Thesis (M.S.)--Florida State University, 2006. / Advisor: Robert van Engelen, Florida State University, College of Arts and Sciences, Dept. of Computer Science. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed Sept. 22, 2006). Document formatted into pages; contains ix, 47 pages. Includes bibliographical references.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-07-29T15:18:21Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao Moema Patricia 2010.pdf: 8288081 bytes, checksum: 2b2f22f313267011fb62367c89de8a95 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-09-20 / This study examines the design process management and its interrelation with the constructive process of multifamily residential buildings. Based on an exploratory survey to identify and understand the methodologies for managing the design activity into two companies in the metropolitan region of Goiania, this work is divided into three phases: literature review, desk research and field research (based interviews with key players in the process). To support this work in the investigation of major issues influencing the design process, one of the key steps in the roadmap construction work was the adoption of two reference models: (i) the reference model for building integrated design process management proposed by Romano (2003), and (ii) the manuals scope of projects and services for the real estate industry (AGESC, 2010). These models helped in the development of a roadmap for semi-structured individual and group members with different professional process in two companies. With the purpose of fostering multidisciplinary cooperation and integration between different actors, the results of this study may be relevant to people who will handle or manage projects so that they can reflect on how to improve the postures adopted by the guidelines prepared and that they cast in development of practices and progress of the project management of buildings. / Este trabalho analisa a gestão do processo do projeto e sua inter-relação com o processo construtivo de edificações residenciais multifamiliares. Fundamentado em um levantamento de caráter exploratório, para identificação e compreensão das metodologias de gestão da atividade projetual em duas construtoras e incorporadoras da região metropolitana de Goiânia, dividiu-se o trabalho em três etapas: pesquisa bibliográfica, pesquisa documental e pesquisa de campo (baseada em entrevistas com os principais agentes do processo). A fim de subsidiar este trabalho na investigação dos principais aspectos que influenciam o processo de projeto, um dos passos principais para construção do roteiro do trabalho foi a adoção de dois modelos de referência: (i) o modelo de gerenciamento do processo de projeto proposto por Romano (2003), e; (ii) os manuais de escopo de projetos e serviços para a indústria imobiliária (AGESC, 2010). Estes modelos auxiliaram no desenvolvimento do roteiro para as entrevistas semi-estruturadas, individuais e em grupo com os diferentes profissionais integrantes do processo em duas empresas de construção e/ou incorporação. Com o propósito de fomentar a cooperação multidisciplinar e a integração entre os diversos agentes, os resultados deste estudo podem ser relevantes para pessoas que gerenciam ou gerenciarão projetos, para que possam refletir sobre como melhorar as posturas adotadas por meio das diretrizes formuladas e que estas auxiliem na evolução das práticas e no progresso do processo de gestão do projeto de edifícios.

The purpose aims identify the needs of customers in the furniture sector, of providing subsidies of theoretical order and practical for the aggregation of value on the using design in production in order to break paradigms business. In addition to presenting the design management and quality as a competitive differential for small and medium enterprises in this sector. The design has not been properly stimulated in most of these companies, by the fact that its benefits are not being properly evaluated. The absence of design professionals from these companies is a great challenge, because it involves changes in the paradigms that in turn relates to the acceptance of design as a differentiator factor. Was described the furniture industry for the theoretical foundation study, emphasizing its main characteristics, as well as the origin and evolution of the management of design and quality. How methodology used the qualitative and quantitative research. The field search was conducted through of the semi-structured interviews with the managers of MEP's. Was selected three companies that are part of the Santa Maria furniture core (NUMOV/SM). It was used questionnaire to seek the views of consumers on the importance of the use of design as differential factor. For consumers, the research was conducted through the questionnaire applied in the four districts with the greatest significance of purchases, according to the opinion of managers. The total population of these districts is 66,113 people. On this population was used a stratified sample valid of 385 