysed

The effects of burning and grazing on soil carbon dynamics in managed Peruvian tropical montane grasslands

The authors wish to thank the Manu National Park forest rangers for allowing us to use their facilities and the field technicians for their assistance. We also thank the Amazon Basin Conservation Association for institutional support. This material is based upon work supported by the UK Natural Environment Council under joint grant references NE/H006583, NE/H007849 and NE/H006753. This publication is a contribution from the Scottish Alliance for Geoscience, Environment and Society (http://www.sages.ac.uk). Imma Oliveras was supported with a NERC grant NE/G006385/1.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

DESTRUCTION STUDY OF TOXIC CHLORINATED ORGANICS USING BIMETALLIC NANOPARTICLES AND MEMBRANE REACTOR: SYNTHESIS, CHARACTERIZATION, AND MODELING

Zero-valent metals such as bulk iron and zinc are known to dechlorinate toxicorganic compounds. Enhancement in reaction rates has been achieved through bimetallicnanosized particles such as nickel/iron (Ni/Fe) and palladium/iron (Pd/Fe). Batchdegradation of model compounds, trichlroethylene (TCE) and 2,2\u27-dichlorobiphenyls(DCB), were conducted using bimetallic Ni/Fe and Pd/Fe nanoparticles. Completedegradation of TCE and DCB is achieved at room temperature. Zero-valent iron, as themajor element, undergoes corrosion to provide hydrogen and electrons for the reductivecatalytic hydrodechlorination reaction. The second dopant metals of nickel and palladium(in nanoscale) act as catalyst for hydrogenation through metal hydride formation thatproduces completely dechlorinated final product. Different compositions of bimetallicNi/Fe and Pd/Fe nanoparticles were synthesized and their reactivity was characterized interms of reaction rate constants, hydrogen generation through iron corrosion, andproducts formation. The observed TCE degradation rate constant was two orders ofmagnitude higher than the bulk iron and nanoiron, indicating that the bimetallicnanoparticles are better materials compared to the monometallic iron systems. Longevitystudy through repeated cycle experiments showed minimum loss of activity. The surfacearea-normalized rate constant was found to have a strong correlation with the hydrogengeneration by iron corrosion reaction. A mathematical model was derived thatincorporates the reaction and Langmuirian-type sorption terms to estimate the intrinsicreaction rate constant and rate-limiting step in the degradation process. Bimetallicnanoparticles were also immobilized into the chitosan matrix for the synthesis of ananocomposite membrane reactor to achieve membrane-phase destruction of chlorinatedorganics under convective flow condition. Formation of uniformly distributed nanosizedparticles is confirmed by high resolution transmission electron microscopy. Themembrane-phase degradation results demonstrated similar trends with the previoussolution phase analysis with the observed enhanced reaction rates. The advantage of themembrane system is its ability to prevent the agglomeration of the nanoparticles in themembrane matrix, to minimize the loss of precious metals into the bulk solution phase,and to prevent the formation of precipitated Fe(III) hydroxide. These are due to thechelating effect of the amine and hydroxyl functional groups in the chitosan backbones