Decision making on operational data: a remote approach to distributed data monitoring

Information gathering and assimilation is normally performed by data mining tools and Online analytic processing (OLAP) operating on historic data stored in a data warehouse. Data mining and OLAP queries are very complex, access a significant fraction of a database and require significant time and resources to be executed. Therefore, it has been impossible to draw the data analysis benefits in operational data environments. When it comes to analysis of operational (dynamic) data, running complex queries on frequently changing data is next to impossible. The complexity of active data integration increases dramatically in distributed applications which are very common in automated or e-commerce applications. We suggest a remote data analysis approach to find hidden patterns and relationships in distributed operational data, which does not adversely affect routine transaction processing. Distributed data integration on frequently updated data has been performed by analysing SQL commands coming to the distributed databases and aggregating data centrally to produce a real-time view of fast changing data. This approach has been successfully evaluated on data sources for over 30 data sources for hotel properties. This paper presents the performance results of the method, and its comparative study of the state-of-the art data integration techniques. The remote approach to data integration and analysis has been built into a scalable data monitoring system. It demonstrates the ease of application and performance results of operational data integration

The Need for Concerted Efforts for COVID-19 Intelligence Gathering: Medical Espionage and Cyber Crime Trends Analysis to Strengthen the UK's Pandemic Response

An important knowledge gap that needs bridging is the extent to which current natural language processing (NLP) tools, models and resources can be successfully applied to exploring a specific aspect of dark-web data such as COVID-19-related communication. It is imperative to support law enforcement in gathering intelligence on the new COVID-19-related cybercrime strategies in the DW. The research gap around the DW search and textual analysis consists in the lack of robust mechanisms for querying, processing and monitoring trends on the DW. The critical data sets and computational solutions need to be made available for immediate exploitation and further research to strengthen the UK’s pandemic response

Social media and student lifecycle: impact on career success

Over the past few years online social networks have become one of the most popular applications on the Internet. Naturally, social media is attracting a significant attention from researchers probing its educational applicability. Online social networking services (SNS) offer a straightforward way to connect people and support information sharing and communication. University students are often ahead of the rest in the adoption of new technologies, and according to (Quan-Haase, 2007) their communication networks tend to be dense and multilayered. Extant literature abounds with evidence of business opportunities (e.g. Aldrich & Kim, 2007) and educational use (e.g. Mastrodicasa,2008) of social networks. However, very little research attention has been paid towards a systematic adoption of SNS throughout the complete student lifecycle . With the aim of achieving higher levels of success in learning as well as improving their career prospects. This study investigates the use of social media by business students. KU business students and students from four international HE institutions in Europe, including Russia and Greece, have participated in the study. Social media has the potential of providing an easy-to use platform to connect students throughout their entire lifecycle from aspiration rising, enrolment, learning and teaching leading on to employment, alumni communication and life-long learning. This is especially important as the stages of employability management and life-long learning take a centre stage in managing student expectations and influencing their decision of taking up places at which university

Use of VLE apps in business education: challenges and emerging issues

HE institutions are investing in mobile applications (apps) for tablet and smart-phones, enabling students to access their Institution’s Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) without restrictions on time and place. For students in HE Institutions a smart phone represents a ‘key social connector and a learning tool’, (BlackBoard.com, 2013) and reduces the issues with wireless technology (Benson & Morgan, 2012). The ‘digital natives’ (Prensky, 2001) in higher education today are used to technology and increasingly expect mobile forms of communication and social networking, which can aid engagement (Okoro, 2012). Earlier research (Hrastinski & Aghaee, 2012) indicated that students prefer to separate their private and study activities, particularly on social media such as Facebook. Potential technical issues, and the most appropriate pedagogic approaches, are still unclear. The research is based on a case study of launch of a mobile application of Blackboard VLE in a UK HE Business School. Usage levels are analysed, along with short surveys with Business School students and staff (still ongoing) regarding their use of mobile systems for both learning and social networking, attitudes to usage, along with reasons for using or not using the system, The ability to take part in mobile collaborative discussions and particularly social media linked to their coursework could increase engagement of the increasingly technologically ‘savvy’ HE students. It may encourage those not yet fully aware of the business requirements of technology use to gain important skills that will increase their social capital and employability. However it will not happen without substantial work by academics to make appropriate use of the systems. The technological investment is just a small part of what is needed to ensure the engagement objective is met. We recommend that staff receive specific support to develop approaches to the VLE, including social media, that will enhance engagement through mobile apps. We will also discuss the pedagogic implications of developing learning systems that work well on an app but remain challenging and interesting to students. There may be new pedagogical approaches that make full use of the potential of mobile. A challenge for HEI’s is to adapt rapidly to new developments in this increasingly fast-changing technological society, we will discuss the implications of our findings for the incorporation of other innovations that might emerge in the future