questionnaires applied, representing a significance level of 5%.The small and medium enterprises in Santa Maria furniture sector recognize the importance of using the design as a competitive factor, however, encounter themselves on the paradigm that design increases production costs. The data presented in this study reinforce the need for companies using the design management and quality. Thus, the strategy of design in this sector, generates innovation and consequently the credibility of the company on the market. / Este estudo tem por objetivo identificar as necessidades dos clientes do setor moveleiro, com a finalidade de fornecer subsídios de ordem teórica e prática para agregar valor mediante o uso do design na produção, com o intuito de quebrar paradigmas empresariais. Além de apresentar a gestão de design e da qualidade como diferencial competitivo para micro e pequenas empresas (MPE s) nesse setor. O design não tem sido devidamente estimulado na maioria dessas empresas, pelo fato de que seus benefícios ainda não estão sendo corretamente avaliados. A carência de profissionais do design nessas empresas é um grande desafio, pois envolve mudanças de paradigmas que a priori, diz respeito à aceitação do design como fator diferenciador. Para o embasamento teórico do estudo contextualizou-se a indústria moveleira, enfatizando suas principais características, assim como também, a origem e evolução da gestão de design e qualidade. Como metodologia utilizou-se a pesquisa quali-quantitativa.O trabalho de campo foi realizado por meio de entrevistas semi-estruturadas com os gestores das MPE s. Foram selecionadas três empresas que fazem parte do Núcleo Moveleiro de Santa Maria (NUMOV/SM). Utilizou-se na pesquisa um questionário para buscar a opinião do consumidor a respeito da importância do uso do design como fator diferencial. Para os consumidores, a pesquisa foi realizada através de um questionário aplicado nos quatro bairros com maior significância de compras, conforme a opinião dos gestores. A população total dos referidos bairros é de 66.113 pessoas. Desta população utilizou-se uma amostra estratificada válida de 385 questionários aplicados, representando um nível de significância de 5%. As MPE s do setor moveleiro de Santa Maria/RS reconhecem a importância da utilização o design como fator competitivo, porém, esbarram no paradigma de que o design onera os custos de produção. Os dados apresentados nesta pesquisa reforçam a necessidade das empresas utilizarem à gestão de design e da qualidade. Assim, a estratégia de design, nesse setor, gera inovação e consequentemente a credibilidade da empresa perante o mercado.

This thesis deals with the process of Capacity Management. The main objective of the process is to ensure sufficient capacity of existing infrastructure to support daily business operations and projections of future capacity based on the requirements of the business. In the first part the author focuses on the basic performance characteristics of the Capacity Management coming within the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL). Also, the author analyzes the process of Capacity Management in an unnamed company and compares it with the best practices of ITIL. The second part is derived from the first, where the author discusses the Business Capacity Management and management of the capacity of IS/ICT. The last part of thesis is about Cloud Computing technologies from the Capacity Management point of view, as well as the introduction of such technologies in selected company. Each part consists of both theoretical backgrounds from diverse sources, as well as practical experience of the author.

An incentive for origin of this diploma work was an effort to bring a solution for a troubleshooting area in an international IT company ́s process management where the author was working for more than one and half year and which subsidiary is based in the Czech Republic. The goal of the work is not even to bring a solution in a form of redesign below spcificated process area with suggestion for implementation, but also to bring the reader overview on one possible way how to design and model processes implemented by a certain company. The private objective of the author is to enlarge her own experience with analysis and process modelling portfolio. Goals were achieved by study of a lot of internal resources in a form of documents, documentation and also by study of a scientific literature and scientific topics published in Internet. Moreover there was needed to realize several interviews with employees, analyze all founded information and suggest a solution with regards to given conditions and restrictions. A contribution of this work is in a transparent elaboration of a given reengineering ́s problems, starting with methodics designed for reengineering, through tools used for modelling to solution of a practical task. This work also reveals a process management approach one of the top IT company effecting the international markets, also with description of methods and tools used to it ́s support.

