This mixed methods study examined secondary teachers’ technology selfefficacy, their professional development activities regarding mobile handheld devices, and how those activities affect their use of mobile devices as instructional tools. Additionally, this study also explored teachers’ perceptions of other factors that act as barriers or enablers to their use of such devices. The study included 104 middle and high school teachers who taught in a large, urban public school district in the Southeastern United States. Data were collected through the administration of an electronic survey and semi-structured interviews. The researcher utilized multiple regression and moderator analyses, as well as qualitative analysis of the interview data. The results of the multiple regression analysis revealed teachers’ technologyrelated self-efficacy to be a significant predictor of their instructional use of mobile handheld devices. However, secondary teachers’ level of professional development was found not to contribute significantly to the model. The moderator analysis too revealed professional development to be a nonsignificant factor. The findings of the qualitative phase of the study revealed secondary teachers’ awareness of their varied and fluid technology-related self-efficacy, as well as those factors that modify it. Qualitative data also revealed four categories of essential elements that teachers must have in order to most effectively implement mobile handheld devices within their pedagogy: intellectual capital, emotional capital, social-cultural capital, and technological capital. When lacking, these elements can represent barriers to teachers’ implementation of mobile handheld devices. Targeted professional development and increased funding to minimize the digital divide are recommended to reduce these barriers. The findings of the study inform designers of professional development programs, school and district and secondary teachers, as they are all stakeholders in the process of increasing the effective implementation of mobile handheld devices as instructional tools. / Includes bibliography. / Dissertation (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2016. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

As handheld devices have become increasingly popular, powerful programmable graphics hardware for mobile and handheld devices has been deployed. While many resources on mobile devices are limited, the predominant problem for mobile devices is their limited battery power. Several techniques have been proposed to increase the energy efficiency of mobile applications and improve battery life. In this thesis, we propose a new dynamic voltage and frequency scaling (DVFS) on Graphics Processing Units (GPU). In most cases, cues within the graphics appli- cation can be used to predict portions of a GPU that will be used or unused when the application is run. We partition the GPU into six clock domains that can be clocked at different rates. Specifically, each domain it has its own voltage and frequency set- ting based on its predicted workload to save energy without reducing applications frame rates. In addition, we propose an signature-based algorithm for predicting the workload offered to our six clock domains by a given application to decide voltage and frequency settings. We conduct experiments and compare the results of our new signature based workload prediction algorithm with some other traditional interval based workload prediction algorithms. Our results show that our signature-based prediction can save 30-50% energy without afecting application frame rates.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Oregon State University, 2009. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references. Also available on the World Wide Web.

Thesis (M.Sc.)--University of Waikato, 2007. / Title from PDF cover (viewed May 15, 2009) Includes bibliographical references (p. 99-100)

Storage devices are rapidly changing, and we need to adapt the OS storage software stack to keep up with the changes. Such a re-evaluation of the storage software stack is especially required for mobile platforms because they are relying on inexpensive flash storage devices having very different performance characteristics from the familiar hard disk.In this thesis work, we first show the importance of storage in mobile platforms; contrary to conventional wisdom, we find evidence that storage is a significant contributor to application performance on mobile devices. Then, we explore the solution space for flash storage; user-level library for selective logging, host-side write buffering layer, and OS buffer replacement scheme for flash storage have been studied. Finally, we build an integrated solution for smartphone storage, named Fjord. In the Fjord study, we re-design logging and RAM buffering solutions for smartphones, and also propose fine-grained reliability control mechanisms. We prove that non-volatile logging can improve storage performance remarkably. Understanding the characteristics of cloud-backed applications and controlling the reliability constraint for chosen cloud-backed applications can achieve additional significant performance gain.We implement and evaluate our solution on a real Android smartphone, and demonstrate significant performance gains for everyday apps on such platforms.

Smartphones form an emerging mobile computing platform that has hybrid characteristics borrowed from PC and feature phone environments. While maintaining great mobility and portability as feature phones, smartphones offers advanced computation capabilities and network connectivity. Although the smartphone platform can support PC-grade applications, the platform exhibits fundamentally different characteristics from the PC platform. Two important problems arise in the smartphone platform: how to mobilize applications and how to deliver them effectively. Traditional application mobilization involves significant cost in development and typically provides limited functionality of the PC version. Since the mobile applications rely on the embedded wireless interfaces of smartphones for network access, the application performance is impacted by the inferior characteristics of the wireless networks. Our first contribution is super-aggregation, a rapid application delivery protocol that in tandem uses the multiple interfaces intelligently to achieve a performance that is ``better than the sum of throughputs' achievable through each of the interfaces individually. The second contribution is MORPH, a remote computing protocol for heterogeneous devices that transforms the application views on the PC platform into smartphone-friendly views. MORPH virtualizes application views independent of the UI framework used into an abstract representation called virtual view. It allows transformation services to be easily programmed to realize a smartphone friendly view by manipulating the virtual view. The third contribution is the system design of super-aggregation and MORPH that achieve rapid application delivery and mobilization. Both solutions require only software modifications that can be easily deployed to smartphones.

