This thesis is applying the neglected concept of assurance on assuring efforts of NATO towards Estonia. This small Baltic republic lives in a fear of conflict with its Russian neighbour which would be impossible to win without help from abroad. The author asks, whether the effort to assure Estonians, that NATO would come to help in case of conflict is successful and what can be improved. To reveal, whether Estonia is assured, the author conducted research interviews in Tallinn with Estonians from the state administration, military, academics, experts from think-tanks and journalist. To get a full picture, the author also used public opinion polls. The thesis uses the concept of assurance as it was defined by Jeffrey W. Knopf. The concept is understudied and almost not used for empirical research. Importance of assuring allies is rising in contemporary's world and this thesis is trying to fill the research gap and show a possible direction for further research on the assurance of allies. Last but not least, the author is contributing to the debate about the defence of the Baltics.

Internal auditors have a substantial impact on organisations’ governance. Hence this research aims to uncover the practice of internal auditors in Sweden, especially their part in cybersecurity and the people factor. While previous research point to internal auditing being an oversight governance mechanism for organisations, the threat of a changing risk landscape due to increased digitalisation and business transactions occurring in cyberspace leaves more questions undiscovered. The research implements a qualitative approach. The data was collected by semi-structured interviews conducted with members from IIA working as internal auditors. The IPPF authoritative guidance was also used as complementary data. The data was later analysed through theories such as the Three Lines of Defense. The results demonstrated how internal auditors provide assurance heavily influence organisations’ cybersecurity. However, it is equally essential for auditors to consider the indirect impact they have on the organisation, especially regarding the people factor of cybersecurity and the amount of influence internal auditors have. These findings indicate the need to focus on researching the indirect influence internal auditors have through their soft skills. Professionals should also reflect on their influence in their organisation not to overshadow other important risks.

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This thesis answers how to create an effective quality assurance method within software development, especially games development. The work has mainly consisted of interviews with employees and others within the same business as well as studies of literature. The thesis also describes how the new quality management method got management acceptance, how it was implemented, what happened and recommendations. The work was conducted in 2007 and the result in this report is still, eight years later, used by the company. / Denna rapport berättar hur man skapar en effektiv kvalitetssäkringsmetod inom mjukvaruutveckling, särskilt spelutveckling. Arbetet har i huvudsak bestått av intervjuer med företagets anställda såväl som andra inom samma bransch samt litteraturstudier. Rapporten beskriver även hur den nya kvalitetssäkringsmetoden förankrades i organisationen, hur den implementerades, vad som hände sen samt rekommendationer. Arbetet utfördes 2007 och såsom framgår i denna rapport används resultatet, åtta år senare, fortfarande av företaget.

Studien har sin bakgrund i förskolans förändrade uppdrag kring det naturvetenskapliga ämnet fysik och den bristande kvalitet på fysikundervisning som Skolinspektionens rapporter visat. Syftet med studien är att bidra med mer kunskap om vilka uppfattningar förskollärare har kring förskolans fysik och vilka likheter och skillnader som går att urskilja i dessa. I studien har fem informanter deltagit. Studien har genomförts med en fenomenografisk metodansats, kvalitativa intervjuer som metod för datainsamling och en fenomenografisk metod för databearbetning och analys. Resultatet visar att förskollärare vet vad fysik är men att det behövs ett förtydligande av förskolans fysikuppdrag. Förskollärare beskriver att det finns en känsla av att man måste redovisa arbetet, för att bevisa vad de arbetar i förskolan. Det beskrivs vara en stor brist på kompetensutveckling inom fysik och det kan vara en huvudorsak till den bristande kvalitet på fysikundervisning som framkommer i olika rapporter från förskolan. Förskollärare har många idéer om hur de kan utveckla verksamheten men upplever att det inte finns möjlighet att förverkliga dessa. För att förskolans uppdrag gällande fysik ska kunna bedrivas kvalitativt krävs en återkommande kompetensutveckling. Förskollärares önskan om en större resurstillgång bör tas i åtanke i relation till ekonomisk möjlighet. / The study has its background in the changed curriculum for the preschool regarding the scientific subject physics and the lack of quality of physics teaching that the Swedish Schools Inspectorate's reports have shown. The purpose of the study is to contribute with more knowledge about what perceptions preschool teachers have about preschool physics and what similarities and differences can be distinguished in these. Five preschool teachers participated in the study. The study was carried out with a phenomenographic method approach, qualitative interviews as a method of data collection and a phenomenographic method for data processing and analysis. The results show that preschool teachers know what physics is but that a clarification of the preschool´s physics mission is needed. Preschool teachers describe that there is a feeling that they must report their work, to prove what they work with in the preschool. A major lack of competence development in physics is described, and this may be the main reason of the lack of quality in physics teaching that appears in various reports from the preschool. Preschool teachers have many ideas of how to develop the occupation, but it is not possible to realize them. For the preschool's assignment regarding physics to be conducted qualitatively, a recurring competence development is required. Preschool teachers' desire for a greater supply of resources should be considered in relation to financial opportunity.

