Tesis sobre el tema "Network managers"

I investigate whether cross-functional or cross-organizational networking following a large corporate merger and acquisition improves managers’ career outcomes. Previous research on networks and career success has focused on stable organizational environments, finding that large, open networks with many structural holes are most advantageous because of superior information benefits and control power, while closed networks provide redundant information that is unhelpful career-wise. However, I suggest that while dense, closed networks formed within knowledge (functional) or identity (legacy organization) boundaries might be detrimental to executives’ future promotability, closed networks are helpful if they are created across those boundaries. These ties help to facilitate knowledge transfer and develop a new superordinate post-merger identity and are ultimately valued by the organization. I tested this on junior executives’ email and survey data collected at two time points (pre-merger and a year later) from a newly-merged organization. Results show that while closed networks with higher constraint in general were detrimental to executive’s promotability pre-merger, they lose the negative effect in the post-merger tumult. Controlling for overall network constraint, increasing closed networks across functional and legacy organizational boundaries led to managers receiving higher promotability evaluations from top management, whereas increasing closed networks within one functional and legacy organizational boundary did not have a significant impact. Managers’ rank and networking strategy that joins other employees (i.e., having a tertius iungens orientation) 2 moderated the relationships between networks and promotability. Implications are discussed for career and social networks research.

Firms participate in network relationships with others to access resources that are not otherwise available. The resources may consist of goods, services, information, advice or support. This flow of resources into a firm has the potential to enhance the capability of a firm to react to the external competitive environment. Generally network relationships can be formal and/or informal. For a small firm, a network is more likely to be informal and have social links with individuals such as family, friends and acquaintances. This thesis investigates the network features and networking activities of small tourism and hospitality firms. The context of the research is that of owner-managers of chalet accommodation firms located at coastal and island destinations in the east of Peninsular Malaysia. Thirty-seven chalet owner-managers were interviewed face-to-face, using standardised interview questions and procedures, and case protocol. The research found that chalet firms were set-up mainly for economic motives rather that for lifestyle motives. The networks are composed of family and ethnic links and predominantly bounded by specific localities such as the 'village'. Informal ties are with those with a common interest in tourism products and services within a destination. The networks' contacts for business and social purposes consist of the same people. They represent less diverse, low cost and low maintenance networks. Chalet owner-managers became attached to family for financial reasons and to friends for other matters throughout their business life. This was due to the trust that was built up through the years of the relationship, which led to strong ties. The main reason for networking with the contacts was to exchange ideas, advice, and help. The local culture and religious believes have some influence in the selection of network members, network content and networking motivation as well as become guidelines in the networking activities.

The goal of this research is to improve the communications protocol for Dual Ring Power Electronics Systems called PESNet. The thesis will focus on making the protocol operate in a more reliable manner by tolerating Hardware Manager failures and allowing failover among duplicate Hardware Managers within PEBB-based systems. In order to make this possible, two new features must be added to PESNet: utilization of the secondary ring for fault-tolerant communication, and dynamic reconfiguration of the network. Many ideas for supporting fault tolerance have been discussed in previous work and the hardware for PEBB-based systems was designed so support fault tolerance. However, in spite of the capabilities of the hardware, fault tolerance is not supported yet by existing firmware or software. Improving the PESNet protocol to tolerate Hardware Manager failures will increase the reliability of power electronics systems. Moreover, the additional features that are needed to perform failover also allow recovery from link failures and make hot-swap or plug-and-play of PEBBs possible. Since power electronics systems are real-time systems, it is critical that packets be delivered as soon as possible to their destination. The network latency will limit the granularity of time that the control application can operate on. As a result, methods to implement the required features to meet real-time system requirements are discussed and changes to the protocol are proposed. Changing PESNet will provide reliability gains, depending on the reliability of the components that are used to construct the system.
Master of Science

Network management requires a large amount of knowledge about the network. In particular, knowledge about used network addresses, access time, and topology is useful. In a network composed of managed devices, much of the data necessary can come from simple network management protocol (SNMP) queries. Other data can come from other databases, or analysis of existing data. In particular, layer-two network topology can be determined by analyzing the mac address forwarding tables of layer-two devices. The layer-two topology can be merged with a layer-three topology to generate a complete topology of the network. This information is useless unless it is easily accessible to the network manager; therefore, a simple interface should be used to give access to all of this data.

Purpose: The purpose of this dissertation is to research managers of small size firms and to study managers’ perceived benefits of their participation in a formal business network. Small firms can benefit from managers participation in formal business network by gaining more knowledge, getting access to resources, create alliances and create opportunities to internationalize.

Methodology: This dissertation is of a deductive approach. Existing theory of managers, managerial demographic characteristics, networks and the outcomes to form a theoretical background is used. From this theory we will develop pattern models, conduct a survey, test the result statistically and compare the result with our created perceived pattern models.

Conclusions: Our findings show that no matter what managerial demographic characteristics of the manager, small firm managers mostly perceive to benefit from more knowledge, gaining consultancy and improving their companies’ position on the market as a result of their participation in the formal business network. Few managers perceived to gain knowledge about international markets, finding employees or created foreign co-operation.

Purpose: The purpose of the study is to extend the knowledge on how Swedish companies canbecome more embedded in the Chinese market by building relationships with political actors. Research question: How do Swedish managers develop and maintain relations with politicalactors in China, and how do they perceive the outcomes from such relations? Method: Qualitative approach with semi-structured interviews. Results: The results of the study shows that managers initially use local middlemen orconsultancies to get in contact with political actions. Further, they participate in variousactivities to build upon and develop that relationship, something that is argued by therespondents to be more time-consuming and extensive than in western countries. The outcomeof having these relationships is that firm could gain a competitive edge and the managers tobecome more efficient in their role. Contribution: This study contributes with additional research to the Extended BusinessNetwork and relationship building with non-business actors in China from a Swedishmanagerial perspective.

Die vorliegende Dissertation besteht aus drei Kapiteln über die Investmentfonds. Das erste Kapitel befasst sich mit der Rolle der Fondsmanager in der Bilanzverschönerung. Auf Basis der Analyse der Karrierewege von amerikanischen Fondsmanagern werden signifikante zusammenwirkende Manager-Fixed-Effects identifiziert, die nach der Kontrolle der endogenen Matching-Probleme immer noch robust sind. Die geschätzten Manager-Fixed-Effects haben signifikante Einflüsse auf die Out-of-Sample-Vorhersagen. Außerdem wird festgestellt, dass die Verriegelungen der Investmentfonds, die von gemeinsamen Managern verwaltet wurden, wichtige Kanäle für die Bilanzverschönerung verursachen. Das zweite Kapitel beschäftigt sich mit den Investmentstrategien der Fonds im Hinblick auf die Nutzung von Credit Default Swaps (CDS). Die Zuordnung der CDS-Positionen der Investmentfonds zu ihrem Bestandportfolio bietet eine neue Methodik zur Identifizierung der CDS-Strategien und kompensiert somit die Analysen der existierenden Literatur auf der Makroebene. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass die Anreize zur Risikoreduzierung die Spekulationsanreize dominieren, insbesondere, wenn die Kreditexposition durch ungedeckte Leerverkäufe der CDS-Verträge erhöht wird. Die erfahrenen Fondsmanager tendieren dazu, mehr Kreditrisiko in Kauf zu nehmen, während es für die Fondsmanagerinnen wahrscheinlicher als für ihre männlichen Kollegen ist, gegen das bestehende Risiko abzusichern. Der letzte Teil nimmt die Pleite von Lehman Brothers unter die Lupe, um sich mit der daraus resultierenden unerwarteten Schließung der CDS-Positionen als einem natürlichen Experiment auseinanderzusetzten. Diese Studie dient zur Untersuchung der Risiko- und Leistungsimplikationen der CDS-Investments der Fonds. Die Investmentfonds besitzen bei ihren CDS-Transaktionen im Durchschnitt einen beachtlichen Teil Extremrisiko. Während die CDS-Nutzer von guten Gesamtmarktlagen profitieren, erleiden sie unter Verlusten bei geclusterten Ausfällen.
This dissertation comprises of three chapters on mutual funds. The first chapter establishes the role of managers in the deceptive practice of window dressing. Employing comprehensive career history of U.S. mutual fund managers, I find strong jointly significant manager fixed effects, which are robust after addressing endogenous matching concerns. The estimated manager fixed effects are significant in making out-of-sample predictions. Further I establish that mutual fund interlocks through common managers are important channels that spread window dressing. The second chapter studies the investment strategies of mutual funds regarding their use of credit default swaps (CDS). Matches between mutual funds’ CDS positions and their underlying portfolio in the holdings facilitate a new approach in identifying CDS strategies that complements the “macro” level analyses in the existing literature. I find risk reducing incentives are dominated by speculative incentives, especially those to increase credit exposure via naked short CDS contracts. Experienced fund managers tend to take on more credit risk, while female managers are more likely to hedge comparing with their male peers. The third chapter employs the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the resulting sudden closures of CDS positions as a natural experiment to examine the risk and performance implications of mutual funds’ CDS investments. Funds on average load up on a significant amount of tail risk by trading CDS. While CDS users benefit when market conditions are favorable, they suffer during periods of clustered defaults.

