<p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Date                   </strong>May 28, 2009<strong></strong></p><p><strong>Level                  </strong>Bachelor thesis in Business Administration/Information Technology</p><p><strong>Authors             </strong>Jennie Andersson, Niklas Fridell, Visar Hoxha</p><p><strong>Tutor                  </strong>Marie Mörndal</p><p><strong>Department    </strong>HST</p><p><strong>Title                    </strong>ERP-solutions in small to medium sized enterprises – possibilities and problems</p><p><strong>Summary          </strong>ERP-solutions have penetrated the market for SME: s, offering the same advantages larger enterprises have enjoyed for years. For a significantly cheaper price, SME: s can nowadays acquire ERP-solutions and become more effective and increase their profit.  The authors have examined five SME: s in both the production and service company segment and have come to the conclusion that an ERP-solution would indeed benefit these companies in many levels but also induce certain obstacles the examined companies must overcome, both financial and organizational.</p><p><strong>Purpose            </strong>The purpose of this thesis is to examine if and how SME: s can become more efficient and developed and increase their profit by implementing an ERP-solution. Further, the purpose is to discuss which conditions that exists for the examined SME: s in order to implement an ERP-solution.</p><p><strong>Method            </strong>The thesis consists of a qualitative research where the authors have interviewed either the owner or employees at management level by using semi-structured interviews. The results from the interviews have been analyzed based on the theoretical framework.</p><p><strong>Result                </strong>Several improvement areas have been identified, most typically the processes are lacking efficiency in some areas even if the SME already had an ERP-solution (or similar) or did not have one at all. Most SME: s did lack the financial resources required for an ERP-solution deployment.</p><p><strong>Conclusion      </strong>The findings show that there are development possibilities within the examined SME:s. The biggest revenue improvement would be decreased manual labor and improved processes. An ERP-solution would help the SME: s achieve that since it automates many tasks and are designed with “best practices” in mind. Despite most of the SME:s lacking financial resources for an ERP-solution, there were some exceptions which contradicted the theoretical framework, mainly because they were SME: s but acted under a larger owner/franchise chain.</p><p> </p>

<p>I företagsvärlden blir standardsystem ett allt mer förkommande val vid anskaffning av nya affärssystem.</p><p>Utredningen behandlar applikationskategorin löneberäkningar som är nationellt beroende. Det är en kategori som styrs av avgifter och lagar som är nationella och kräver regelbundna uppdateringar. Det begränsar leverantörer av systemet till den svenska marknaden men stoppar också leverantörer att slå sig in på den internationella marknaden.</p><p>Syftet med utredningen var att undersöka om det uppstod oplanerade anpassningar, förändringar i verksamheten eller standardsystemet, för de verksamheter som anskaffade standardiserade lönesystem, varför de uppstod och hur de kan åtgärdas.</p><p>Intervjuer genomfördes med både kunder och leverantörer av standardiserade lönesystem. Med intervjuresultaten kunde vi jämföra kunders och leverantörers åsikter om anpassningar samt se skillnader mellan kunderna. Resultaten av vår kvalitativa utredning visar på att kunder av systemet inte behöver göra anpassningar eftersom branschen är väldigt styrd. Anpassningar som görs är ofta integrationer med sidosystem och är förväntade vid anskaffningen.</p>

<p>Radiofrekvensidentifiering (RFID) är en teknik som har funnits en längre tid men aldrig fått något riktigt genombrott på marknaden. Intresset för tekniken finns, men användandet har inte tagit fart. Anledningen till detta examensarbete är att ta reda på vad detta beror på.</p><p>Uppsatsen har två syften där huvudsyftet är att undersöka vilka faktorer som har påverkat utvecklingen av RFID negativt, därefter ett bisyfte som är att undersöka hur framtiden för RFID ser ut.</p><p>Undersökningen genomförs med hjälp av litteratur samt intervjuer av två respondenter, som använder sig av RFID i sitt arbete. Den ena respondenten utvecklar RFID lösningar till andra företag, medan den andra respondenten arbetar som forskare. För att komma fram till en slutsats jämför vi litteratur med de uppgifter som kommit fram genom intervjuerna. På detta sätt identifieras ett antal faktorer, som bromsar utvecklingen av RFID.</p><p>De faktorer som framkommer delar vi in i marknadsfaktorer och tekniska faktorer. Marknadsfaktorerna är ointresse för tekniken, otillräckliga nätverkseffekter samt en långsam adoption av tekniken. Tekniska faktorer är kostnad, brist på gemensam standard, svårigheter i frekvensval samt säkerhetsaspekter.</p>

