Vendor transition and the impact on in-flight projects

This paper explores the vendor transition process after the termination or alteration of existing outsourcing contracts and the impact on in-flight projects. A single case study based on a large Australian telecommunications company, which operates a heavily outsourced IT environment is presented. Qualitative techniques were used for data collection and analysis. Data collection was undertaken using on-site semistructured open-ended interviews. The following key themes were uncovered in the interviews 1) Communication of the vendor transition, 2) The transition period, 3) Confusion during transition, 4) Extending agreements, and 5) Knowledge management. The paper concludes by presenting a number implications and underlying points of interest derived from the findings. © 2010 Amaya Booker and Alan Sixsmith

Improving the learning of graduate attributes in the curriculum: A case-study in it management

Government, employers and professional societies want university graduates who are more ready for work. The UTS Work-Ready Project is a curriculum renewal initiative that aims to improve graduates' professional attributes and employability skills. The Project provides online teaching and learning resources to support the integration of Work-Ready Learning Activities (WRLA) into the existing curriculum. The paper provides an overview of the UTS Work-Ready Project and the incorporation of WRLA's into three Information Technology (IT) Management subjects which all included a group assessment item. In each subject, students were surveyed to gain feedback regarding how useful they found a team collaborative decision-making WRLA and whether it helped in their group assessment task. When averaged across the three subjects and the five surveys undertaken 85% of students thought the activity was useful, however there were mixed results in relation to whether the WRLA helped in the group assessment task. Under-graduate students reported the WRLA made no difference to the group assessment task, whereas postgraduates indicated the WRLA did help the team produce their group assessment item. © 2010, Australian Computer Society, Inc

Integrating an elearning information system into the classroom to engage it undergraduate students in non it content

© 2014 IADIS. This paper presents a comparative case study of the challenges of teaching non-IT content to IT undergraduates. Data was collected over five semesters via a standard University student survey to show how the integration of ELearning Information Systems (ELIS) has led to improved student satisfaction within an undergraduate IT subject. Results from the surveys are discussed in relation to the change history of the subject and indicate that continually updating content and delivery methods (no matter how static the subject area) can lead to improved outcomes. With further development, the combination of collaborative group work and an ELIS will provide an enhanced learning experience for students

Radial displacement sensor for non-contact bearings

A radial position sensor includes four capacitive electrodes oriented about a shaft, arranged in two diametrically opposite pairs. Sensor circuitry generates an output signal in proportion to the capacitance between the electrodes and the shaft; the capacitance between an electrode and the shaft increases as the shaft approaches the electrode and decreases as the shaft recedes from the electrode. The sensor circuitry applies an alternating voltage to one electrode of a pair and a 180 degree out of phase alternating voltage to the other electrode of the pair. The electrical responses of the two electrodes to their respective input signals are summed to form a radial deviation signal which is relatively free from the alternating voltage and accurately represents the position of the shaft relative to the electrodes of the pair

An agent-based architecture for managing the provision of community care - the INCA (Intelligent Community Alarm) experience

Community Care is an area that requires extensive cooperation between independent agencies, each of which needs to meet its own objectives and targets. None are engaged solely in the delivery of community care, and need to integrate the service with their other responsibilities in a coherent and efficient manner. Agent technology provides the means by which effective cooperation can take place without compromising the essential security of both the client and the agencies involved as the appropriate set of responses can be generated through negotiation between the parties without the need for access to the main information repositories that would be necessary with conventional collaboration models. The autonomous nature of agents also means that a variety of agents can cooperate together with various local capabilities, so long as they conform to the relevant messaging requirements. This allows a variety of agents, with capabilities tailored to the carers to which they are attached to be developed so that cost-effective solutions can be provided. </p

Periodic domains of quasiregular maps

We consider the iteration of quasiregular maps of transcendental type from Rd to Rd. We give a bound on the rate at which the iterates of such a map can escape to infinity in a periodic component of the quasi-Fatou set. We give examples which show that this result is best possible. Under an additional hypothesis, which is satisfied by all uniformly quasiregular maps, this bound can be improved to be the same as those in a Baker domain of a transcendental entire function. We construct a quasiregular map of transcendental type from R3 to R3 with a periodic domain in which all iterates tend locally uniformly to infinity. This is the first example of such behaviour in a dimension greater than two. Our construction uses a general result regarding the extension of biLipschitz maps. In addition, we show that there is a quasiregular map of transcendental type from R3 to R3 which is equal to the identity map in a half-space

Australian newspaper blogs

Blogs have become one of the most prominent forms of social media on the Web. This paper reports on the first part of a comprehensive study of how a mainstream Australian media organisation is integrating blogs into their business. The research used a qualitative approach and data collection was undertaken using semi-structured interviews with newspaper staff. The findings presented provide an insight into the opportunities to be gained and the challenges to be faced by Australian media organisations as they incorporate blogs in their online offerings

Dimensions of culture: A project perspective

This research in progress explores organizational culture from a project context. The paper takes the form of a case study with two projects, one from an oil company and the other from a bank, presented and analysed using Hofstede's [10] Six Dimensions of Organizational Culture. Data collection was Qualitative using the methods of reflective observation and informal discussion with project team members. The results show that for the bank project the culture of the project and the organization were along similar paths whereas for the oil company project the culture of the project and the organization were dissimilar in a number of dimensions. This research has also developed and pilot tested a questionnaire in relation to organisational culture in the context of projects, however this is not the focus of this paper

Engaging IT undergraduates in non-IT content: Adopting an eLearning information system in the classroom

© Emerald Group Publishing Limited. Purpose-This paper aims to report on the efforts made to enhance the engagement of IT students with non-IT-specific content. The mechanism to foster this engagement was the introduction of an eLearning information system (ELIS) for a finance-related subject within an IT undergraduate degree at the university. The subject developers were primarily concerned with both the learning design and the engagement of the student to enable the effective incorporation of an ELIS into the classroom. Design/methodology/approach-This interpretive research used a comparative case study as the aim was to gain an in-depth understanding of a particular situation. The research approach also allows an open-minded interpretation of the collected data as the researcher is interested in looking for the “Why and not the How”. Data were collected via an online university student feedback survey. Findings-Four key themes emerged from the data as follows: ITstudents learning non-IT-related content was a major driving force behind the changes to the course; staff change brought fresh eyes to the subject content and enabled improvements to occur; introducing the ELIS assisted the teaching staff to reduce preparation time while also helping students learn at the own pace; and collaborative group work helped facilitated student insights into real life work scenarios. The findings show that each of the key themes identified played a role in improving student engagement and satisfaction with the non-IT subject matter. Originality/value-The value of this paper is from its practical perspective. Engaging IT students in non-IT subject matter is a challenging proposition for which there is no simple solution. This paper shows that over a five-semester period and through a phased implementation of major changes, student satisfaction and engagement with non-IT subject matter has improved steadily. This paper is of interest, and hence value, to academics who encounter problems or issues of engaging students in non-domain-related subject matter