The purpose of the research is to understand how unit managers react to and are able to engage with a newly devised centralised performance measurement system(PMS) based on the balanced scorecard(BSC). The theoretical contribution of this study is to establish the behaviours which may contributeto or hinder the way in which the BSC is accepted and used at a unit level. The knowledge gained and tested in actual practice will prove invaluable.This will not only allow managers to identify and therefore react to areas of probable negativity, but also allow them to encourage and endorse the more positive aspects. The observed research which adopts a process of collaborative inquiry covers a period of 10 months and adopts a longitudinal case study approach. During this time, emphasisis paid upon the role of the reviewing senior manager and those managers responsible for the unit score cards, examining their initial exposure to and deployment of the scorecard, along with its use in eight of the seventeen delivery units. The findings identify that three core elements exist within a performance environment.These consist of the performance strategy, its PMS and the performance encounter where performance improvement are ultimately realised. Within the centre core there exists both an emotional and behavioural reaction determining either the success or demise of the overall performance management and its measurement system. The research concludes by evaluating the lessons derived from the interactions within the performance environment.The study focuses on how considerations such as personal control and influence,when linked to understanding, knowledge and contribution impact on the level of perceived ownership and accountability felt by individuals. By addressing these areas organisations are able to ensure a more successful use of a centrally devised BSC approach across its exposure,deployment and usage.

The aim of this thesis is to investigate the role and impact of the committee staff of the South Korean National Assembly in the scrutiny of government bills. It also explores the factors affecting their role and impact focusing on the scrutiny of government bills. Parliamentary staff globally have not drawn much academic attention with the exception of those in the U.S., and it is difficult to apply the theories and concepts in American studies to staff in the legislatures of other countries due to the peculiarity of legislatures in the U.S. Moreover, previous literature on parliamentary staff has not given much attention to the roles of staff in mediation and negotiation between policy actors. This research sets out the framework consisting of macro-level institutions, network, actors and the interaction between actors, and uses the perspectives of policy network theory and new institutionalism to derive key concepts, in the context of the South Korean National Assembly, on the features of network; the capabilities and orientations of MPs and committee staff members; and historical contexts affecting the evolution of institutions. In order to collect and analyse empirical data, this research conducted qualitative interviews with 38 committee staff members; amendment analysis on 787 amendment opinions in the scrutiny of law bills; and legislative case studies on four cases of the legislative process. The thesis argues that the committee staff provide information and guide the scrutiny; consult with and mediate between policy actors; and play a limited role in setting the items of the subcommittee meetings. Generally speaking, the impact of them is found to be strong, as evidenced through the interview data and amendment analysis. This is because the orientation structures and capabilities of MPs and committee staff members are conducive to MPs’ delegation of detailed scrutiny to committee staff members; staff members’ participation; and MPs’ agreement with them according to the interview data. In addition, political controversy affects the role and impact negatively, but technical complexity affects positively according to the interview data and amendment analysis. These findings are also supported by the legislative case study. The committee staff conducted substantive roles in the scrutiny of uncontroversial bills, but their roles in amending bills were limited to the translation of the agreement between parties in the scrutiny of controversial bills although they specified detailed amendments and conducted scrutiny in the aspects of legal structure and wording in technically complex matters. The contributions of this research are as follows: First of all, it sheds lights on the network managing function of parliamentary staff generally and in Korea in particular in their roles such as consultation and mediation. In addition, it also sheds light on the nature of issue as the factors affecting the role and impact of parliamentary staff differently. Last, but not least, it can be a base of comparative research on the legislative staff through studying non-partisan committee staff. The major limitation of this research is that it does not address whether the findings can be applied to the legislatures of other countries. This limitation is due to the peculiarity of South Korean National Assembly, although it shares some features of the legislative process with those in the U.K. and U.S. But then, this is a major problem with all kinds of comparative social science research and ought not to be an excuse not to engage with these important issues. Thus, the conduct of a comparative research about parliamentary staff of different countries with a consistent framework is suggested as the direction of future studies.

WirelessHART standard is becoming a reference as a wireless solution in industrial process automation and control. The WirelessHART network performance is mainly determined by its main component: the Network Manager, responsible for creating and configuring the WHART network, as well as managing routing and scheduling communications between devices. Due to the novelty of the WirelessHART standard (2010), there is not an opensource design or implementation of the WirelessHART Network Manager available. Only Dust Networks has a commercial Network Manager in the market. This fact makes the WirelessHART Network Manager an interesting area of research. In this thesis, we present a layered interface-oriented component-based architecture and the software design for the WirelessHART Network Manager. Furthermore, we give solution to some of the question marks left by the WHART specification regarding the Network Manager operation. Due to the modularity of the proposed design and architecture, the software components can be reused in other WirelessHART devices such Gateway or Field Devices.

Wireless technology has been advancing a lot over the years and it has become mature enough to be used in industrial process control. Wireless sensor networks have overtaken the wired devices and are vastly adapted across the industry. Using wireless technologies in industrial process control results in easy installation and configuration of network and helps in reduction of overall cost. Applying wireless technologies has greater benefits but on the other hand it provides challenges due to harsh industrial environments. Nowadays, wireless sensor devices are smart enough to detect the problems within the network and are capable of producing health reports. To use the capabilities of these smart devices a centralized management is required.  A centralized network manager can manage these smart devices to improve the overall network. Network manager plays a pivotal role because it is a central part of the network and a bad network manager results in network performance degradation. This thesis work addresses the need of centralized network management and proposes a design for the network manager based on the WirelessHART standard. Several algorithms are developed based on the layered architecture of WirelessHART  and a user-friendly graphical user interface is designed for the network manager which is capable of displaying real-time performance and statistics of the network, adding and configuring the nodes, creating routes for the nodes, showing routing tables and neighbour tables and display the network topology. Any change in the network is reflected and displayed by the GUI at run time. The designed network manager is implemented and tested using both simulated packets and real hardware and the work is evaluated using Average Packet Delivery Ratio, Average End to End Delay and by comparing the work to already designed network managers.

ITC/USA 2014 Conference Proceedings / The Fiftieth Annual International Telemetering Conference and Technical Exhibition / October 20-23, 2014 / Town and Country Resort & Convention Center, San Diego, CA
Network-based telemetry systems have unprecedented amounts of flexibility due to the ability to monitor, control, configure, coordinate, and visualize the operations of the flight test system. As a result of this flexibility, multiple tests can be conducted in a single flight; all it takes is reconfiguration of portions of the system. However, management of such a dynamic system is a complex task. As such, the integrated Network Enhanced Telemetry (iNET) Program is currently developing a System Manager application to provide a model for coordinated management of networked telemetry. The System Manager provides a user application for monitoring, controlling, configuring, coordinating, and visualizing the operations of the Telemetry Network System (TmNS) network. This paper describes the key requirements, capabilities, and development approach of the System Manager.

Today's organizations need optimized computing environments that integrate diverse hardware, operating systems and applications, sometimes at numerous locations. The rapid growth in size and complexity of distributed networks and the use of heterogeneous components require effective tools to manage these resources. The system management aspect of distributed networks is one of the least mature components of the environment, and unfortunately it is receiving little attention by systems developers for various reasons. A new model of an expert network system network manager has been designed based on an analysis and evaluation of major contemporary distributed network management systems: (i) DEC PolyCenter network management system, (ii) Hewlett-Packard Open View network management system, (iii) IDM NetView network management system, and (iv) Sun Microsystems SunNet network management system. These network management systems can handle network operations, administration, maintenance and provisioning functions with human intervention, but they cannot handle or predict unforeseen network fault situations; autonomous capabilities are entirely missing. A model of an expert network management system that utilizes a rule-based paradigm for decision making and neural networks for fault-recognition and -prediction has been proposed. The design includes all the functionalities recommended by International Standard Organization (ISO) for Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model. The proposed model also possesses existing operational features of contemporary distributed network management systems, and is capable of providing corrective network maintenance actions manually as well as automatically. A prototype was built and tested to authenticate the new model. Test results indicate that the combination of a rule-based paradigm with neural network fault-recognition and -prediction capabilities can be useful in the design of successful future distributed network management systems.

