This research is an effort to test our hypothesis that a software agent based architecture will provide a better response time and will be more maintainable and reusable than the present J2EE based architecture of DLNET (Digital Library Network for Engineering and Technology). We have taken a portion of the complete DLNET application for our study, namely the Content Review Process, as our test bed. In this work, we have explored the use of software agents in the current setup of DLNET for the first time, specifically for the Content Review part of the application and tried to evaluate the performance of the resulting application. Our work is a novel approach of doing content review using software agent architecture. The proposed system is an automated process that will asynchronously look for suitable reviewers based on content (the input) and create logs for the administrator to view and analyze. In the first part of the thesis we develop a new system that is parallel to the existing DLNET Content Review Process. In the second part, we compare the newly developed Content Review Process with the baseline (old Content review Process) by designing comparison tests and measuring instruments. This part of the thesis includes the selection of dependent variables, design of various measurement instruments, execution of the quasi-experiments and analysis of the empirical results of comparisons tests. The quasi-experiments are done to measure the response time, maintainability, scalability, correctness, reliability and reusability of the two systems. The results show that the proposed software agent based system gives better response time (an improvement ranging from 57% to 82%) and is more maintainable (an improvement ranging from 16% to 67%) and more reusable (an improvement ranging from 1% to 26%). The improvement in the response time may be attributed to the fact that the agent based systems are inherently multithreaded while the existing content review system is a serial application. Both the systems, however, give comparable results for other dependent variables. / Master of Science

During the last two decades, Wikipedia’s multiple language versions managed to become editable forms of knowledge source, publicly available, which deal both, with non-typical knowledge dissemination and knowledge production, thanks to visitors’ viewership and active users/Wikipedians visitation/viewership and voluntary contribution, respectively. This dissertation investigates the function of recent viewership and editing in Wikipedia in Greek (WiG) and Bulgarian Language (WiB), by visitors and active users/Wikipedians (G-Wiks and B-Wiks), respectively, with respect to the issue of knowledge production (including reproduction) in the broader spectrum of Epistemology. Data and metadata analyzed in the dissertation were released/available as digital footprints from Wikimedia’s Common area and a third-party source (WikiShark). A recent snapshot of each of the above language versions of Wikipedia’s (WiG and WiB) activity, both individually and comparatively, proved that visitors have a specific pattern in both language versions in timeline, are relatively many compared to the number of their own language active users/Wikipedians (G-Wiks and B-Wiks). G-Wiks and B-Wiks, functioning as digitally enabled social networks (DESN), seem to deal more with editing, instead of content creation. From further content analysis of G-Wiks comments in discussion, it seems that editing process is not without tension or toxification; in their attempt to result after discussion in a meaningful Neutral Point of Views (NPOV) content of WiG. Moreover, thanks to many contemporary activities, G-Wiks DESN seems to open floor and facilitate/educate youth to become new members of WiG, through webinars, Editathons, and contests, aiming to result in further intentional, purposeful, and useful, collaborative knowledge production in the digital information pace, during this so-called Information Era.