Issues of the project management with the possibility of artificial intelligence in information management has been solved in this thesis. The solution of this problem has been made on the basis of the publications listed in the information resources that produce description of initial conditions for the theoretical part of this thesis. The model of the company‘s project management with a selection of artificial intelligence methods in designing the HelpDesk for the company has been created on analysis of information management business basis.

Modern logistics is strongly influenced by ongoing outsourcing. Numerous logistics service providers as stakeholders, as well as fragmented logistics networks and supply chains, result from this outsourcing and specialization on distinct core competencies. These stakeholders have to collaborate in order to enable complex supply chains. The collaboration is difficult with the inherent heterogeneity between stakeholders in terms of differing naming conventions and differing IT systems. An inadequate integration and poor communication as well as incorrect information lead to mistakes and inefficiency. One promising approach to solve these problems is the interdisciplinary paradigm of Cloud Logistics. Several parallels can be drawn between services of cloud computing and services of logistics. The paradigm of Cloud Logistics is based on these parallels and focuses on the adoption of the basic principles from cloud computing to logistics. These principles comprise the virtualization of all resources and their encapsulation within reusable modules, the so called cloud logistics services. The essential aspect of the cloud logistics paradigm is to bridge the logistics service providers' heterogeneity and differing naming conventions and IT systems with a semantic approach. The systematic literature review contained in the thesis reveals existing research gaps in the field of cloud logistics. Shortcomings are, next to others, basic aspects such as a definition and a conceptual framework to set the field of cloud logistics in context to both affecting disciplines - cloud computing and logistics. Essential explicit artifacts describing concepts and semantics of cloud logistics services are missing as well. Following a design oriented information systems research approach, the contribution of the cumulative thesis comprises the development of these mentioned essential artifacts. Especially the reusable generic ontology design patterns that semantically describe the cloud logistics services and their structuring are important contributions. Summarizing, the thesis contains a basic set of artifacts to enable the paradigm of cloud logistics. The development of a first prototype and the elaboration of an application example in the context of systematic engineering and evaluation of logistics process alternatives complement the course of the thesis.:Contents List of Figures III List of Tables V List of Abbreviations VI 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Background and Problem Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 1.2 Objective and Research Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 1.3 Reflections on Research in IS and Logistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 1.4 Outline and Structure of the Thesis’ Contributions - Included Publications 25 2 Landscape - Conceptual 33 2.1 'Go with the Flow - Design of Cloud Logistics Service Blueprints' . . . 33 2.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 3 Landscape - Technical 46 3.1 'LoSe ODP - An Ontology Design Pattern for Logistics Services' . . . . 46 3.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 4 Map - Conceptual 62 4.1 'Metamodel of a Logistics Service Map' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 4.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 5 Map - Technical 77 5.1 'Ontological Structuring of Logistics Services' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 5.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 6 Service Granularity Framework 88 6.1 'How Low Should You Go? - Conceptualization of the Service Granu- larity Framework' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88 6.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106 7 Prototype 108 7.1 'Logistics Service Map Prototype' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 7.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114 8 Application 116 8.1 'Planning of Composite Logistics Services: Model-Driven Engineering and Evaluation' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 8.