Context. With the evolvement of cloud computing in recent years many companies have stated providing various services using it. Desktop as a Service, DaaS is one of services in the cloud computing in which the backend of Virtual Desktop Infrastructure, VDI is hosted by a cloud service provider. Although in SaaS, Software as a Service Web applications are used, all kinds of applications can be used in DaaS. There are many companies which provide VDI for private cloud and they are VMware Horizon, XenDesktops by Citrix, OpenStack VDI solution and etc. Objectives. In this thesis two VDI solutions are analyzed based on the virtual desktop launch time and the performance of the desktop in various test cases. The VDI solutions considered are VMware Horizon view and OpenStack VDI. Methods. The method for this research consists of two stages. The first stage was a qualitative analysis in which literature study and a survey was conducted. In the next stage, experiment was setup where different performance metrics were calculated when the virtual desktop was put under several test cases. Results. Results collected include the virtual desktops launch time in two scenarios and several performance metrics such as CPU usage, memory usage, average IO size, average latency, throughput, IOPS and queue length at the processor. Conclusions. Performance of Virtual desktop running on OpenStack VDI was better in most of the test cases. In the test scenario where disk was put under stress OpenStack VDI solution performance was better than VMware Horizon View. Even considering the launch time for virtual desktops, OpenStack VDI performed better compared to VMware Horizon View.

This thesis seeks to investigate the vastly varying time to market of newly approved drugs across Europe. Firtsly, I use a country fixed effects model on data of newly approved drugs from 2014 to 2017 from 18 European countries. I investigate the correlations between medication specific characteristics and the launch time and find that drugs intended to treat HIV, rheumatism or hepatitis are correlated with a faster launch time. Orphan drugs, though they represent a third of the dataset are found to be insignificantly correlated with time to market. Using a drug fixed effects model, I research important country characteristics in relation to the launch time and find that countries with higher imports of medications are correlated with a quicker time to market. Countries with larger medication export sectors experience a longer waiting time, which could be linked to companies trying to hinder the parallel export of new drugs.

The Hybrid approach of development has for a long time been the dominating way to develop cross-platform applications targeting both the web and mobile. In recent years, a new combination of technology has appeared called Progressive Web Application (PWA) which aims to combine Native capabilities with best practices of the web to deliver a new Native-like experience to users without the need of Native wrappers. So far PWAs have proven to be the inferior choice when it came to performance and platform support. The purpose of this study is to compare the two technologies based on a literature review and evaluate the current performance across three parameters in an experiment - battery consumption, CPU utilization and time to first activity. Two applications were developed using each respective technique, with the Apache Cordova framework being used for the Hybrid approach and the React framework being used to implement PWA features. The results showed that the Hybrid approach is better in the majority of tests, offering more in terms of platform API access and providing better performance while only being slower when it came to time it took to first activity; but something to consider is that the PWA approach was not far behind. The conclusion this study arrived at was that PWAs have developed significantly since previous studies and is almost able to match Hybrid apps in terms of APIs and performance, but that Hybrid apps are still the preferred choice when it comes to performance. Further development and a wider adaptation of the PWA specification could very well change the way developers choose to approach mobile app development in the future as well as a potential for bringing the web closer to the mobile platform.

The objective of this thesis was to select a star for observation and determine the error in the retrieval technique for a rocket experiment to measure lower thermospheric Nitric Oxide in the polar night using stellar occultation technique. These objectives are accomplished by planning the geometry, determining the requirements for observations, window for launch and discussing the retrieval technique. The planning is carried out using an approximated (no drag) and simulated rocket trajectory (provided by NSROC: NASA Rocket Operations Contract). The simulation for the retrievals is done using data from Student Nitric Oxide Explorer. Stars were taken from a catalogue called TD1. Launch times were obtained from the geometry planned resulting from selecting a zenith angle after choosing a maximum occultation height and determining rocket apogee. Window for observing Spica was found to be 20 minutes. The retrieval technique and simulations showed that column densities and volume densities should be retrievable to less than 5% and 20% respectively observing occultation heights 90-120km. The study suggests that choosing a star positioned north w.r.t the observation location gives us more poleward latitudes and larger launch window. Future research can be carried out applying the stellar occultation and retrieval technique to a satellite. / Master of Science