The main goal of the present thesis is to contribute to the study of overt visual attention under natural conditions. All publications included in the thesis employ eye-tracking methodology and local image feature analysis. The particular scientific question posed, if all parts of the thesis are considered together, can be formulated as: What experimental (i.e. experimenter controlled) and pseudo-experimental (e.g. demographic characteristics such as age) variables define, quantify and set limits for bottom-up determinants of fixation election? In this summary, I will bring together the answers to this question obtained during the course of the thesis and try to elucidate their significance in relation to the puzzles and riddles of eye movement research. After presenting an overview of the field, I will show how and to what extent fixation selection is altered as a function of age and as certain stimulus components are modified. Finally, I will argue that visual attention involves varying degrees of reliance on bottom-up cues according to the attending agent’s knowledge that is relevant in a given context.

This dissertation investigates whether a statistically significant relationship exists between a company’s corporate characteristics and the quality of its integrated report. The JSE Top 100 companies are used as the study population, with the Ernst & Young Excellence in Reporting ratings used as the framework for assessing integrated reporting quality. A multiple multivariate regression analysis was employed to assess the impact of ten company characteristics that were found to be prominent by other studies. The results show that firm size, board diversity, board independence and firms in the resource sector show a statistically significant positive association with components of integrated reporting quality as described in the Integrated Reporting Framework. The results suggest that firms with stronger adherence to good corporate practices, with firm board diversity and board independence as a possible indicator, are more responsive to the need for quality integrated reporting. Further, firms with greater accountability to stakeholders through their size of sector also appear to respond to this obligation through increased disclosures.

A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Arts in partial fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of Master’s in the Department of Anthropology and Development Studies at the University of Zululand, 2015 / According to the Constitution, Act No.108 of 1996 of the Republic of South Africa, every person has the right to clean water. The Department of Water Affairs and Forestry’s Community Water Supply Programme was established in 1994 to achieve this objective. Access to safe drinking water is the basic need to human life and wellbeing, and is a key to public health issues. The UGu District Municipality is the water distributor to the Umzumbe Local Municipality residents. The study area for this research is the Umzumbe Local Municipality, which is the second largest municipality under the UGu District Municipality. Communities, especially in rural areas under the Umzumbe Local Municipality, are still unable to access adequate safe drinking water which meets the national standards for protecting human health. The main concern of this research was to assess water access and provisioning in the Umzumbe Local Municipality, under the UGu District Municipality. The research assessed the water supply system in the UGu District Municipality by engaging with all the stakeholders involved in water provision to verify their roles in the water supply and development of water service delivery projects. The study was predicated on three theories which were assumed to explain water provisioning. The first theory is the top-down and bottom up approach to service delivery. The second approach is the privatisation concept which is based on neo-liberalism. This explains that buying what could hinder efficient delivery, mostly in poor environments. The final theory of the study deals with project management. This theory asserts that the way a project is packaged and commissioned will have implications in the delivery of services, in this case, water delivery. The research employed mixed a methods research design. The reason for employing both qualitative and quantitative methods is because the research sought to obtain a comprehensive interpretation of the occurrences in the research area. The adoption of qualitative data alone is likely to provide limited vision which would not be sufficient for the research without the inclusion of quantitative data. The population for the research consisted of the Umzumbe Local Municipality residents, both males and females from twenty one years of age, upwards. Seventy participants were chosen for the research. Interview schedules and survey questionnaires were used as data collection instruments. vii The findings showed that the UGu District Municipality infrastructure does have some challenges, which come in the form of skills challenges, and capacity challenges. Other challenges that the study identified include inability to access municipality’s infrastructure grant (M.I.G) and bulk infrastructure grant (B.I.G). The UGu District Municipality areas that are far inland are likely to have water, and also the problems because of the low capacity of engines that are used to pump water also the problem is exacerbated by power failures. The findings further indicated that unskilled contractors could be the cause of water outage in the Umzumbe Local Municipality. It has been established that contractors who are hired to run projects have a tendency of abandoning projects that have not been completed. The findings presented that the UGu District Municipality does not consider the involvement of community members when they take decisions on project matters. The research established that water tankers do not provide community with adequate water and the utilization of water tankers is an expensive option that can cause community not to be served. The findings also indicated that some of the water infrastructure is old and it can be the cause of water shortage. Lastly, the findings showed that the Umzumbe Local Municipality has low income opportunities, causing its inhabitants to be unable to pay for water services. On the basis of the findings the study recommends that the UGu District Municipality needs to adhere to the principles of monitoring and evaluation of all activities and projects that relate to water provisioning. At a broader scale the study suggests that further research be done to determine whether the Department of Water and Sanitation can consider the construction of water reservoir in UMzimkhulu River. The reservoir should be linked with the Umgeni Water Board to provide water to communities during water outage.