The trend of moving conventionallP networks towards Next Generation Networks (NGNs) has highlighted the need for more sophisticated Traffic Managers (TMs) to guarantee better network and Quality of Service (QoS); these have to be scalable to support increasing link bandwidth and to cater for more diverse emerging applications. Current TM solutions though, are limited and not flexible enough to support new TM functionality or QoS with increasing diversity at faster speeds. This thesis investigates efficient and flexible memory management architectures that are critical in determining scalability and upper limits of TM performance. The approach presented takes advantage of current FPGA technology that now offers a high density of computational resources and flexible memory configurations, leading to what the author contends to be an ideal, programmable platform for distributed network management. The thesis begins with a survey of current TM solutions and their underlying technologies/architectures, the outcome of which indicates that memory and memory interfacing are the major factors in determining the scalability and upper limits of TM performance. An analysis of the implementation cost for a new TM with the capability of integrated queuing and scheduling further highlights the need to develop a more effective memory management architecture. A new on-demand QM architecture for programmable TM is then proposed that can dynamically map the ongoing active flows to a limited number of physical queues. Compared to the traditional QMs, it consumes much less memory resources, leading to a more scalable and effiCient TM solution. Based on the analysis of the effect of varying Internet traffic on the proposed OM, a more robust and resilient QM architecture is derived that achieves higher scalability and pefformance by adapting its functionality to the changing network conditions.

Thesis (S.M.M.O.T.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, Management of Technology Program, 2002.
This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections.
Includes bibliographical references (leaves 116-121).
As our world becomes more complex and information-rich, the effort needed to share and create knowledge is increasing greatly. Transformation from Industrial Age to Information Age organizations is not simple. But there are strategies managers can use and emulate, to make their organizations more successful in sharing and creating new knowledge, to achieve better performance. Knowledge loss is a significant issue. Demographics may cause the "first-of-type" implementation pioneers to retire, or events such as those of Fall 2001 may cause people to be no longer available -- or no longer able to reach their knowledge support systems, as seen when anthrax attacks closed Congressional offices for weeks. Strategies can be implemented for the different kinds of knowledge -- explicit knowledge, meta knowledge, and tacit knowledge. Processes can be used to enhance knowledge sharing, extending the number of people who know and reducing the risk of loss. The US Army is a learning organization which has spent the past decade becoming "knowledge centric and network centric." Techniques, processes and knowledge lessons learned are presented, including a case study of the Project Management Office for Bradley Fighting Vehicle Systems, as it transformed its people, organization, and vehicles being developed from Industrial Age to internet-work Information Age systems. Rather than focusing on knowledge management, which has become synonymous with archiving what is already known into digital databases, I am focused on the strategies real-world managers can use for knowledge. The goal is to help the organization achieve better performance by sharing knowledge. Technology can help, when supporting instead of driving the goals. Networking, both in person and virtually, can overcome the isolation of knowledge. Many of my examples tap into the experiences I had or observed in the US Army product development community -- but I believe they are valuable and generalizable to other high- performance organizations. "Hope is not a method" -- knowledge sharing is a better technique.
by Lisa M. Shaler-Clark.
S.M.M.O.T.

In order to meet the requirements of emerging services, the future Internet will need to be flexible, reactive and adaptive with respect to arising network conditions. Network management functionality is essential in providing dynamic reactiveness and adaptability but current management approaches have limitations which prevent them from meeting these requirements. In search for a paradigm shift, recent research efforts have been focusing on autonomic/self-management principles, whereby network elements can adapt themselves to contextual changes without any external intervention through adaptive and flexible functionality. This thesis investigates how autonomic principles can be extended and applied to fixed networks for quality of service and performance management. It presents a novel resource management framework which enables intelligence to be introduced within the network in order to support self-management functionality in a coordinated and controllable manner. The proposed framework relies on a distributed infrastructure, called the management substrate, which is a logical structure formed by the ingress nodes of the network. The role of the substrate is illustrated on realistic resource management application scenarios for the emerging self-managed Internet. These cover solutions for dynamic traffic engineering (load balancing across multiple paths), energy efficiency and cache management in Internet Service Providers. The thesis addresses important research challenges associated with the proposed framework, such as the design of specific organisational, communication and coordination models required to support the different management control loops. Furthermore, it develops, for each application scenario, specific mechanisms to realise the relevant resource management functionality. It also considers issues related to the coexistence of multiple control loops and investigates an approach by which their interactions can be managed. In order to demonstrate the benefits of the proposed resource management solution, an extensive performance evaluation of the different mechanisms described in this thesis have been performed based on realistic traffic traces and network topologies.

