Support for Wireless LAN Design

As mobile devices become common in mainstream computing, it becomes imperative to effectively design computing architectures that seamlessly and effectively integrate them. Rapid advancements in wireless technology has made it possible to build efficient wireless local area networks (WLANs). Designing WLANs presents some unique challenges. Some heuristics are available for WLAN design, but they represent piecemeal solutions, focusing on a limited set of issues. This paper provides a more comprehensive approach to WLAN design, by providing support for additional tasks in the design process, as well as by providing the designer the option of examining multiple competing options. The approach is developed in modular fashion, thereby permitting the easy substitution of alternative models in any phase of the process. We believe the approach to be useful for WLAN designers, and it provides an apt illustration of design science in information systems research

Capacity Management for Cloud Computing: A System Dynamics Approach

As the demand for cloud computing as a preferred computing architecture grows, the need for effective capacity planning by cloud providers becomes crucial for their long term viability. Situations involving under-capacity and over-capacity represent lost opportunities and increased overhead. Economic conditions play a critical role in determining the capacity, cost, and revenue of cloud-based services. Using a system dynamics approach, this study evaluates the different conditions in cloud ecosystem from a capacity planning and management perspective, with a view to providing cloud service providers guidance for cloud capacity building strategies

Rebuilding Consumer Trust in eCommerce Relationships

Several researchers have studied trust in the electronic commerce context. Much of this work is aimed at establishing initial trust, with some recent research on maintaining on-going trust between consumer and vendor. This paper examines a related aspect of trust in the e-Commerce environment, namely trust violations and their subsequent repair. It draws upon research in professional trust relationships and adapts it to the e-Commerce context. It proposes a conceptual model that relates trust violation characteristics, vendor reconciliation tactics, and individual consumer characteristics as relevant determinants of the consumer\u27s willingness to reconcile. Given the large range of possible trust violations in on-line purchases, and increasing competition among vendors, it becomes imperative for earnest vendors to provide sincere opportunities to repair the trusting relationship with devoted consumers

Application of Ethical Frameworks to IT Offshoring

The global outsourcing of information technology (IT) activities, has received increased attention recently, given the controversy it generates. Differing views on IT offshoring prevail. One view claims IT offshoring steals jobs away from the United States economy, while another view maintains IT offshoring creates jobs and improves the overall Unites States economy. Despite the controversy created by IT offshoring, the ethical issues related to IT offshoring have received little attention. In this paper three major normative theories of business ethics: stockholder, stakeholder, and social contract theory will be introduced to examine the impact of IT offshoring from an ethical perspective. The application of these theories to a specific example of IT offshoring is presented in detail. This research represents an early attempt to examine the ethics of IT offshoring and could provide early insights into the IT offshoring decision

Does the \u27Golidlocks Conjecture\u27 Apply to Software Reuse?

Adopters of corporate software reuse programs face important decisions with respect to the size of components added to the reuse repository. Large components offer substantial savings when reused but limited opportunity for reuse; small components afford greater opportunity for reuse, but with less payoff. This suggests the possibility of an “optimal” component size, where the reuse benefit is at a maximum. In the software engineering discipline, this relationship – termed the Goldilocks Principle - has been empirically observed in software development, software testing, and software maintenance. This paper examines whether this relationship also applies for software reuse. In order to understand the effects of component size and repository size on the benefits of a reuse program this paper extends an empirically grounded reuse model to assess the effects of component size on reuse savings. The study finds that a variant of the Goldilocks Principle applies with respect to both component and repository size, suggesting that uncontrolled growth of a reuse repository and an inappropriate choice of component size may reduce benefits obtained from reuse

Data Warehouses in Public Schools: Lessons Learned in an On-Going Implementation

Over the last several years data warehouses and data marts have been increasingly used in commercial business enterprises to support decision making. However, this technology has not been as widely adopted in not-forprofit enterprises and public education in particular. Public education is coming under increased scrutiny as grass-roots support for spending is on the wane and accountability expectations for resource utilization are increasing. Data warehousing can effectively support data-driven decision making and represents a logical area for investment. This paper describes a partnership between a major metropolitan university and a large urban school district to deploy a comprehensive studentcentered data warehouse to support educators and administrators in their day-to-day operations. It addresses managerial, technical, and political issues faced in the implementation

Beautiful is Good and Good is Reputable: Multiple-Attribute Charity Website Evaluation and Initial Perceptions of Reputation Under the Halo Effect

The halo effect has been extensively used to understand how people make judgments about the quality of an object. Also, the halo effect has been known to occur when people evaluate multi-attribute objects. Although websites consist of multiple attributes and dimensions, prior research in information systems has paid little attention to how people evaluate multi-attribute websites and associated halos. Furthermore, research investigating how initial evaluations of reputation are formed toward unknown objects under the halo effect is scarce. Based on these two research gaps, the purposes of this study are to identify whether there is evidence of salient halos in the evaluation of multi-attribute websites and to theorize initial perceptions of reputation. To accomplish these objectives, we introduce a framework for classifying halos based on attributes and dimensions. Also, this study employs charity websites as a multi-attribute donation channel consisting of three attributes of information content quality (mission information, financial information, and donation information) and four attributes of system quality (navigability, download speed, visual aesthetics, and security). Based on the proposed framework, this study proposes four types of halos that are relevant to charity website evaluation—collective halo (attribute-to-attribute), aesthetics halo (attribute-to-dimension), reciprocal-quality halo (dimension-to-dimension), and quality halo (dimension-to-dimension). The results of structural equation modeling and other analyses provide evidence of the various proposed halos

Key Information Systems Management Issues in Developing Countries: Differences in the Indiana and US Contexts

This paper uses the Minnesota insturment to do a comparative study of the key information systems issued in the Indian and US contexts. The results indicate that seventeen of the top 25 and six of the top ten issues coincide. The top ten issues to conincide are: Data Resource, Strategic Planning, Aligning IS Orgnaization, Competitive Advantage, Quality of Software Development, and Telecommunications Systems. The issues making the top ten list in the US context but not so in the Indian context are: Information Architecture, IS Human Resources, and Organizational Learning. Technology Infrasturcture did not appear on the questionnaire administered in India. From this study it can be concluded that the gap between the state of IS in Indian and US has been narrowed

Modeling the Impact of the Sharing Economy on Traditional Firms

The rapid growth of the sharing economy in multiple industries suggests that the peer-to-peer participants are claiming an increasing share of the market, and having a real impact on traditional firms. Assessing the magnitude of this impact is critical for both sets of providers. Economic conditions play a critical role in determining the overall demand for services and the extent to which different providers can capture that demand. This paper uses a system dynamics approach to evaluate market share and revenue under a variety of economic conditions when traditional and peer-to-peer providers compete. The paper focuses on the travel and hospitality industry and examines the role of apartments for rent in contrast to traditional hotel rooms. Results suggest that unless the sharing economy is subjected to strict regulation, it will perform favorably under a variety of economic conditions