<p>En lärande organisation kännetecknas av att medarbetarna i en organisation utvecklar och för vidare kunskap mellan varandra, samt förmågan att förändra och tillämpa kunskaperna. Peter Senge utvecklade begreppet en lärande organisation och med hjälp av fem discipliner redogör han vad en organisation bör göra för att åstadkomma en lärande organisation. Kline och Saunders uppmärksammade att företag tog åt sig av Senge’s fem discipliner och märkte även att företagen behövde en mer detaljerad information om hur den lärande organisationen skapas. Därav grundade Kline och Saunders tio detaljerade steg som skapar en sådan organisation.</p><p>Genom att ett företag är en lärande organisation anpassar den sin verksamhet till det som händer i omvärlden för att det ska gynna både medarbetare och ägare. Kline och Saunders förklarar att en lärande organisation har bra sammanhållning och en förenande kraft. Det leder sedan i sin tur till att grupparbetet, kreativiteten och problemlösningarna effektiviseras, och att tankeverksamheten gynnas.</p><p>Syftet med uppsatsen blev därför att undersöka vilka av Kline och Saunders tio steg Markant Reklambyrå använder sig av för att ses som en lärande organisation. För att besvara syftet i uppsatsen valdes att undersöka hur kunskaper och erfarenheter används och förmedlas mellan medarbetarna i det valda fallföretaget.</p><p>Undersökningen resulterade i att Markant Reklambyrå omedvetet använder sig av alla de steg som Kline och Saunders beskriver, dock finns det områden där lärandet kan förbättras. Med hjälp av utökad struktur vid dokumentering och möten kan Markant Reklambyrå bli en ännu effektivare organisation där medarbetarna förmedlar sina kunskaper och erfarenheter till varandra.</p>

<p>Augmented reality is an interesting technology which has increased in popularity the last couple of years. Even though we see more and more of this technology the use of it doesn’t match up to its true potential. This paper aims to investigate the possibilities of this technology and illustrate how companies can use it in their business to reach out to customers in a new and exciting way. The study consists of three parts. The first part explores what companies have done today with augmented reality, which companies are of interest for this technology and how they can use it. The second part investigates who the user of augmented reality is today and who tomorrow’s user will be. The third part goes through the technology behind augmented reality. This part investigates what is possible to do today and which techniques are the most common. These three steps are then combined and make the foundation of a prototype which will illustrate how a business can adopt augmented reality. Interviews of potential users reveal that these kinds of artifacts are needed by the public, for example, to visualizing products from the internet in the customers own home environment. Conclusions from the literature study and from the development of the prototype disclose that augmented reality have a lot of problems that needs to be solved before it will be accepted by a wider public audience. These problem areas range from camera quality to standardization of markers, but like all new technology these problems have solutions and eventually augmented reality will be a natural part of our lives.</p>

In the thesis a theoretical exploration concerning the significance of information technology in everyday life is conducted. The main question advanced is how the reflexive nature of information technology can be envisioned. By this question attention is directed to transformative, experiential and dynamic qualities of information technology,i.e. unknown mergers of information technology and human experience. It is tentatively suggested that it is within everyday life that such transformative abilities are due to be significant. That is, depending on if and how people experience otherness in their relationships with information technology different strategies and responses of being a part of the whole are achieved. The main purpose of the thesis is to establish a theoretical base that both reveals such reflexivity and allows for further studies of the significance of information technology in everyday life. An extended purpose is to provide the critical tradition of Informatics research with an alternative view on what might count as critical ideals as well as make some suggestions about what should be subject to further research within this tradition. The framework#being-with information technology#emerges as a result of my insistence on grasping the relationship between information technology and human experience as a whole. Informed primarily by Martin Heidegger’s %1977&amp; thinking on technology the framework ascribes primacy to meaning-making and sense-making processes. The framework also aspire to reach beyond notions of use and design by emphasizing the role and importance of the potential of information technology to transform human experience in new and significant ways. This potential is referred to as information technology as lifeworlds. Throughout the thesis, information technology as lifeworlds is recognized in a number of ways. At the same time it is argued that this is a never-ending, dynamic, open,complex, and often contradictory object of study. It is suggested that a focus on aesthetic experiences entails the possibility to investigate ambiguous meanings of information technology, meanings that all are intrinsic to information technology, but so far has received little or no attention. This suggestion is also a move away from a view of information technology as an object, with certain features, qualities and properties, towards a view of information technology as a relation to the world, to itself,and towards being human. / I boken felaktigt ISBN 91-7305-117-9, skall vara 91-7264-054-5