Network virtualisation is a promising technique for dealing with the resistance of the Internet to architectural changes, enabling a novel business model in which infrastructure management is decoupled from service provision. It allows infrastructure providers (InPs) who own substrate networks (SNs) to lease chunks of them out to service providers who then create virtual networks (VNs), which can then be re-leased out or used to provide services to end-users. However, the different VNs should be initialised, in which case virtual links and nodes must be mapped to substrate nodes and paths respectively. One of the challenges in the initialisation of VNs is the requirement of an efficient sharing of SN resources. Since the profitability of InPs depends on how many VNs are able to be allocated simultaneously onto the SN, the success of network virtualisation will depend, in part, on how efficiently VNs utilise physical network resources. This thesis contributes to efficient resource sharing in network virtualisation by dividing the problem into three sub-problems: (1) mapping virtual nodes and links to substrate nodes and paths i.e. virtual network embedding (VNE), (2) dynamic managing of the resources allocated to VNs throughout their lifetime (DRA), and (3) provisioning of backup resources to ensure survivability of the VNs. The constrained VNE problem is NP-Hard. As a result, to simplify the solution, many existing approaches propose heuristics that make assumptions (e.g. a SN with infinite resources), some of which would not apply in practical environments. This thesis proposes an improvement in VNE by proposing a one-shot VNE algorithm which is based on column generation (CG). The CG approach starts by solving a restricted version of the problem, and thereafter refines it to obtain a final solution. The objective of a one-shot mapping is to achieve better resource utilisation, while using CG significantly enhances the solution time complexity. In addition current approaches are static in the sense that after the VNE stage, the resources allocated are not altered for the entire lifetime of the VN. The few proposals that do allow for adjustments in original mappings allocate a fixed amount of node and link resources to VNs throughout their life time. Since network load varies with time due to changing user demands, allocating a fixed amount of resources based on peak load could lead to an inefficient utilisation of overall SN resources, whereby, during periods when some virtual nodes and/or links are lightly loaded, SN resources are still reserved for them, while possibly rejecting new VN requests. The second contribution of this thesis are a set of proposals that ensure that SN resources are efficiently utilised, while at the same making sure that the QoS requirements of VNs are met. For this purpose, we propose self-management algorithms in which the SN uses time-difference machine learning techniques to make autonomous decisions with respect to resource allocation. Finally, while some scientific research has already studied multi-domain VNE, the available approaches to survivable VNs have focused on the single InP environment. Since in the more practical situation a network virtualisation environment will involve multiple InPs, and because an extension of network survivability approaches from the single to multi domain environments is not trivial, this thesis proposes a distributed and dynamic approach to survivability in VNs. This is achieved by using a multi-agent-system that uses a multi-attribute negotiation protocol and a dynamic pricing model forming InPs coalitions supporting SNs resource backups. The ultimate objective is to ensure that virtual network operators maximise profitability by minimising penalties resulting from QoS violations.
La virtualització de xarxes es una tècnica prometedora per afrontar la resistència d'Internet als canvis arquitectònics, que permet un nou model de negoci en el que la gestió de la infraestructura de xarxa es desacobla de la provisió del servei. Això permet als proveïdors de infraestructura (InPs), propietaris de la xarxa física substrat (SN), llogar segments d'aquesta als proveïdors dels serveis, que crearan xarxes virtuals (VNs) que a l'hora poden re-llogar-se o utilitzar-se per donar servei a usuaris finals. No obstant això, les diferents VNs s'han d'inicialitzar assignant els seus nodes i enllaços als del substrat. Un dels reptes d'aquest procés es el requisit de fer un ús eficient dels recursos de la SN. Donat que el benefici d'un InP depèn del nombre de xarxes virtuals que puguin allotjar-se simultàniament en la SN, l'èxit de la virtualització de xarxes depèn en part de quan eficient es l’ús dels recursos de la xarxa física per part de les VNs. Aquesta Tesi contribueix a la millora de l’eficiència en la compartició de recursos en la virtualització de xarxes dividint el problema en tres sots problemes: (1) assignació de nodes i enllaços virtuals a nodes i enllaços del substrat (VNE), (2) gestió dinàmica dels recursos assignats a les VNs al llarg de la seva vida útil (DRA) i (3) aprovisionament de recursos de backup per assegurar la supervivència de les VNs. La naturalesa del problema VNE el fa “NP-Hard". En conseqüència, per simplificar la solució, moltes de les propostes son heurístiques que es basen en hipòtesis (per exemple, SN amb recursos il•limitats) de difícil compliment en escenaris reals. Aquesta Tesi proposa una millora al problema VNE mitjan_cant un algorisme “one-shot VNE" basat en generació de columnes (CG). La solució CG comena resolent una versió restringida del problema, per tot seguit refinar-la i obtenir la solució final. L'objectiu del “one-shot VNE" es aconseguir millorar l’ús dels recursos, mentre que CG redueix significativament la complexitat temporal del procés. D'altre banda, les solucions actuals son estàtiques, ja que els recursos assignats en la fase VNE no es modifiquen durant tot el temps de vida útil de la VN. Les poques propostes que permeten reajustar l’assignació inicial, es basen en una assignació fixe de recursos a les VNs. No obstant això, degut a que la càrrega de la xarxa varia a conseqüència de la demanda canviant dels usuaris, assignar una quantitat fixe de recursos basada en situacions de càrrega màxima esdevé en ineficiència per infrautilització en períodes de baixa demanda, mentre que en tals períodes de demanda baixa, el tenir recursos reservats, pot originar rebutjos de noves VNs. La segona contribució d'aquesta Tesi es un conjunt de propostes que asseguren l’ús eficient dels recursos de la SN, garantint a la vegada els requeriments de qualitat de servei de totes les VNs. Amb aquesta finalitat es proposen algorismes d’autogestió en els que la SN utilitza tècniques d'aprenentatge de màquines per a materialitzar decisions autònomes en l’assignació dels recursos. Finalment, malgrat que diversos estudis han tractat ja el problema VNE en entorn multi-domini, les propostes actuals de supervivència de xarxes virtuals s'han limitat a contexts d'aprovisionament per part d'un sol InP. En canvi, a la pràctica, la virtualització de xarxes comportarà un entorn d'aprovisionament multi-domini, i com que l’extensió de solucions de supervivència d'un sol domini al multi-domini no es trivial, aquesta Tesi proposa una solució distribuïda i dinàmica per a la supervivència de VNs. Això s'aconsegueix amb un sistema multi-agent que utilitza un protocol de negociació multi-atribut i un model dinàmic de preus per formar coalicions d'InPs que proporcionaran backups als recursos de les SNs. L'objectiu últim es assegurar que els operadors de xarxes virtuals maximitzin beneficis minimitzant les penalitzacions per violació de la QoS.
La virtualización de redes es una técnica prometedora para afrontar la resistencia de Internet a cambios arquitectónicos, que permite un nuevo modelo de negocio en el que la gestión de la infraestructura está desacoplada del aprovisionamiento del servicio. Esto permite a los proveedores de infraestructuras (InPs), propietarios de la red física subyacente (SN), alquilar segmentos de la misma a los proveedores de servicio, los cuales crearán redes virtuales (VNs), que a su vez pueden ser realquiladas o usadaspara proveer el servicio a usuarios finales. Sin embargo, las diferentes VNs deben inicializarse, mapeando sus nodos y enlaces en los del substrato. Uno de los retos de este proceso de inicialización es el requisito de hacer un uso eficiente de los recursos de la SN. Dado que el benecio de los InPs depende de cuantas VNs puedan alojarse simultáneamente en la SN, el éxito de la virtualización de redes depende, en parte, de cuan eficiente es el uso de los recursos de red físicos por parte de las VNs. Esta Tesis contribuye a la compartición eficiente de recursos para la virtualización de redes dividiendo el problema en tres sub-problemas: (1) mapeo de nodos y enlaces virtuales sobre nodos y enlaces del substrato (VNE), (2) gestión dinámica de los recursos asignados a las VNs a lo largo de su vida útil (DRA), y (3) aprovisionamiento de recursos de backup para asegurar la supervivencia de las VNs. La naturaleza del problema VNE lo hace “NP-Hard". En consecuencia, para simplificar la solución, muchas de las actuales propuestas son heurísticas que parten de unas suposiciones (por ejemplo, SN con recursos ilimitados) de difícil asumir en la práctica. Esta Tesis propone una mejora al problema VNE mediante un algoritmo “one-shot VNE" basado en generación de columnas (CG). La solución CG comienza resolviendo una versión restringida del problema, para después refinarla y obtener la solución final. El objetivo del “one-shot VNE" es mejorar el uso de los recursos, a la vez que con CG se reduce significativamente la complejidad temporal del proceso. Por otro lado,las propuestas actuales son estáticas, ya que los recursos asignados en la fase VNE no se alteran a lo largo de la vida útil de la VN. Las pocas propuestas que permiten reajustes del mapeado original ubican una cantidad fija de recursos a las VNs. Sin embargo, dado que la carga de red varía con el tiempo, debido a la demanda cambiante de los usuarios, ubicar una cantidad fija de recursos basada en situaciones de pico conduce a un uso ineficiente de los recursos por infrautilización de los mismos en periodos de baja demanda, mientras que en esta situación, al tener los recursos reservados, pueden rechazarse nuevas solicitudes de VNs. La segunda contribución de esta Tesis es un conjunto de propuestas para el uso eficiente de los recursos de la SN, asegurando al mismo tiempo la calidad de servicio de las VNs. Para ello se proponen algoritmos de auto-gestión en los que la SN usa técnicas de aprendizaje de máquinas para materializar decisiones autónomas en la asignación de recursos. Finalmente, aunque determinadas investigaciones ya han estudiado el problema multi-dominio VNE, las propuestas actuales de supervivencia de redes virtuales se han limitado a un entorno de provisión de infraestructura de un solo InP. Sin embargo, en la práctica, la virtualización de redes comportará un entorno de aprovisionamiento con múltiples InPs, y dado a que la extensión de las soluciones de supervivencia de un entorno único a uno multi-dominio no es trivial, esta Tesis propone una solución distribuida y dinámica a la supervivencia de VNs. Esto se consigue mediante un sistema multi-agente que usa un protocolo de negociación multi-atributo y un modelo dinámico de precios para conformar coaliciones de InPs para proporcionar backups a los recursos de las SNs. El objetivo último es asegurar que los operadores de VNs maximicen su beneficio minimizando la penalización por violación de la QoS.

As the role of the Internet has been steadily gaining in importance, overlays are increasingly being used to provide new services and to deploy older ones. Some of the services for which overlays have been proposed include multicast, quality of service (QoS), search, and resilient networks. The use of overlays, in turn, has led to more interest in improving their performance. The performance of an overlay network depends significantly on how the network is structured, i.e., the placement of the nodes in the underlying network topology, the links between the overlay nodes and the access links of these nodes. This thesis focuses on algorithms for improving the performance of

This thesis has examined how expatriate managers in Russia create and use social networks with other individuals, in order to be successful in their assignment on an international unit. The study has also focused on how corporations can benefit from these networking activities conducted by the expatriates. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with expatriate managers on location in Russia in order to answer the research question. The interviews have later been analyzed by using a theoretical framework mainly based on the social capital theory and the main findings are as follows. Expatriate managers in Russia create networks with other individuals in order to both receive new business opportunities but also for adjusting to life in Russia. Corporations themselves do also benefit from these social networks, since they can create foundations for new business opportunities and increase corporations general image. The limitations of this study are that only Swedish expatriates have been included in the presented empirical material.

