Implementing Business Intelligence solutions has fundamentally changed how many large organizations conduct their business. This is well understood in the scholarly literature but the adoption of BI within small or medium sized enterprises has, on the other hand, received little attention. Given the importance of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in the economy, the scarcity of research in this area can be viewed as a problem. Thus, the aim of this work is to explore the BI-commitment in smaller-sized organizations and investigate how far they have proceeded in putting business analytics in action. In order to shed light on BI-implementation in the context of smaller organizations, in-depth interviews were conducted with representatives of four organizations within the Skaraborg district of Sweden. The initial objective of the research project was to explore several focal areas in order to establish the current state-of-practice. This provided the groundwork for further investigation on how SMEs approach BI. Further work involved the use of two theoretical frameworks to analyze organizational commitment and analytical maturity within the focal areas. The main findings in this work are that the organizational commitment to implement BI infrastructure is high among participating companies, but the use of analytics is nevertheless limited to few specific areas. The high ambition of managers to implement BI infrastructure can be the key to further develop the use of business analytics.  This work adds valuable insights for various stakeholders within the community and to others that want to have an idea of the current status of BI within SMEs in Sweden.

This thesis focuses on the growth of cracks which are small in relation to the material microstructure especially the situation of clusters of small cracks grown from smooth surfaces, termed micro-multi-site cracking, as is frequently the case for components in service. A proper understanding of this regime of crack growth will allow for less conservative maintenance schedules as well as the application of more sensitive health monitoring systems which are currently under development. To address the problem a significant experimental investigation of micro-multi-site cracking was conducted on 7075-T7351 aluminum alloy. Using the resulting data a micro-structurally based transition crack length is defined to determine the point which separates small and long crack growth. This definition is based upon the observed evolution of scatter in the growth rates of growing small cracks. It is shown that this scatter falls with growth until the transition point is reached where it assumes a constant value for the growth of long cracks. It is then shown that the total population of cracks within the clusters can be considered as bi-modal. One distribution consists of primary cracks which can grow and ultimately cause specimen failure. The second distribution consists of secondary cracks, the growth of which ultimately arrests. Several methods for experimentally separating the two distributions have been developed. The first method relies upon the defined transition point between small and long crack behavior. A second method based upon the second derivative of the crack length versus cycle count data has also been developed. Since the secondary cracks cannot lead to failure their data must be discarded prior to any analysis. It is then shown that failure to do so will lead to erroneous non-conservative predictions of crack growth.

This dissertation is divided into two main topics. In the first topic, we study the joint source-channel coding problem of transmitting an analog source over a Gaussian channel in two cases - (i) the presence of interference known only to the transmitter and (ii) in the presence of side information about the source known only to the receiver. We introduce hybrid digital analog forms of the Costa and Wyner-Ziv coding schemes. We present random coding based schemes in contrast to lattice based schemes proposed by Kochman and Zamir. We also discuss superimposed digital and analog schemes for the above problems which show that there are infinitely many schemes for achieving the optimal distortion for these problems. This provides an extension of the schemes proposed by Bross and others to the interference/source side information case. The result of this study shows that the proposed hybrid digital analog schemes are more robust to a mismatch in channel signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), than pure separate source coding followed by channel coding solutions. We then discuss applications of the hybrid digital analog schemes for transmitting under a channel SNR mismatch and for broadcasting a Gaussian source with bandwidth compression. We also study applications of joint source-channel coding schemes for a cognitive setup and also for the setup of transmitting an analog Gaussian source over a Gaussian channel, in the presence of an eavesdropper. In the next topic, we consider joint physical layer coding and network coding solutions for bi-directional relaying. We consider a communication system where two transmitters wish to exchange information through a central relay. The transmitter and relay nodes exchange data over synchronized, average power constrained additive white Gaussian noise channels. We propose structured coding schemes using lattices for this problem. We study two decoding approaches, namely lattice decoding and minimum angle decoding. Both the decoding schemes can be shown to achieve the upper bound at high SNRs. The proposed scheme can be thought of as a joint physical layer, network layer code which outperforms other recently proposed analog network coding schemes. We also study extensions of the bi-directional relay for the case with asymmetric channel links and also for the multi-hop case. The result of this study shows that structured coding schemes using lattices perform close to the upper bound for the above communication system models.