Les services de distribution de contenus évoluent rapidement. Un axe majeur d’évolution concerne la fédération de distributeurs de contenus distincts mettant ensemble leurs ressources respectives et agissant en tant qu’entité unique par rapport aux fournisseurs de contenus (Content Providers). En particulier, nous proposons une solution technique basée sur une architecture centralisée qui permet de prendre des décisions statiques d’établissement et de provisionnement de fédérations ainsi que des décisions de contrôle dynamique de fédérations établies. Nous adressons les aspects statiques de prise de décision en introduisant un modèle d’optimisation que nous appliquons à différents scénarios de fédération d’intérêt pour le marché. Nous démontrons que, quand la demande sur le marché de distribution de contenu est élevée, les distributeurs de contenus ont intérêt, d’un point de vue économique, à fédérer. Dans le contexte de contrôle dynamique de fédérations, nous nous focalisons sur le contrôle d’événements de pointe (peak events) dans une fédération de distributeurs de contenus. Différentes approches de contrôle sont valables à ce niveau. Nous effectuons des simulations basées sur des traces de trafic réelles dans le but de comparer les différentes approches. Nous démontrons que, quand une approche jointe de contrôle d’événements de pointe est adoptée au sein d’une fédération, la fédération réagit mieux à ces événements. Ceci se traduit en un moindre volume de sessions rejetées et en une meilleure résolution vidéo ressentie par les internautes. Notre travail sur la fédération nous conduit à se focaliser sur le rôle d’un Telco dans un contexte fédéré. / Content Distribution Services are evolving fast in various directions. One of them is the federation of CDNs, referring to a number of CDN providers putting together their assets and acting as a single entity with regards to content providers. We introduce a technical solution based on a centralized architecture that allows taking static decisions of federation establishment and provisioning and dynamic decisions of federation control. Static decision-making is enabled through an optimization model that we apply to concrete use cases of federation. We demonstrate that, in case of high market demand, CDN providers always have an interest in federating. In particular, some CDN providers can double their economic gains through federating. In the context of federation dynamic control, we focus on the control of peak events within a federation of CDNs and we introduce different control frameworks at this level. We conduct trace-driven simulations in order to assess different frameworks. We demonstrate that, when a joint approach for events control is adopted within a federation of CDNs, the federation is better resilient to peak events. This translates into a higher hit ratio of the federation and a better video resolution witnessed by end users. Our work on CDN federation leads us to focus on the role of a Telco in this context. In particular, we identify three added-value services that can be proposed by a Telco to a federation of CDNs or to individual Over the Tops (OTTs).We suggest enhancements of the Telco control infrastructure and new Telco APIs in order to enable the proposed services.