This thesis investigates the management of social capital processes as they are accomplished-understood, experienced and shaped-by owner-managers. The aim of the thesis is to develop a deeper understanding of the management of social capital processes, to achieve a greater congruence between real-life perspectives and experiences and social capital literature. The thesis argues that social capital is situational, and in the economic situation the theory has been bounded by rational choice framing assumptions. The research problem is that claims for the universality of the economic way of looking at life, and for looking at social capital processes are over-stated. Predicated on this insight the research investigates economic notions of rationality, and low and non-rationality, as well as their inter-dependence in the management of social capital processes. The research follows a qualitative approach for data collection, with flexible pre-coding to guide the research where to look, while retaining an inductive openness to emergent data. The research population is drawn from SME owner-managers in the service and retail sectors, who were researched over two years using semi-structured interviews, observation, and by researcher participant observation. The thesis presents a number of contributions to knowledge. First, the thesis offers an in-depth, single source review explicating the meaning of the economic form of social capital, with reference to its intellectual antecedents, conceptual debates and key theoretical authors. The second (emergent research) contribution is to identify the significance of ethics and autodidactic reading for managing social capital processes. The third (theoretical) contribution argues for an expanded social capital perspective, beyond the prevailing and over-confident rational framing assumptions, and also for a new holistic ontological understanding. The fourth contribution is to identify a number of generic processes which can guide the management of social capital processes.

The continuous transformation of the industrial society into a service and knowledge society is accompanied by profound change of demand: Customer requests will increasingly focus on individual products, shorter delivery times and appropriate prices. To encounter these challenges under the conditions of dynamic global markets and inter-regional competition, the CRC 457 “Non-Hierarchical Regional Production-Networks” at the Chemnitz University of Technology focuses on SME and investigates ways to implement customer-oriented, temporary networking of smallest, autonomous units (“competence cells”) in the region of South-West-Saxony. As a partial result of this research we are able to present a model of competence cell based networking distinguishing between three levels of networking, each with its own logic of reproduction (cp. Figure 1): 1) According to a most general concept, networks can be seen as given in any social context. Regarding a specific region, one has to assume that there is a broad array of infra-structural, mental and communicative relations; that as a whole we call the Regional Network. This level can be seen as basic level of competence cell based networking, specific elements (competence cells) of this network can be seen as necessary resources of the following level. 2) The second level of networking we call Competence Network. The first continuous problem of this network is to select competence cells according to relevant parameters that may be defined by customer orders or, in view of new market entry, be generated by the Competence Network itself. The second problem is to arrange these cells along a product specific value chain and, by this means, to create temporary production networks. Concerning both of the problems, the third is to find a non-hierarchical mode of negotiation. 3) On the third level temporary alliances of basically autonomous competence cells can be observed. After executing their order, these Production Networks dissolve and the constituent cells reenter the second or even the first level of networking. Generalising our observation we now assume that every phenomena labelled as regional or industrial network or district should be investigated in view of (these) different levels of networking, especially if we are interested in dealing more efficiently with the problems of network management. Hence, we suggest to first answer the question “Which (of these) networks are we to manage?” before asking how. Concerning the latter, a synopsis on the discourse on managing networks shows three major approaches: 1) Networks are assumed to be uncontrollable (cp. e.g. Castells 2001), as they are self-organised systems selecting external control impulses only by their own criterias of relevance, so we have either to adapt the logic of the target system (which implies self-adaption) or to take the risk of being totally ignored. With this in mind we can’t speak of control in terms of causal logic. 2) Networks are assumed to be cultivable: According to Wenger and Snyder (2000) for example networks are uncontrollable, but - like a gardener - we are able to set adequate general conditions for their “growth” and continuity. 3) Networks are assumed to be controllable: For authors like Sydow (2000) networks are to be seen as hybrid forms of coordination recombining aspects of market and hierarchy. Thus, recombining the classical means of control will finally lead to the ability to manage networks. It will be to show that each of these approaches focuses on specific aspects of networking, thus, each of them is creating a self-contained concept of networks: Castells refers to networks as a basal nexus of (global) interconnectedness that, like the Regional Network in our case, obviously can’t be managed. Wenger and Snyder are interested in network-organisations that (like Competence Networks) also can’t be controlled but can be implemented by and embedded in other social systems (cp. Grabher 1993). Sydow finally observes networks of more or less autonomous organisations corresponding to our Production Networks, which are in deed more or less controllable. Not least because of their different theoretical assumptions, all these concepts seemed to be not only incommensurable but incompatible so far. Nonetheless, during our work in CRC 457 we were to manage all these concepts while approaching to one single objective of research. Therefore, we had to ask, how many perspectives on network are we to manage? The answer is: at least three. Integrating these, we generated a holistic life-cycle model of network, which we like to present as starting point for further research in the field network management.

Les Réseaux de Capteurs Sans Fils (RCSFs) sont composés d'une multitude de nœuds, chacun étant capable de réaliser des mesures (température, pression, etc) et de communiquer par radio fréquence. Ces réseaux forment une pierre angulaire de l'Internet des Objets, en étant au cœur de nombreuses applications, par exemple de domotique ou d'agriculture de précision. La limite d'utilisation des RCSFs provient souvent de leurs durées de vie restreintes, les rendant peu intéressants pour des applications nécessitants de longues périodes de fonctionnement en autonomie. En effet, les RCSFs traditionnels sont alimentés par des piles individuelles équipant chaque nœud, et les nœuds sont ainsi condamnés à une durée de vie finie et courte par rapport aux besoins de certaines applications. De plus, changer les piles n'est pas toujours réalisable si le réseau est dense, ou si les nœuds sont déployés dans des environnements les rendant difficile d'accès. Une solution plus prometteuse est d'équiper chaque nœud d'un ou de plusieurs récupérateur(s) d'énergie individuel(s), et ainsi de le rendre capable de s'alimenter exclusivement à partir de l'énergie récoltée dans son environnent. Plusieurs sources d'énergie sont possibles, telles que le vent ou le solaire. Étant donné que les sources d'énergie sont typiquement dynamiques et non contrôlées, ne pas tomber en panne d'alimentation et nécessaire pour garantir un fonctionnement fiable. Comme l'augmentation de la qualité de service engendre souvent une augmentation de la puissance consommée, une solution simple est de configurer la qualité de service au déploiement à une valeur constante suffisamment faible pour éviter la panne d'alimentation. Cependant, cette solution ne permet pas d'exploiter pleinement l'énergie récoltée, et mène ainsi à un gaspillage d'énergie important ainsi qu'à de faibles qualités de service au vu de l'énergie récoltée. Une solution plus efficace est d'adapter dynamiquement la puissance consommée, et donc la qualité de service. Cette adaptation est faite par un composant logiciel appelé gestionnaire d'énergie. Dans cette thèse, deux nouvelles approches pour l'adaptation en ligne sont proposées, l'une s'appuyant sur la théorie du contrôle floue, et l'autre sur l'apprentissage par renforcement. De plus, comme la communication est souvent la tâche la plus énergivore dans les RCSFs, les wake-up receivers sont utilisées dans cette thèse pour réduire le coût des communications. Un modèle analytique générique a été proposé pour étudier différents protocoles de contrôle d'accès au support (Medium Access Control -- MAC), et combiné à des résultats expérimentaux pour évaluer les wake-up receivers. Aussi, un nouveau protocole MAC permettant la sélection opportuniste de relais a été proposé. Enfin, la combinaison des wake-up receivers et de la récolte d'énergie a été étudiée expérimentalement avec un cas pratique
Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) are made of multiple sensor devices which measure physical value (e.g. temperature, pressure...) and communicate wirelessly. These networks form a key enabling technology of many Internet of Things (IoT) applications such as smart building and precision farming. The bottleneck of long-term WSN applications is typically the energy. Indeed, traditional WSNs are powered by individual batteries and a significant effort was devoted to maximizing the lifetime of these devices. However, as the batteries can only store a finite amount of energy, the network is still doomed to die, and changing the batteries is not always possible if the network is dense or if the nodes are deployed in a harsh environment. A promising solution is to enable each node to harvest energy directly in its environment, using individual energy harvesters. As most of the energy sources are dynamic and uncontrolled, avoiding power failures of the nodes is critical to enable reliable networks. Increasing the quality of service typically requires increasing the power consumption, and a simple solution is to set the quality of service of the nodes to a constant value low enough to avoid power failures. However, this solution does not fully exploits the available energy and therefore leads to high energy waste and poor quality of service regarding the available environmental energy. A more efficient solution is online adaptation of the node power consumption, which is performed by an energy manager on each node. In this thesis, two new approaches for online adaptation of the nodes energy consumption were proposed, relying on fuzzy control theory and reinforcement learning. Moreover, as communications are typically the most energy consuming task of a WSN node, emerging wake-up receivers were leveraged to reduce the energy cost of communications. A generic analytical framework for evaluating Medium Access Control (MAC) protocols was proposed, and it was combined to experiments to evaluate emerging wake-up receivers. A new opportunistic MAC protocol was also introduced for "on-the-fly" relay selection. Finally wake-up receivers and energy harvesting were combined and experimentally evaluated in a practical use case