Network usage is an important quality metric for mobile apps. Slow networks, low monthly traffic quotas and high roaming fees restrict mobile users’ amount of usable Internet traffic. Companies wanting their apps to stay competitive must be aware of their network usage and changes to it. Short feedback loops for the impact of code changes are key in agile software development. To notify stakeholders of changes when they happen without being prohibitively expensive in terms of manpower the change detection must be fully automated. To further decrease the manpower overhead cost of implementing network usage change detection the system need to have low configuration requirements, and keep the false positive rate low while managing to detect larger changes. This thesis proposes an automated change detection method for network activity to quickly notify stakeholders with relevant information to begin a root cause analysis after a change in the network activity is introduced. With measurements of the Spotify’s iOS app we show that the tool achieves a low rate of false positives while detecting relevant changes in the network activity even for apps with dynamic network usage patterns as Spotify. / Nätverksaktivitet är ett viktigt kvalitetsmått för mobilappar. Mobilanvändare begränsas ofta av långsamma nätverk, låg månatlig trafikkvot och höga roamingavgifter. Företag som vill ha konkurrenskraftiga appar behöver vara medveten om deras nätverksaktivitet och förändringar av den. Snabb återkoppling för effekten av kodändringar är vitalt för agil programutveckling. För att underrätta intressenter om ändringar när de händer utan att vara avskräckande dyrt med avseende på arbetskraft måste ändringsdetekteringen vara fullständigt automatiserad. För att ytterligare minska arbetskostnaderna för ändringsdetektering av nätverksaktivitet måste detekteringssystemet vara snabbt att konfigurera, hålla en låg grad av felaktig detektering samtidigt som den lyckas identifiera stora ändringar. Den här uppsatsen föreslår ett automatiserat förändringsdetekteringsverktyg för nätverksaktivitet för att snabbt meddela stakeholders med relevant information för påbörjan av grundorsaksanalys när en ändring som påverkar nätverksaktiviteten introduceras. Med hjälp av mätningar på Spotifys iOS-app visar vi att verktyget når en låg grad av felaktiga detekteringar medan den identifierar ändringar i nätverksaktiviteten även för appar med så dynamisk nätverksanvändning som Spotify.

CHARLES UNIVERSITY IN PRAGUE Faculty of Arts Institute of Information Studies and Librarianship February 2012 DISERTATION THESIS ABSTRACT Information Systems Quality Measurement and Evaluation This dissertation thesis includes a concept of an information system evaluation based on the criteria provided with respect to the philosophical, historical and cultural context and using contemporary methodologies well proven in industrial quality assurance systems. The reasoning and proper foundations are made with the sampling methodology through the selected sources interpretation. A comprehensive and an integral approach apply paradigms inspired with for example Aristotle, Giordano Bruno, Confucius and also with the contemporary authorities in philosophy and arts (Belohradsky), information science (Wiener, Shannon, Nielsen), management (Ducker), economy (Stieglitz), psychology and sociology (Kohoutek, Koukolik), quality assurance systems and software and information technology quality assurance systems based on the CSN, EN, ISO and IEC standards. The essence and the nature of information are put to the relation with a value in its social, economic and ethic sense. Based on the information systems quality model designed on such basis, using the statistic methodologies and the seven year data retention pool, the...