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138 9 Consolidation and Research Roadmap 140 9.1 'Towards the Conception of Cloud Logistics - Engineering and Manage- ment of Modular Cloud Logistics Services in the Context of Flexible Future Supply Chains' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 9.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 10 Conclusion and Future Work 189 10.1 Developed Artifacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 10.2 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191 10.3 Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194 10.4 Limitations and Threats to Validity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196 10.5 Outlook and Subsequent Research Perspectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197 Bibliography VIII Curriculum Vitae XXVIII Selbständigkeitserklärung XXIX / Logistik ist heutzutage durch eine wachsende Arbeitsteilung und von einem Outsourcing-Trend geprägt. Daraus resultieren fragmentierte Logistiknetzwerke und Supply Chains, welche durch eine Vielzahl von Logistikdienstleistern als Stakeholder geprägt sind. Diese Stakeholder müssen miteinander kollaborieren, um innerhalb der Supply Chains zusammen zuwirken. Die Kollaboration geht mit Herausforderungen einher, welche aus der inhärenten Heterogenität zwischen den Stakeholdern sowie abweichenden Namenkonventionen und IT-Systemen der beteiligten Stakeholder resultiert. Unzureichende Integration, mangelhafte Kommunikation sowie Fehlinformation führen zu Fehlern und Ineffizienzen. Ein vielversprechender Ansatz, um diese Probleme zu lösen, ist das interdisziplinäre Paradigma Cloud Logistics. Zwischen Diensten des Cloud Computing und Diensten der Logistik können diverse Parallelen gezogen werden. Das Cloud Logistics Paradigma basiert auf diesen Parallelen und überträgt die Grundprinzipien des Cloud Computing auf die Logistik. Zu diesen Grundprinzipien gehören unter anderem Aspekte wie die Ressourcenvirtualisierung und -kapselung in wiederverwendbaren Modulen, den so genannten Cloud Logistics Services. Essentieller Aspekt des Cloud Logistics Paradigmas ist die Überbrückung der Heterogenität der Logistikdienstleister und ihrer abweichenden Namenskonventionen und IT-Systeme mittels eines semantischen Ansatzes. Die vorliegende Dissertation deckt mit Hilfe einer systematischen Literaturrecherche bestehende Lücken innerhalb des Forschungsfeldes Cloud Logistics auf. Defizite bestehen, neben anderen Aspekten, vorallem in essentiellen Artefakten des Forschungsfeldes, wie bspw. einer angemessenen wissenschaftlichen Definition, und eines konzeptuellen Frameworks, um das Forschungsfeld in den Kontext der beiden tangierenden Disziplinen - Cloud Computing und Logistik - einzuordnen. Weiterhin mangelt es an essentiellen und explizit beschriebenen Artefakten, welche Konzepte und die Semantik des Engineering und Managements der Cloud Logistics Services beschreiben. Der Methodologie der gestaltungsorinetierten Wirtschaftsinformatik folgend, besteht der Beitrag dieser Dissertation in der Entwicklung der vorgenannten Artefakte. Besonders die wiederverwendbaren generischen Ontology Design Pattern zur semantischen Beschreibung der Cloud Logistics Services und ihrer Strukturierung stellen einen wichtigen Beitrag dar. Zusammenfassend enthält die Dissertation ein notwendiges Grundset an Artefakten für die Umsetzung des Cloud Logistics Paradigmas. Die Entwicklung eines ersten Prototypen, sowie die Erarbeitung eines Anwendungsbeispiels im Kontext systematischer Entwicklung und Evaluation von Prozessvarianten in der Logistik runden die Arbeit ab.:Contents List of Figures III List of Tables V List of Abbreviations VI 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Background and Problem Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 1.2 Objective and Research Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 1.3 Reflections on Research in IS and Logistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 1.4 Outline and Structure of the Thesis’ Contributions - Included Publications 25 2 Landscape - Conceptual 33 2.1 'Go with the Flow - Design of Cloud Logistics Service Blueprints' . . . 33 2.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 3 Landscape - Technical 46 3.1 'LoSe ODP - An Ontology Design Pattern for Logistics Services' . . . . 46 3.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 4 Map - Conceptual 62 4.1 'Metamodel of a Logistics Service Map' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 4.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 5 Map - Technical 77 5.1 'Ontological Structuring of Logistics Services' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 5.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 6 Service Granularity Framework 88 6.1 'How Low Should You Go? - Conceptualization of the Service Granu- larity Framework' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88 6.