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Na última década tem-se observado grande interesse no estudo do canal chamado “Correspondente Bancário” como parte do processo de inclusão bancária, ampliação do acesso a crédito e entrega de serviços bancários em comunidades isoladas e/ou carentes do país. Dentre esses estudos podemos depreender a importância do canal para a universalização do acesso a serviços bancários no contexto brasileiro e uma taxonomia dos modelos de operação via “gestores de redes”, empresas voltadas a operacionalização da cadeia de valor que se forma para viabilizar o negócio do correspondente bancário em escala comercial. Considerando os correspondentes bancários como canal de entrega de diversos serviços financeiros ou não, fortemente apoiados no uso de tecnologia da informação, o trabalho teve como principal interesse de pesquisa, expandir o conhecimento a respeito dos arranjos tecnológicos que suportam a operação do canal e dos tipos de serviços ofertados pelas instituições financeiras e gestores de rede, lacuna ainda existente nos estudos sobre o tema. Estes objetivos foram atingidos através da apresentação da tipologia dos arranjos tecnológicos e tipos de serviços atualmente disponíveis no canal de correspondente bancário no contexto brasileiro. Adicionalmente novas classes e tipos de serviços foram definidas e podem ser adicionados ao canal de correspondente bancário. O trabalho utilizou os pressupostos do modelo conceitual multinível estruturacionista que combina moldagem social da tecnologia e contextualismo, incorpora indissociáveis níveis de análise: individual, do grupo e da comunidade local, combinando quatro conceitos fundamentais: a tecnologia-na-prática, a negociação, os grupos sociais relevantes e frames tecnológicos.

This report is for my research of Collaboration Instance Manager of UbiCollab project. UbiCollab want to be the platform for ubiquitous collaborative active. UbiCollab project aims to develop a distributed collaborative platform which makes people in distributed space ubiquitous collaborate with friends and colleagues. Collaboration instance manager (CIM) is a core component of the UbiCollab platform, which manage such collaborative activities. My research topics of CIM include in the P2P network development by using JXME, the data synchronization through this P2P network and how to manage these synchronized date by using a local file system. The result of my research is a CIM system, which deployed as OSGI bundle. User can use that do some collaborative active. This CIM system manage the service level of data synchronization, other modules and applications can use that to handle data synchronization between each other without know the details of how to implement it. For that purpose I first reviewed the related theories of distributed systems, ubiquitous systems, mobile systems and CSCW. After that review I researched on some alternatives for developing such system and choose the candidate technologies for my prototype. Secondly I analyzed the requirements of UbiCollab and designed the prototype. Based on that design, I implemented and tested that CIM system based on agreed common scenarios and developed a simple GUI for show the utility. Finally, I evaluate the system by analysis system requirements and scenario criteria.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Florida, 2002.
Title from title page of source document. Document formatted into pages; contains ix, 44 p.; also contains graphics. Includes vita. Includes bibliographical references.

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Pontif?cia Universidade Cat?lica de Campinas ? PUC Campinas
A new revolution is happening: the Internet of Things, a new wave of technologies where it is possible to connect everyday objects to the Internet. Among these technologies, one of the most criticai is the Wireless Sensor Networks. A Wireless Sensor Network consists of several elements called Sensor Nodes, which collect environmental information such as light, temperature and air quality, providing data to applications on the Internet, usually through an intermediate element called the Gateway. For a Wireless Sensor Network to work properly, it is essential that the elements that make it are managed efficiently. However, there is a shortage of available management solutions, especially when these Wireless Sensor Networks are installed in known environments, such as office buildings, factories, homes and cities. The lack of management tools is one of the main factors that hinder the deployment of Wireless Sensor Networks and consequently the Internet of Things. The purpose of this work is to provide a centralized management platform for Wireless Sensor Networks installed in known environments. Conceptually, this platform is called the Proxy Manager, hosted by the network gateway. The platform is able to communicate with a Network Manager and other applications located on the Internet through web services, receiving management parameters and providing summarized data. The Proxy Manager functionalities are split into two management categories: network infrastructure and application, which in turn are divided into Configuration, Performance and Fault management. In this work, the implemented functionalities relating to the network infrastructure management are: Proxy Manager and Sensor Node configuration; route finding through RSSI (Received Signal Strength Indicator) and number of hops to the Sensor Node; performance monitoring via PER (Packet Error Rate); fault recovery using alternative routes and the generation of alerts to the network administrator. Regarding the application management, the functionality implemented is the sensor configuration, since this will effectively collect the data. Tests of the features implemented were done, involving the establishment of routes, performance monitoring, disaster recovery, data collection and platform performance. The tests showed that the proposed solution is functional. Finally, it is anticipated that this work will contribute to the study and implementation of new management functionalities and Wireless Sensor Networks interconnection.
Uma nova revolu??o est? acontecendo: ? a Internet das Coisas, uma nova onda de tecnologias onde ? poss?vel conectar ? Internet objetos do cotidiano de forma inteligente. Dentre estas, uma das mais cr?ticas s?o as Redes de Sensores sem Fio. Uma Rede de Sensores sem Fio consiste em v?rios elementos denominados N?s Sensores, os quais coletam grandezas do meio ambiente, tais como luz, temperatura e qualidade do ar, disponibilizando as mesmas para aplica??es na Internet, normalmente atrav?s de um elemento intermedi?rio denominado gateway. Para o bom funcionamento de uma Rede de Sensores sem Fio, ? imprescind?vel que os elementos que a comp?em sejam gerenciados de maneira eficiente. No entanto, h? uma escassez de solu??es de ger?ncia dispon?veis, principalmente quando estas s?o voltadas para ambientes previamente conhecidos, como pr?dios comerciais, ind?strias, resid?ncias e cidades. Esta escassez de ferramentas de ger?ncia ? um dos principais fatores que dificultam a implanta??o maci?a de Redes de Sensores sem Fio e, consequentemente, da Internet das Coisas. Sendo assim, a proposta deste trabalho ? apresentar uma plataforma de gerenciamento centralizado para Redes de Sensores sem Fio, instaladas em ambientes conhecidos. Conceitualmente, esta plataforma se denomina Proxy Manager, e ficar? hospedada no gateway da rede. A mesma ? capaz de se comunicar com um Gerente de Rede e outras aplica??es localizadas na Internet atrav?s de web services, recebendo par?metros de ger?ncia e disponibilizando dados sumarizados. As funcionalidades do Proxy Manager s?o divididas em dois focos de ger?ncia: da infraestrutura da rede e da aplica??o, as quais s?o subdivididas nas ?reas de ger?ncia de Configura??o, Desempenho e Falhas. No trabalho em quest?o, as funcionalidades implementadas referentes ? ger?ncia da infraestrutura da rede foram: configura??o do Proxy Manager e dos N?s Sensores; estabelecimento de rotas para os mesmos tendo como base a RSSI (Received Signal Strength Indicator) e o n?mero de saltos para os N?s Sensores; monitoramento de desempenho atrav?s da PER (Packet Error Rate); e recupera??o de falhas, atrav?s do estabelecimento de rotas alternativas e gera??o de alertas para o administrador da rede. Em rela??o ao gerenciamento da aplica??o, a fun??o implementada foi a de configura??o dos sensores, localizados nos N?s Sensores, os quais efetivamente ir?o coletar os dados. Testes relacionados as funcionalidades implementadas, envolvendo o estabelecimento de rotas, monitoramento do desempenho, recupera??o de falhas, coleta de dados pelos sensores e desempenho da plataforma foram realizados, os quais demonstraram que a solu??o em quest?o ? funcional. Por fim, espera-se que o presente trabalho possa contribuir para o estudo e implementa??o de novas funcionalidades de ger?ncia e interconex?o de Redes de Sensores sem Fio, tanto nesta quanto em outras plataformas, atrav?s de trabalhos vindouros.