¡@¡@In recent years, the trends in network communication towards mobile network .Traditional network cannot meet the need of new communication challenge. The 802.11 outperforms other new wireless network technique ¡@¡@In this paper, we assume user have wireless NIC devices with Mobile IPv6 protocol module. We use this model to build an environment and use this environment to design our Mobile IPv6 multicast simulation. We do these for two reasons, (1)To analyze how to use multicast over Mobile IPv6 wireless network. (2)To design an experimentation for multicast over wireless LAN. After we get results of the experimentation, we could know why wireless network does not have better quality than wired LAN. ¡@¡@During our implementation, we have a high latency problem and try to solve it by our program. After our improvement, average latency reduces to 27.77% and miss rate reduces to 33.07%. ¡@¡@Our implementation not only provide some useful information when some one need to build Mobile IPv6 environment but also give a solution for solving handover latency problem.

Lipid bi-layers are ubiquitous components of biological cells and are found in a variety of cell components. In biological membranes, lipid bi-layer membranes carry membrane proteins, which control transport of material and communication of signals in and out the cell. There are several disadvantages involved with patch clamping method as a way of studying biological membranes and protein interactions. Hence, artificial synthesis of bi-layer has been of great interest in basic biophysical studies, drug discoveries in pharmaceutical studies and study of protein nanopores for precise engineering applications. However, conventional lipid bi-layer synthesis techniques require skilled operators, have low repeatability (reliability), have portability restrictions and result in unstable bi-layers having a short lifetime. In this investigation a novel microfluidic device and a method for artificial synthesis of lipid bi-layer in-situ are explored. In the proposed method, lipid trapped at an aperture on a Teflon sheet, is thinned to form a lipid bi-layer by a continuous flow of buffer solution on both sides of the aperture in the microfluidic device. The microfluidic device is expected to have advantages from its compact design. Further, the new approach is expected to be repetitive and good for automation removing the requirement of a skilled operator. The microfluidic device was fabricated using two glass substrates. Two channels of ? ? shape were etched and through holes were fabricated at all four terminal ends of the microchannels on each glass substrate. A thin Teflon sheet carrying a 100?m diameter hole was sandwiched between the two glass wafers forming two sets of microchannels on both sides of the aperture. An analytical microfluid model of the microchannels was developed to investigate the nature of the flow and to select microchannel parameters. Experiments using the proposed device were performed to verify the feasibility of the novel approach for lipid bi-layer synthesis. Experimental results suggest formation of a lipid bi-layer at an aperture on the Teflon sheet but further investigation might be necessary for verification. Life time of the bi-layer is short mainly due to low quality of the used aperture.

An information society under constant development enables organizations to have access to a growing supply of information. Handled in an efficient manner, information can be a valuable, competitive resource. This can be achieved by investing in a Business Intelligence system (BI system). BI system's main function is to manage large amounts of unstructured data, convert it into useful information, which in turn will be used as a basis for performance management. The purpose of this study is that, through qualitative, semi-structured, in-depth interviews, to examine the perceived benefit of using BI systems to support business governance. This benefit is analyzed using theories such as traditional, bounded and flexible-bounded rationality, cognitive bias and theories of man's ability to think intuitively and reflective. The benefits of BI systems will also be analyzed using the theories of the communication process, conflicts in decision making and DIKW pyramid describing the process data, information, knowledge, wisdom. It also analyzes the benefits of BI systems using agency theory. The results show that users of BI systems are experiencing the benefits as follow: BI systems provide increased access to information in the organization, increasing the ability to handle large amounts of information, creating more fact-based decisions, freeing up time for analysis, reducing opportunistic behavior and facilitates internal communication. This creates flexibility in the bounded rationality, a more reflective decision-making process that improves the prospects to make rational decisions. Users go higher up in DIKW pyramid. BI systems reduce the information asymmetry between principal and agent. BI systems reduce uncertainty in decision reducing the risk of conflict. Training and practice are essential for BI systems to generate benefits. Unlike previous research, this study shows that BI systems are well integrated into organizations as well as live up to expectations. A new aspect of BI systems is that they reduce the risk of opportunistic behavior.