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106 7 Prototype 108 7.1 'Logistics Service Map Prototype' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 7.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114 8 Application 116 8.1 'Planning of Composite Logistics Services: Model-Driven Engineering and Evaluation' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 8.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138 9 Consolidation and Research Roadmap 140 9.1 'Towards the Conception of Cloud Logistics - Engineering and Manage- ment of Modular Cloud Logistics Services in the Context of Flexible Future Supply Chains' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 9.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 10 Conclusion and Future Work 189 10.1 Developed Artifacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 10.2 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191 10.3 Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194 10.4 Limitations and Threats to Validity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196 10.5 Outlook and Subsequent Research Perspectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197 Bibliography VIII Curriculum Vitae XXVIII Selbständigkeitserklärung XXIX

Interdisziplinäre Produktanforderungen, eine hohe Servicequalität und ein verändertes Nutzerverhalten führen in immer mehr Unternehmen von klassischen funktionsorientierten und abteilungsgebundenen Organisationsformen zu einer Prozessorientierung, in der das Abteilungsdenken durch das Erfolgsziel des Gesamtprozesses ersetzt wird. Dies gilt insbesondere für einen der wichtigsten Teilprozesse der Produktentwicklung, die Berechnung der im Erzeugnis verbauten Maschinenelemente. Deren Auslegung, Optimierung und Nachrechnung sind einerseits Teil eines übergeordneten und arbeitsteiligen Entwicklungsprozesses, bedürfen aber zur eigenen Bestimmung ebenfalls vieler einzelner parallel ablaufender interdisziplinärer Aktivitäten. Die vorliegende Arbeit beschäftigt sich mit der Entwicklung einer Methode zur Systematisierung und Erhöhung der Transparenz der Abläufe in der Produktentwicklung mit dem Schwerpunt der Auslegung und Berechnung von Maschinenelementen und deren Baugruppen. Es wurden die Baugruppen- und Prozessbildung, die Werkzeuge für die Modellbildung sowie eine prototypisch realisierte Baugruppenberechnung vorgestellt. Auf Basis der durchgeführten Literaturrecherche wurden die grundlegenden Vorgehensweisen und Methoden zur Organisation und Durchführung von Berechnungsprozessen identifiziert, analysiert und auf die Anwendbarkeit der Lösung, der im Rahmen dieser Arbeit gestellten Aufgaben zur Systematisierung und Erhöhung der Transparenz der Berechnungsabläufe im Bereich der Maschinenelementeberechnungen untersucht. Die Grundlage der neuen Methode bilden Ansätze, die sich bereits in der Konstruktionsmethodik und in der Informationstechnik bewährt haben. Ergänzt mit den Konzepten der Klassifikation und Prozessautomatisierung sowie den mathematisch-technischen Berechnungsalgorithmen der Ingenieurwissenschaften bilden sie die Basis dieser Methode. Die für die Automatisierung notwendige Formalisierung der Methode wurde basierend auf der Theorie der gerichteten Graphen, der SysML (Systems Modeling Language) und des Business Process Management (BPM) Ansatzes durchgeführt. Die gewonnenen theoretischen Erkenntnisse wurden in Form eines prototypisch entwickelten Design Process Management Systems realisiert, welches die Erreichung der in der Arbeit gesetzten Ziele ermöglicht und für ein nachhaltiges Wissensmanagement bei der Organisation der Berechnungsabläufe sorgt. Die Besonderheiten dieses workfloworientierten Management Systems liegen einerseits in einem Wissens-Repository, welches die modularen Bestandteile zur Definition der Berechnungsabläufe beinhaltet sowie andererseits in einem interaktiven Prozess-Designer, mit dessen Hilfe die Abläufe graphisch, schnell und intuitiv modelliert und ausgeführt werden können. In den Produktplanungsphasen vom Anforderungsmanagement bis zur Validierung nach dem Prinzip des „Systems Engineering“ kann dabei auf eine Bibliothek modularer Berechnungsobjekte in Form von Prozess-Bausteinen zugegriffen werden, deren Schnittstellen und Datenstrukturen ausnahmslos einheitlichen Definitionen entsprechen. Gemeinsam mit der nach eCl@ss - Standard entwickelten Merkmalsstruktur der Berechnungsobjekte wird so eine hohe Wiederverwendbarkeit erzielt. Die Klassifizierung der Berechnungsobjekte orientiert sich an konstruktionssystematischen Gesichtspunkten. Der eigentliche Prozess der Baugruppenbildung erfolgt mit einem Editor, der die Berechnungsobjekte