Privacy, Security and Politics:Current Issues and Future Prospects

Overview Individual privacy and national security have been regarded as notions with a conflicting impact. As seen in the UK general election 2017, security has taken a prominent role on the Conservative Party agenda while public perceptions on privacy were split. This article reviews the election manifestos of three political parties on privacy and security. We use the pre-election YouGov survey of 2017 UK respondents to understand the views of the public by age groups and gender. While there is general support for legislation aimed at strengthening national security and crime prevention, such as the Investigatory Powers Act 2016, the younger segment of the UK population is increasingly concerned with the infringement of their privacy (both in traditional and online settings). These contrasting views may explain the outcome of the general election in 2017, and offer open questions for legislators

The role of learning analytics in networking for business and leisure: A study of culture and gender differences in social platform users

Engagement with social networking sites is influenced by the cognitive and learning processes which in turn is influenced by culture. This paper aims at unbundling the effect of culture on the use of social network sites and thus contributes to our understanding on the way cognitive and learning processes influence the engagement with social networks. The study of over 600 social networking users addresses how professional and leisure use of social networks differs across cultures, gender and other demographics. Firstly, by utilising ANOVA techniques we associate users' behaviour with nationality and furthermore through the use of an ordered logistics regression we delineate clusters of users by the purpose of social networking adoption and their cultural characteristics. Our study helps bridge the gap in literature on identifying how cultural traits, nationality and gender affect both business and leisure use of social networking. The implications of differences in user behaviour driven by nationality and gender warrant further need for applying learning analytics in social platforms to enhance user experience. Future directions of research on social networking in relation to cognition and culture are offered for discussion

Barriers to the adoption of social technologies in higher education

The advantages of social technologies in education have been amply explored in recent research, but it is just as important to understand the drawbacks that come with the adoption of social media in learning and teaching. This paper draws on the review of literature on privacy, information security, trust, technology acceptance and other fields which help us gain an insight into why social media integration into pedagogy is slow while its proliferation into other areas is overwhelming. We report the findings of a survey of UK students on their social networking behaviour, privacy and information security concerns. Social technologies are viewed differently by the faculty, as emerged from our qualitative study of technology adoption. In order to gain a balanced insight into concerns about social media adoption in learning and teaching we present the student and instructor views. Further research directions and practical implications are discussed

Unlocking the Potential of Wireless Learning

Wirelessly enabled learning offers distinctive benefits to teaching and learning because of portability, low cost and improved communication capabilities (Kukulska-Hulme & Traxler, 2005). This article presents an exploratory review of several categories of wireless technologies, their successful applications in higher education institutions and challenges from the educator’s perspective. Recent research reports a diverse range of wireless learning strategies, see for example Parsons et al. (2006), and current applications of wireless technologies in teaching are still emerging. Conclusions drawn from successful experiments using mobile devices and wireless networks in universities may inspire others and help reassess the challenges ahead. Further studies are needed to explore and successfully apply wireless capabilities driven by the pedagogy, rather than the technology. This paper attempts to outline various teaching strategies and relevant categories of wireless applications focusing on the relationship between the pedagogy and the supporting technology. It concludes with suggesting issues for further research, especially the need to thoroughly evaluate the learning benefits of wireless applications