Trenderna inom sedering har på senaste tid gått från djup till lätt sedering. Tidigare forskning indikerar att detta är fysiologiskt gynnsamt för patienterna och att det upplevs som positivt av både patienter och närstående. Dock är det relativt outforskat hur detta nya arbetssätt upplevs av vårdarna kring patienten och hur det påverkar deras arbetssituation. Denna studie syftade till att undersöka vårdares upplevelser av att vårda patienter som är vakna med respirator på en intensivvårdsavdelning. En kvalitativ ansats valdes. Sjuksköterskor och undersköterskor på två olika intensivvårdsavdelningar intervjuades i fokusgrupper. Totalt deltog tolv informanter, där två fokusgruppsintervjuer genomfördes med sjuksköterskor och två fokusgruppsintervjuer med undersköterskor. En kvalitativ innehållsanalys användes för att analysera materialet, vilket resulterade i fem huvudkategorier och tolv subkategorier. Resultatet presenterades genom följande huvudkategorier: ökad stress hos vårdaren, ökade krav på vårdaren, en resurskrävande vårdform, patienten blir en person samt krav på teamsamverkan. I resultatet framkom att vård av patienter som är vakna med respirator bidrog till en möjlighet att bättre lära känna patienten och därmed få ett mer stimulerande arbete. Men det upplevdes också som utmanande och krävande av vårdarna, vilket ledde till känslor av otillräcklighet och stress. För att ta tillvara på de positiva effekterna av att ha patienten mer vaken krävs resurser och en multiprofessionell teamsamverkan.

Οι τρόποι κωδικοποίησης κειμένου για Fax καθορίζονται από το πρωτόκολλο «Facsimile Coding Schemes and Coding Control Functions for Group 4 Facsimile Apparatus» ITU-T Recommendation T.6 και το στάνταρντ JBIG2. Στη διπλωματική αναλύονται όλες οι λεπτομέρειες του στάνταρντ JBIG2, πολλές από τις οποίες δεν είναι σαφώς καθορισμένες στο στάνταρντ. Περιλαμβάνονται οι μέθοδοι για κωδικοποίηση κειμένου και bi-level (binary) εικόνων. Αναφέρονται οι σχετικές μεθοδολογίες, όπως η μέθοδος αναγνώρισης προτύπων και αντικατάστασης (pattern-matching and substitution, PM&S). / The word coding methods for fax applications are defined with the use of «Facsimile Coding Schemes and Coding Control Functions for Group 4 Facsimile Apparatus» ITU-T Recommendation T.6 protocol and JBIG2 standard. All details concerning the JBIG2 standard are thoroughly analyzed throughout this thesis, many of which are not clearly defined in the standard itself. Methods for word and bi-level images coding are included. We also focus on techniques like the pattern-matching and substitution, PM&S method.

Abstract The aim of this thesis is to show how numerous organizations such as CGI Consultant attempt to introduce BI-Solutions through IT and other operational methods in order to deal with large companies, which want to make their competitive market position stronger. This aim is achieved by Gap Analyzing in the BI roadmap and available Data Warehouses based on one of the company projects which were handed over to CGI from Lithuania. The fundamentals in achieving the BI-Solutions through IT, which has built the thesis methodology by research are, data warehousing, content analytics and performance management, data movement (Extract, Transform and Load) and CGI BI methodology, business process management, TeliaSonera Maintenance Management Model (TSM3) and AM model of CGI in the high level. The part of the thesis basically requires some research and practical work on Informatica PowerCenter, Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio and low level details such as database tuning, DBMS tuning implementation and ETL workflows optimization.   Keywords: BI, ETL, DW, DBMS, TSM3, AM, Gap Analysing

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