miteinander verknüpft, indem er die zugehörigen Informationsobjekte, Datenbankzugriffe und Algorithmen in die Benutzeroberfläche und in den Prozess einbindet. Ebenso können externe Prozesse und Datenquellen nahtlos in die Modellierung einfließen. Schließlich wird die Vorgehensweise bei der Modellbildung einer Berechnungs-Baugruppe am Beispiel einer Getriebeauslegung dargestellt. Ausgehend von den geforderten Merkmalen der Lösungskonfiguration wird die Funktionsstruktur durch analoge Berechnungsobjekte abgebildet und anschließend über eine geeignete Logik miteinander verknüpft. Der dabei entstehende Prozess bildet die neue Berechnungs-Baugruppe der Getriebeauslegung und kann schließlich für Parameterstudien herangezogen werden. Mit den prozessgebundenen Berechnungsbaugruppen wurde eine Methode vorgestellt, die den Konstrukteuren die Möglichkeit bietet, ihre zum Teil mehrstufigen und rekursiven Berechnungen durch den Einsatz modularer Funktionsbausteine verbindlich, nachvollziehbar und vor allem zeitsparender zu gestalten. Dabei sind die Arbeitsergebnisse allen Ingenieuren und Abteilungen einer Community, vor allem auch dem Qualitätsmanagement und damit einem kontinuierlichen Verbesserungsprozess zugänglich. Inwieweit die hier vorgetragenen Methoden auch den Validierungsprozess unterstützen können, bleibt weiteren Untersuchungen vorbehalten.

The decisions taken during the aircraft conceptual design stage are of paramount importance since these commit up to eighty percent of the product life cycle costs. Thus in order to obtain a sound baseline which can then be passed on to the subsequent design phases, various studies ought to be carried out during this stage. These include trade-off analysis and multidisciplinary optimisation performed on computational processes assembled from hundreds of relatively simple mathematical models describing the underlying physics and other relevant characteristics of the aircraft. However, the growing complexity of aircraft design in recent years has prompted engineers to substitute the conventional algebraic equations with compiled software programs (referred to as models in this thesis) which still retain the mathematical models, but allow for a controlled expansion and manipulation of the computational system. This tendency has posed the research question of how to dynamically assemble and solve a system of non-linear models. In this context, the objective of the present research has been to develop methods which significantly increase the flexibility and efficiency with which the designer is able to operate on large scale computational multidisciplinary systems at the conceptual design stage. In order to achieve this objective a novel computational process modelling method has been developed for generating computational plans for a system of non-linear models. The computational process modelling was subdivided into variable flow modelling, decomposition and sequencing. A novel method named Incidence Matrix Method (IMM) was developed for variable flow modelling, which is the process of identifying the data flow between the models based on a given set of input variables. This method has the advantage of rapidly producing feasible variable flow models, for a system of models with multiple outputs. In addition, criteria were derived for choosing the optimal variable flow model which would lead to faster convergence of the system. Cont/d.

In this thesis the discourse on intercultural and language contact of German native speakers in the Czech Republic (so called "expatriates") is analysed in accordance with the Language Management Theory. Individual interactions on the discourse-based (micro) level are the source of data for the analysis of linguistic, communicative and socio-cultural language problems. Language problem is understood as a noted and negatively evaluated deviation from the expectation of the expatriates. Which language problems have been recognized by the German native speakers and which strategies to solve them have been chosen is examined in three domains "work domain", "leisure domain" and "daily life domain". The Czech language competence is the most mentioned language problem in the discourse. As a result of the discourse analysis it has been found out that Language Management cannot be seen as an objective process of solving language problems, as the expatriates possess diverse expectations according to their individual interests and further aspects (situation conditions or the issue of social power). Therefore it is not possible to give a general recommendation of how to solve the language problems. Key words: Expatriates, Discourse, Language Problem, Language Management, Language Management Theory, Adjustment...