Wireless is getting more important and popular because its convenience and portability make things easier. The goal of this project is to develop a mobile vehicle application called MOBILE USED CAR PRICES AND INFORMATION and this application will provide the prices and information for clients. The client can use their Palm handheld devices to read the prices and information whenever they want to check.

In the Morder-Client Food Service, a waiter/waitresses orders meals via a wireless handheld device. By reading the order items listed on the screen of a personal computer which is in a kitchen, the cook can make the correct dishes. This system can improve service quality and efficiency.

Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited / Handheld devices have evolved significantly from mere simple organizers to more powerful handheld computers that are capable of network connectivity, giving it the ability to send e-mail, browse the World Wide Web, and query remote databases. However, handheld devices, because of its design philosophy, are limited in terms of size, memory, and processing power compared to desktop computers. This thesis investigates the use of Data Flow Query Language (DFQL) in querying local and remote databases from a handheld device. Creating Standard Query Language (SQL) queries can be a complex undertaking; and trying to create one on a handheld device with a small screen only adds to its complexity. However, by using DFQL, the user can submit queries with an easy to use graphical user interface. Although handheld devices are currently more powerful than earlier PCs, they still require applications with a small footprint, which is a limiting factor for software developed. This thesis will also investigate the best division of labor between handheld device and remote servers. / Sergeant, United States Army

This thesis assesses the speed of adaptation and adoption of computing systems from an adult first-time user perspective in South Africa, with the aim of determining if it could ultimately lead to the reduction of the existing digital gap. As is evident from the social, educational, and economical gap for some observers, the reality of the existence of the digital gap in South Africa is undeniable. Constant non-targeted progress is made toward addressing imbalances, which seem to be more visible as the number of constant and permanent users is visibly increasing. These observed phenomena are mostly noticed amongst urban, educated, younger, middle-class citizens. The forgotten “missing middle” are left to fend for themselves. These are people who are still outside the digital drive the world is experiencing based on their schooling grade, geographical location, income level, and age. They were not in school when computer literacy was introduced, and they were too poor to teach themselves how to use a computer, too remote to observe the digital drive, and too old to learn from their peers. As citizens, their welfare matters, and when assessing the penetration of ICT in the country, their numbers also matter. One cannot ignore their presence and the difficulties and frustration that they experience when coming into contact with a computing system for the first time. The researcher is of the view that the presence of a computing system may not simply translate to the closure of the digital gap. In other words, people may gain access to a computer, but without computing usability skills or Internet connectivity it may not add value to their daily activities. Closing the digital gap in South Africa can be seen as political propaganda, but the reality is, how do we measure and assess it? It comes down to users, and in this particular case, attention is turned to the “missing middle”, here referred to as the adult first-time user. This is simply someone who is over the age of 18 years, lives in a rural community in South Africa, never completed school, and is using a computer for the first time. The researcher used a handheld tablet system as a tool to assess the participants’ adequacy in terms of the rate at which they complete tasks by developing mathematical equations which were placed together within an assessment metric that was later used to determine user proficiency, as well as their adaptation and user experience in order to determine if the participant can later adopt the device and take advantage of it. By so doing, the metric will comprise variables such as the user movement time, task completion success rate, task completion speed, user satisfaction, user reaction time, user completion rate per activity, time-based efficiency, and the assessment of the level of frustration any adult first-time user may experience while interacting with the system for the first time. The term “digital gap” may not be new to the ICT sphere, but no one has taken the step towards assessing it. The digital gap is no longer the absence of computing systems in many communities but rather the presence of inadequate user experience, which has not been properly measured and documented. The user experience metric (UXM) that was developed in this study provided the researcher with the opportunity to reassess the issue of systems adaptation, adoption, and usability by adult first-time users. This research is particularly driven by sound interaction design principles, user adaptation, and usability and user experience / Ph. D. (Information Systems) / School of Computing