Linear weirs are a common hydraulic structure that have been used for centuries with many different applications. One characteristic of weirs that is particularly useful is the head-discharge relationship where the discharge over the weir is directly related to the upstream water depth above the crest. In general, the head-discharge relationship for a weir is determined experimentally in laboratories using geometrically similar models. Due to space, time, money, and discharge capacity limitations at water laboratories, creating full scale models is not always a feasible option when determining head-discharge relationships for large prototype weirs. It is typically more cost effective to create a scale model than to build a full scale model or conduct tests on the prototype. Because of this fact, physical modeling has been one the most important tools in determining head-discharge relationships for weirs. However, as the physical size of the model decreases, size scale effects associated with surface tension and viscosity forces can significantly affect the results from the physical model and cause the results to differ from what would actually occur at the prototype scale. Therefore, it is important to understand what affects surface tension and viscosity forces have on the head-discharge relationship for different size weirs and when those effects are no longer negligible. The purpose of this research was to evaluate size scale effects for linear weirs. Weirs models of three different crest shapes (flat-top, quarter-round, and half-round) were constructed and tested at four different geometrically similar sizes [weir heights (P) = 24-, 12-, 6-, and 3-in]. This was done in order to evaluate how size scale effects affect the head-discharge relationship as model size decreases for different crest shapes. Discharge coefficients were calculated for relative upstream head values ranging from 0.01 ≤ Ht/P ≤ 2.0 for vented and non-vented conditions. Nappe aeration behavior was documented and compared to determine where differences in the nappe trajectory occurred as a result of scale effects. Comparisons were made with data from others researchers to determine if the recommendations for minimum head limits were similar to the results from this study. This study examined the errors in the discharge coefficient associated with size scale effects and suggested limits to avoidance depending on model scale and crest shape.

No description available.

Although the literature has a wealth of information about the barriers that Hispanic women encounter to achieve senior leadership positions in higher education, there continues to be a lack of research focusing on the factors that positively influence the career path of successful contemporary Hispanic women in academe. This study bridged this gap by adding to the field about this population. The information provided will allow for a greater understanding of how to deal with those challenges and opportunities and may change societal perceptions associated with Hispanic women leaders in academe. The researcher’s indepth analysis of the factors that positively influenced the career path of the Hispanic female top administrators who participated in this study showed that several components were fundamental for the successful career path mobility of the aforementioned participants. An analysis of the data revealed that the following were found to be the most significant components that best describe the professional profile of the group of Hispanic female top administrators who participated in this study: (a) having the credentials and training, (b) following tenured and academic administrative tracks, (c) being mentored and empowered, (d) being able to balance career and family, (e) being politically savvy, (f) demonstrating leadership capacity, and (g) displaying high self- efficacy beliefs.

The dissertation thesis dealt with the managerial competencies in the small manufacturing enterprises in the Czech Republic. The research aimed to examine the current level of these competencies on the sample of top managers of those enterprises. The chosen topic is topic of current importance due the competency development for enhancing the managerial performance. The thesis elaboration was based on the detailed literature review of national and international publications in the respected scientific journals, and on the in-depth analyses conducted through the primary researches. The main objective of the dissertation thesis was to detect the competency level of top managers in the small manufacturing enterprises in the context of business management and to identify the key variables influencing the discovered competency level and on the basis of research findings provide recommendations for further competency development. The main objective was supported with four partial objectives and five research hypotheses. On the basis of results of executed pilot research on managerial competencies the model of managerial competencies was established, and further verified in the author’s primary research. Within the data analysis and data evaluation, the competency level was formed. The dependences of competencies on examined variables were tested empirically. Those variables were sex, length of current and total practice, age, ownership and education. The aggregated research results were compared with the literature review and based on this comparison, the recommendations for further managerial competency level improvement were provided. The conclusions and further research aims form the integral part of the dissertation thesis.

京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(情報学) / 甲第21909号 / 情博第692号 / 新制||情||119(附属図書館) / 京都大学大学院情報学研究科知能情報学専攻 / (主査)教授 神谷 之康, 教授 熊田 孝恒, 教授 西野 恒 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Informatics / Kyoto University / DGAM

No description available.