Thesis advisor: Peter Gottschalk
Thesis advisor: Thomas McGuire
Thesis advisor: Donald Cox
Does managed care send expectant mothers to hospitals they would choose even if their choice of hospital was not limited? I find that Medicaid managed care patients are redirected to hospitals that enrollees of more generous insurance payers with the same personal characteristics do not go to. However, Medicare managed care enrollees do not face an increased risk of having a cesarean delivery at the hospital they attend, which is interpreted as evidence that they are redirected to high quality hospitals
Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2003
Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Discipline: Economics

To this point research on firms’ political behavior has contributed knowledge concerning large firms’ relationships and strategies with political actors and their surrounding environment. Less is known about small firms’ behavior towards political organizations. As a matter of fact, the fields of international marketing, international business and corporate political science have left the political behavior of small firms almost untouched. Therefore, extant literature assumes that small firms due to their resource constraints are passive receivers of political initiatives. About 99 percent of all firms within the European Union are small firms, and it is therefore questioned whether all these firms are passive receivers of political initiatives. The intention with this thesis is to challenge some assumptions regarding how small firms manage their relationships with political actors concerning EU related rules and regulations. Consequently, the study raises the overarching research question; how do small firms manage their political environment? Theoretically, the study takes a network perspective on business political interaction to examine both individual and/or collective political behavior of small firms. It develops a theoretical view constituted of knowledge, commitment and legitimacy. Methodologically, two sequential stages are followed: first an in-depth qualitative case study of three successful cases is presented and second, the in-depth understanding is broadened to a wider population of firms based on a quantitative survey. A central contribution of this thesis is to aid research on the political behavior of small firms. It is found that small firms, in contrast to prevailing assumptions, do possess political resources. They are not passive receivers of political initiatives. Instead, the findings show that small firms are active and can exercise influence. This, however, is shown to be dependent on the firm’s political commitment, political knowledge and competency and business-political legitimacy. It is also shown that small firms mobilize these critical resources not only directly, but also indirectly through various intermediating actors. Besides the theoretical contributions, these conclusions are important not just because of the managerial implications but also, and perhaps more importantly, for the policy implications that can be drawn from the study. Being exploratory and opening up the black box of small firm’s political behavior, the thesis ends with a number of future research directions.

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) allow the remote and distributed monitoring of parameters in their deployed environment. WSNs are receiving increasing research interest, due to their ability to enable a wide range of applications, and their potential to have a major impact on ubiquitous computing. Many research challenges are encountered in retaining a useful network lifetime under constrains imposed by the limited energy reserves that are inherent in the small, locally-powered sensor nodes. This research addresses some of these challenges through the development and evaluation of energy- and information-managed algorithms leading to increased network lifetime. The first contribution of this research is the development of an Information manageD Energy-aware ALgorithm for Sensor networks with Rule Managed Reporting (IDEALS/RMR). IDEALS/RMR is an application-independent, localised system to control and manage the degradation of a network through the positive discrimination of packets. This is achieved by the novel combination of energy management (through IDEALS) and information management (through RMR) which increases the network lifetime at the possible expense of often trivial data. IDEALS/RMR is particularly suited to applications where sensor nodes are small, energy constrained, embedded devices particularly those that feature energy harvesting) that are required to report data in an unassisted fashion. The second contribution of this research is the analysis of various environmental and physical aspects of WSNs, and the effect that they have on the operation of nodes and networks. These aspects include energy components (stores, sources and consumers), sensing devices, wireless communication, and timing; these aspects are independently modelled and, through simulation, their effect on the operation of the network is quantified. The third contribution of this research is the evaluation of IDEALS/RMR using a simulator that has been specifically developed to integrate both the proposed environmental and physical models, and a novel node architecture that facilitates structured software design. A scenario depicting the use of a WSN to monitor pump temperature in a water pumping station is simulated, and highlights the benefits of the developed algorithms.

The current prospects in wired and wireless access networks, it is becoming increasingly important to address potential convergence in order to offer integrated broadband services. These systems will need to offer higher data transmission capacities and long battery life, which is the catalyst for an everincreasing variety of air interface technologies targeting local area to wide area connectivity. Current integrated industrial networks do not offer application aware context delivery and enhanced services for optimised networks. Application aware services provide value-added functionality to business applications by capturing, integrating, and consolidating intelligence about users and their endpoint devices from various points in the network. This thesis mainly intends to resolve the issues related to ubiquitous application aware service, fair allocation of radio access, reduced energy consumption and improved capacity. A technique that measures and evaluates the data rate demand to reduce application response time and queuing delay for multi radio interfaces is proposed. The technique overcomes the challenges of network integration, requiring no user intervention, saving battery life and selecting the radio access connection for the application requested by the end user. This study is split in two parts. The first contribution identifies some constraints of the services towards the application layer in terms of e.g. data rate and signal strength. The objectives are achieved by application controlled handover (ACH) mechanism in order to maintain acceptable data rate for real-time application services. It also looks into the impact of the radio link on the application and identifies elements and parameters like wireless link quality and handover that will influence the application type. It also identifies some enhanced traditional mechanisms such as distance controlled multihop and mesh topology required in order to support energy efficient multimedia applications. The second contribution unfolds an intelligent application priority assignment mechanism (IAPAM) for medical applications using wireless sensor networks. IAPAM proposes and evaluates a technique based on prioritising multiple virtual queues for the critical nature of medical data to improve instant transmission. Various mobility patterns (directed, controlled and random waypoint) has been investigated and compared by simulating IAPAM enabled mobile BWSN. The following topics have been studied, modelled, simulated and discussed in this thesis: 1. Application Controlled Handover (ACH) for multi radios over fibre 2. Power Controlled Scheme for mesh multi radios over fibre using ACH 3. IAPAM for Biomedical Wireless Sensor Networks (BWSN) and impact of mobility over IAPAM enabled BWSN. Extensive simulation studies are performed to analyze and to evaluate the proposed techniques. Simulation results demonstrate significant improvements in multi radios over fibre performance in terms of application response delay and power consumption by upto 75% and 15 % respectively, reduction in traffic loss by upto 53% and reduction in delay for real time application by more than 25% in some cases.

Although different authors mean different thing by the term "digital libraries," one common thread is that they include or are built around collections of digital objects. Digital libraries also provide services to large communities, one of which is almost always search. Digital library collections, however, have several characteristic features that make search difficult. They are typically very large. They typically involve many different kinds of objects, including but not limited to books, e-published documents, images, and hypertexts, and often including items as esoteric as subtitled videos, simulations, and entire scientific databases. Even within a category, these objects may have widely different formats and internal structure. Furthermore, they are typically in complex relationships with each other and with such non-library objects as persons, institutions, and events. Relationships are a common feature of traditional libraries in the form of "See / See also" pointers, hierarchical relationships among categories, and relations between bibliographic and non-bibliographic objects such as having an author or being on a subject. Binary relations (typically in the form of directed links) are a common representational tool in computer science for structures from trees and graphs to semantic networks. And in recent years the World-Wide Web has made the construct of linked information objects commonplace for millions. Despite this, relationships have rarely been given "first-class" treatment in digital library collections or software. MARIAN is a digital library system designed and built to store, search over, and retrieve large numbers of diverse objects in a network of relationships. It is designed to run efficiently over large collections of digital library objects. It addresses the problem of object diversity through a system of classes unified by common abilities including searching and presentation. Divergent internal structure is exposed and interpreted using a simple and powerful graphical representation, and varied format through a unified system of presentation. Most importantly, MARIAN collections are designed to specifically include relations in the form of an extensible collection of different sorts of links. This thesis presents MARIAN and argues that it is both effective and efficient. MARIAN is effective in that it provides new and useful functionality to digital library end-users, and in that it makes constructing, modifying, and combining collections easy for library builders and maintainers. MARIAN is efficient since it works from an abstract presentation of search over networked collections to define on the one hand common operations required to implement a broad class of search engines, and on the other performance standards for those operations. Although some operations involve a high minimum cost under the most general assumptions, lower costs can be achieved when additional constraints are present. In particular, it is argued that the statistics of digital library collections can be exploited to obtain significant savings. MARIAN is designed to do exactly that, and in evidence from early versions appears to succeed. In conclusion, MARIAN presents a powerful and flexible platform for retrieval on large, diverse collections of networked information, significantly extending the representation and search capabilities of digital libraries.
Ph. D.

