Since the lack of connection between library education and society was identified as the major problem of library education in Brazil, emphasis was placed on some social variables which bear upon librarianship education and practice. These social variables were selected on the basis of the communication cycle of recorded information, where the library profession is inserted. A framework for developing educational objectives for library undergraduate education in Brazil was attempted by taking into account the three sources from which educational objectives may be derived, viz. the state of society, the needs of the student, and the nature of librarianship qua discipline. Factors contributing to the disconnection between library education and society in Brazil were identified as being the uncritical transplant of foreign library educationat models, as well as the lack of a bridge between the basic cycle in social sciences and the professional library cycle. In order to gain a better insight into the problem of library education in Brazil a series of interviews were conducted with a group of Brazilian library educators. The student (background, needs and interests) was examined by considering the findings of general studies on the Brazilian university student as well as a local study (State of Minas Gerais) specifically on the library student. The need was felt to know the students view of the existent relationships between the basic cycle of social sciences and the professional library cycle. A study by means of a questionnaire applied to the students of the Library School of the Federal University of Minas Gerais was undertaken. Librarianship qua discipline was approached under Nitecki's analysis of its nature, subject matter and objective, and compared and contrasted with a recent proposal for a minimum library curriculum, which is being studied by a group of Brazilian library schools. This piece of work, as an exploratory study, presents some general guidelines for the definition of objectives for library education in Brazil, as hypotheses to be tested within the educational process.

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This dissertation considers the rise of new and emergent organisational forms characterised as networks. The work presents an analysis of the underlying themes that motivate such developments by drawing upon modern models of organisation together with contemporary perspectives on information systems. A network is seen as interlinked work processes supported by communication technologies; work processes which, in particular, can transcend space and time and enable team based approaches. The characteristics that might distinguish the network are set out in terms of technology, the nature of the work process, and approaches to traditional organisational functions. Associations of individuals, institutions and groups of people and institutions; and societal considerations affecting inter-governmental and regional developments are also considered. An analysis of these characteristics is presented within a layered model and further developed by the use of tools and techniques drawn from social network analysis. A detailed case study is presented using this theoretical approach. The case examined is the Commonwealth Network of Information Technology for Development (COMNET-IT). This is an initiative of the Commonwealth aimed at bringing together expertise and organisations from around the world to coordinate their efforts in utilising information technology in pursuit of development goals. The focus of COMNET-IT's activities is on adding value to the work of a group of geographically dispersed experts through the utilisation of electronic networks. The study provides a detailed theoretical analysis of the network phenomenon. Using structuration theory and social network analysis, this research provides insights into processes of network formation and evolution, network structure and the behaviour of network participants. The processes of appropriation of technology are observed and analyzed, and this work is supported by detailed empirical research investigating electronic group meetings.

The theory of data modelling makes a variety of claims about schema stability. This research determined the current state of data modelling practice, and tested hypotheses related to measuring model stability. The research developed a method whereby the major elements of a data model can be consistently represented whatever process was originally used for modelling. This was achieved through a construction of a logical relational schema from the record design. The construction/reconstruction process attempted to identify the primary meaning primitives of a data model in order to track changes to them in different iterations of the application. The stability data collection process was applied to a case study followed by a series of models to generate further data. The early evidence indicated that data model instability has it roots in errors in modelling, errors in the semantic analysis whether done consciously or intuitively, and in changes to the requirements brought on by changes to the "reality". This research suggested that some of the elements of a data model are significantly more important than others. The research documented problems associated with the transformation of natural language into the constraints of data dictionaries. This exploration into the potential application of linguistic research into systems theory and practice identified a number of theoretically interesting problems, such as variable semantic determination. The discussion outlined some specific techniques an analyst can use to improve the process of semantic analysis. The work suggested that there should be greater concentration on the question of data model evolvability, and the appropriate preservation of meaning across model versions, and not necessarily on data model stability.

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The research has been concerned with identifying the contribution cultural factors play in explaining difficulties in transferring, implementing and exploiting information systems and information technology to Gulf countries.

Many people believe that good documentation is important, yet few use it regularly and effectively. An attempt is made to find reasons for this contradictory behaviour, by examining the existing practices of providers and users of documentation. Reasons for not using documentation appear to fall into two classes; predictable interaction effects and unpredictable interaction effects. Providers usually try to predict the problems users are likely to have at the user-documentation interface, by following standard quality control procedures. When these fail to produce good documentation, users become dissatisfied and turn elsewhere for their information needs. On the other hand, good quality documentation may not be used for reasons which cannot be predicted, and often cannot be explained. An approach which suggests methods for dealing with both of these situations is formulated, and ideas for raising the status of documentation are discussed.

The re-use of products such as code, specifications, design decisions and documentation has been proposed as a method for increasing software productivity and reliability. A major problem that has still to be adequately solved is the storage and retrieval of re-usable 'components'. Current methods, such as keyword retrieval and catalogues, rely on the use of names to describe components or categories. This is inadequate for all but a few well established components and categories; in the majority of cases names do not convey sufficient information on which to base a decision to retrieve. One approach to this problem is to describe components using a formal specification. However this is impractical for two reasons; firstly, the limitations of theorem proving would severely restrict the complexity of components that could be retrieved and secondly the retrieval mechanism would need to have a method of retrieving components with 'similar' specifications. This thesis proposes the use of formal 'property' models to represent the key functionality of components. Retrieval of components can then take place on the basis of a property model produced by the library's users. These models only describe the key properties of a component, thereby making the task of comparing properties feasible. Views are introduced as a method of relating similar, non identical property models, and the use of these views facilitates the re-use of components with similar properties. The language Miramod has been developed for the purpose of describing components, and a Miramod compiler and property prover which allow Miramod models to be compared for similarity, have been designed and implemented. These tools have indicated that model based component library retrieval is feasible at relatively low levels of the programming process, and future work is suggested to extend the method to encompass earlier stages in the development of large systems.