Context: The core of software testing is test artifacts, i.e., test cases, test suites, test scripts, test code, test specifications, and natural language tests. Hence, the quality of test artifacts can negatively or positively impact the reliability of the software testing process. Several empirical studies and secondary studies have investigated the test artifact quality. Nevertheless, little is known about how practitioners by themselves perceive test artifact quality, and the evidence on test artifact quality in the literature has not been synthesized in one place. Objective: This thesis aims to identify and synthesize the knowledge in test artifact quality from both academia and industry. Hence, our objectives are: (1) To understand practitioners’ perspectives on test artifact quality, (2) To investigate how test artifact quality has been characterized in the literature, (3) To increase the reliability of the research method for conducting systematic literature reviews (SLR) in software engineering. Method: In this thesis, we conducted an interview-based exploratory study and a tertiary study to achieve the first two objectives. We used the tertiary study as a case and referred to related observations from other researchers to achieve the last objective. Results: We provided two quality models based on the findings of the interview-based and tertiary studies. The two models were synthesized and combined to provide a broader view of test artifact quality. Also, the context information that can be used to characterize the environment in which test artifact quality is investigated was aggregated based on these studies’ findings. Based on our experience in constructing and validating automated search results using a quality gold standard (QGS) in the tertiary study, we provided recommendations for the QGS construction and proposed an extension to the current search validation approach. Conclusions: The context information and the combined quality model provide a comprehensive view of test artifact quality. Researchers can use the quality model to develop guidelines, templates for designing new test artifacts, or assessment tools for evaluating existing test artifacts. The model also can serve as a guideline for practitioners to search for test-artifact quality information, i.e., definitions for the quality attributes and measurements. For future work, we aim at investigating how to improve relevant test artifact quality attributes that are challenging to deal with.

京都大学 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(人間・環境学) / 甲第23270号 / 人博第985号 / 新制||人||233(附属図書館) / 2020||人博||985(吉田南総合図書館) / 京都大学大学院人間・環境学研究科共生人間学専攻 / (主査)教授 内田 由紀子, 教授 齋木 潤, 教授 月浦 崇 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Human and Environmental Studies / Kyoto University / DGAM

The problem of quality assurance/quality control (QA/QC) for real-time measurements of environmental and water quality variables has been a field explored by many in recent years. The use of in situ sensors has become a common practice for acquiring real-time measurements that provide the basis for important natural resources management decisions. However, these sensors are susceptible to failure due to such things as human factors, lack of necessary maintenance, flaws on the transmission line or any part of the sensor, and unexpected changes in the sensors' surrounding conditions. Two types of machine learning techniques were used in this study to assess the detection of anomalous data points on turbidity readings from the Paradise site on the Little Bear River, in northern Utah: Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) and Relevance Vector Machines (RVMs). ANN and RVM techniques were used to develop regression models capable of predicting upcoming Paradise site turbidity measurements and estimating confidence intervals associated with those predictions, to be later used to determine if a real measurement is an anomaly. Three cases were identified as important to evaluate as possible inputs for the regression models created: (1) only the reported values from the sensor from previous time steps, (2) reported values from the sensor from previous time steps and values of other water types of sensors from the same site as the target sensor, and (3) adding as inputs the previous readings from sensors from upstream sites. The decision of which of the models performed the best was made based on each model's ability to detect anomalous data points that were identified in a QA/QC analysis that was manually performed by a human technician. False positive and false negative rates for a range of confidence intervals were used as the measure of performance of the models. The RVM models were able to detect more anomalous points within narrower confidence intervals than the ANN models. At the same time, it was shown that incorporating as inputs measurements from other sensors at the same site as well as measurements from upstream sites can improve the performance of the models.