Over the past two decades, translation workplaces have been substantially transformed by technological developments (Drugan 2013; Risku et al. 2013), and by the emergence of production networks in which a language service provider (LSP) acts as an intermediary between translator and client (Abdallah and Koskinen 2007; Abdallah 2012). However, there is little research into how technologies are integrated in the various translation workplaces found in production networks. My research aims at enhancing our understanding of translation project management and translation quality in production networks by conceptualising project management as a practice (Shove et al. 2012). For this empirical study, a data set was collected based on 60 hours of workplace observations within a UK-based LSP and 10 semi-structured interviews with four project managers (PMs) and one vendor manager (VM). Drawing on concepts from practice theory, the study analyses routinised enactments of the practice by PMs, their integration of information technologies into such enactments, their understanding of translation quality, and their strategies to achieve quality in the translation production process. I propose that the practice of translation project management is deeply embedded into a larger complex of interdependent translation production practices. A practice-theoretical framework emphasises the socio-material and collective nature of the practice. My study demonstrates that project management is a joint effort between PMs and other actors in translation production. Based on an analysis of how PMs use CAT tools and an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system when they are managing translation projects, I argue that technologies are inextricably linked with enactments of production practices, and that they form part of the social structures surrounding the practice. The application of practice theory affords a new understanding of skills, or competence, in which the engagement in professional activities is vital, and in which building competence is an ongoing process. Finally, I suggest that buyers of translation products, i.e. clients, substantially contribute to translation quality, as PMs carry out project management based on the notion of translation as a service.

Network monitoring is a necessity for both reducing downtime and ensuring rapid response in the case of software or hardware failure. Unfortunately, one of the most widely used protocols for monitoring networks, the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMPv3), does not offer an acceptable level of confidentiality or integrity for these services. In this paper, we demonstrate two attacks against the most current and secure version of the protocol with authentication and encryption enabled. In particular, we demonstrate that under reasonable conditions, we can read encrypted requests and forge messages between the network monitor and the hosts it observes. Such attacks are made possible by an insecure discovery mechanism, which allows an adversary capable of compromising a single network host to set the keys used by the security functions. Our attacks show that SNMPv3 places too much trust on the underlying network, and that this misplaced trust introduces vulnerabilities that can be exploited.

Communicative challenges that hinder managerial engagement in social networks can impede innovation adoption and thereby damage the financial performance and competitiveness of a firm. The purpose of this correlational study was to examine the relationship between communication apprehension (CA) and individual innovativeness in managers. The focus of the research questions was determining if a relationship exists between these variables before and after controlling for demographic characteristics. With diffusion of innovation theory as the theoretical framework, this research involved an attempt to address how adoption categories relate to varying degrees of CA. One hundred and five American-based owner-executives, senior managers, and middle managers completed 2 preexisting survey instruments on the Internet measuring individual perceptions of CA and individual innovativeness. Results from a Pearson correlation analysis indicated that a significant negative correlation existed between CA and individual innovativeness. A multiple regression analysis showed that CA and individual innovativeness were negatively correlated after controlling for gender, age, and education level. Furthermore, participants' level of education was negatively related to both total CA score and public speaking CA score. Leaders may apply these findings to achieve positive social change by using tools to reduce CA in managers. Such initiatives could lead to greater social confidence in managers, improved organizational performance, and more meaningful social engagement in the innovations that continue to shape the world.

The Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) is a signaling protocol for IP-based media services that will be the de facto standard for future media-over-IP services. Since SIP User Agents (UAs) support a limited number of service types (usually one or two), we assume that the future user will need to operate several UAs simultaneously. These UAs will constitute the user's personal service network. In this thesis, we investigate architectures for policy-based management of this network so that it can be used in an efficient manner. To achieve this, we propose a new SIP entity, called the SIP Service Manager (SSM), which lies in the core of the management system. Finally, we evaluate our proposal by implementing one version of the SIP Service Manager.
Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) är ett signaleringsprotokoll för IP-baserade mediatjänster som kommer att bli "de facto"-standard för framtida "media-över-IP"-tjänster. Då SIP User Agents (UAs) stöder ett begränsat antal typer av tjänster (oftast en eller två), antar vi att framtida användare kommer att behöva använda sig av flera UAs samtidigt. Dessa UAs utgör en användares personliga tjänstenätverk. I denna rapport, undersöker vi arkitekturer för policybaserad hantering (management) av detta nätverk, så att det kan användas effektivt. För att uppnå detta, föreslår vi en ny SIP-enhet, kallad SIP Service Manager (SSM), som är placerad i kärnan av hanteringssystemet. Slutligen utvärderar vi vår föreslagna lösning genom att implementera en version av en SIP Service Manager.

För att uppnå optimal resursdelning och öka hållbar energiförsörjning, stiger behovet av gränsöverskridande kraftöverföring ständigt. Därför frekventa utbyta information med detaljerade galler uppgifter krävs. För att standardisera sådant utbyte och därigenom främja gemensam kraftsystemstudier i Europa, Common Grid Model Exchange Standard (CGMES) grundar sig på IEC CIM (Common Information Models) utfärdats av ENTSO-E (European Network of Transmission Operators for Electricity) i 2013. En CGMES bedömning av överensstämmelse processen också inrättats att uppmuntra och undersöka antagandet av CGMES med relevanta kraftsystemtillämpningar. Huvudsyftet med denna avhandling är att validera att Network Manager produkten av ABB har genomfört CGMES ordentligt. Effektflödesberäkningar utförs baserat på ENTSO-Es provnäten och erhållna lösningarna jämförs med standard resultat samt resultaten från Power Factory (ett kraftsystem analysverktyg från DIgSILENT som redan har passerat bedömningen av överensstämmelse med framgång). Jämförelse resultaten analyseras alltså för att identifiera orsakerna till eventuella avvikelser från standardeffektflödeslösningar och ge förslag på framtida utveckling av Network Manager.
To achieve optimal resource sharing and enhance the sustainability of energy supply, the need for cross-border power transmission is continuously growing. Therefore, frequent information exchange with detailed grid data is required. To standardize such exchange and thus to facilitate common power system studies in Europe, the Common Grid Model Exchange Standard (CGMES) based on IEC CIM (Common Information Models) was issued by ENTSO-E (European Network of Transmission Operators for Electricity) in 2013. A CGMES conformity assessment process was also set up to encourage and examine the adoption of CGMES with relevant power system applications. The main purpose of this thesis is to validate that the Network Manager product of ABB has implemented CGMES properly. Power flow calculations are performed based on ENTSO-E’s test networks and the solutions obtained are compared with the standard results as well as the results from Power Factory (a power system analysis tool from DIgSILENT that has already passed the conformity assessment successfully).  The comparison results are analyzed thus to identify causes of any variation from the standard power flow solutions and to give suggestions for future development of Network Manager.

Master of Regional and Community Planning
Department of Landscape Architecture and Regional and Community Planning
Tim Keane
The City of Manhattan, Kansas has been subject to intense flooding in the last couple of years. Areas of the city, within the Wildcat Creek Watershed, have been adversely affected. The City of Manhattan and stakeholders from various walks of life are looking for solutions to alleviate flooding within the area. This Master’s Project looks into rainwater harvesting as one of the solutions to help reduce stormwater runoff and contribute to the alleviation of flooding within the Watershed. Rainwater harvesting is increasingly being recognized as an effective way to reduce stormwater runoff. The project explores the potential benefit of using a network of rainwater harvesting elements, namely rain barrels and cisterns supplemented by rain gardens and other infiltration methods to reduce runoff in the City of Manhattan, Kansas. To assess the benefit of using rainwater harvesting in the City, a neighborhood scale site was chosen and divided into land use types. Three phases were used to assess the impact and implementation of rainwater harvesting. Phase I calculates the volume of runoff generated from each land use type and how much of that runoff can be harvested from the rooftops. The values from the neighborhood scale analysis were then extrapolated to see the impact of rainwater harvesting on a larger scale. Phase II looks at the configuration of a rainwater harvesting system for the structures in each land use type and rainwater reuse options. Finally, Phase III looks at policies, regulations and incentives that can be employed by the City of Manhattan to help encourage rainwater harvesting. This Master’s project seeks to educate the City and its residents about the benefits of rainwater harvesting as a stormwater management tool and provide steps towards potentially using rainwater harvesting as a way to reduce runoff, and help alleviate flooding in the Wildcat Creek Watershed.