In this thesis we present the procedures and outcomes of adopting two roles in a study: the role of a researcher and the role of a designer. The subject is crossmedia design. Crossmedia is a growing and changing trend for media producers of today its design is of great importance. The purpose is to create a concept from scratch that stands out from the crowd and engage people with the use of cross media as the approach. We also aim to investigate if a cross media designer can rely on previous research made within this subject or if the scene has changed. In order to test and to fully understand the process of the subject, we designed a crossmedia concept, based upon previous and related research. We employ a qualitative and exploratory approach informed by recent developments in action design research. We will then review our results by analysing which medium, digital or analogue, was the most successful and how the audience and the general media embraced the concept.

Testing has always been an important task in the scope of software quality. Though it has never been as much appreciated within the management of the organisations as the software development has. However testing is becoming more attractive within organisations because it becomes more evident how much money working systems saves in contrast to defect ones. A tester often use testing tools to simplify the work progress. There are a lot of tools nowadays but not many evaluating models which helps the tester to know which one to recommend. This essay tries to approach the problematic area of evaluating testing tools. It will process the testing area with an orientation to high level test and automation. This area is choosen because there is, so far, scarce research and scientific support for test tool evaluation and this problem needs to be attended to. A first step of an evaluating model is presented in this essay, which can evaluate todays testing tools. The model contains criterias from earlier research and praxis with a test tool, Microsoft Test Manager 2012. To get a deeper understanding about which assesment criteria the model should contain, software quality standard ISO/IEC 9126-1, the test process, and Microsoft Test Manager 2012 were used to define those criterias. We also found that some criterias were missing and needed to be added, so our model would fit todays evaluating of test tools.

In today’s society more and more activities are digitalized. This means that everyone has to be able to use information and communication tools (ICT) in order to take part in the digital world, otherwise they will be left out of the digital community. There is a so called digital gap between for instance elderly and young people, where elderly do not know how to use the tools and there for cannot gain access to the digital society. What happens when people, not only grow old, but also have a communication disorder, such as aphasia? How are they included? The purpose of this study is to investigate whether or not surf pads are good tools for bridging the digital gap for people with aphasia, and which activities and situations that encourages people with aphasia to work with the surf pad. This has been investigated by conducting a qualitative study where ten people with aphasia who owns a surf pad have been interviewed. Also one person who has aphasia but does not want a surf pad has been a part of this study. The interviews have been complemented with a participating observation that has been conducted over a period of one year. The study shows that the surf pad might be a good tool to bridge the digital gap, even though the participants in this study do not think that they have gotten more social by using surf pads. It shows that it takes more than just handing out the tool. It needs support and motivation in order to learn how to use it. Finally, and maybe the most important finding is that it is about a lack of confidence, both in the tool but also in one self that is the biggest indicator for wanting to learn and daring to do so.

Abstract IT can facilitate communication among individuals and connect people across geographical distances. On the contrary, citizens of the society who do not use communication technologies to some extent might feel excluded from the information society. As elderly citizens are already in a vulnerable position for the digital divide, communication technology becomes an important tool for interacting with friends and family. The social situation of elderly, 60 years of age and older, is a topic of current interest since they are the fastest growing age group in the world today. Further, social interaction becomes more important among elderly since it has a positive effect on well- being. However, elderly are the least represented age group using social media, which gives a reason to speculate about what affects their outdistancing. To approach this issue we investigated in elderlys’ social background, what motivates them to use technology, attitudes toward technology and whether Facebook meets their social needs. The purpose of this study is to give a deeper understanding of what impact social media has on how elderly build relationships. We have approached this issue by using a qualitative study where we examined how nine elderly between the age of 65-79, in Umeå use Facebook to maintain or establish relations with their surroundings. Our findings suggest that it is most often family members who motivate elderly to join Facebook to enable social interaction online. Another factor that affects elderlys’ relationships is the fact that they feel insecure online, because of a lack of knowledge on the usage of Facebook features. Also, there is an awareness among elderly that social media is characterized by transparency, where information becomes more vulnerable for exploitation. Hence, elderly prefer not to share information on social media. Facebook is thereby mainly used as a complementary mean for maintaining and re-connecting relations with family and friends.  Finally,  our  study  suggests  that  social  media  also  can  conduce  inclusion  in society by serving as a link between working life and retirement.