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The increasing trends towards customization which has also been emphasized as a competitive advantage have resulted in engineering-to-order (ETO) companies having a leading role in many industries. However, in parallel with this digital information and technological advancement is rising, and companies are aiming to improve their processes to consequently reach greater success in their operations. Recent research has discussed Industry 4.0 and improved production planning methods in the manufacturing industry. Thus, manufacturing companies are striving to increase their efficiency levels and readily available data has been one of the most important and common denominators for this transformation, in fact, considered a necessity to survive in the current highly competitive market. Despite this, data collection which is a crucial part remains unexplored by academia and especially in ETO but also production planning methodologies as well as tool considering that they have a complex production process and relies heavily on manual labor from skilled operators.  Thus, this thesis sets out to investigate and explore shopfloor data collection and production planning and control (PPC) in the ETO environment. The research approach used here was a case study at an electrical transformer manufacturing plant located in Sweden. However, this study has also considered benchmarking companies as well to achieve the result of this study. Data collection techniques used were interviews, observation, and an extensive literature review that has guided the realization of the aim and gave a base to the suggested improvement for the problems identified. The findings of this master thesis illustrated that there is a lack of detailed plans, detailed information, manual effort, and lack of IT development which negatively impacts the performance of PPC. Furthermore, this had a strong correlation with the still manual shopfloor data collection that many ETO companies rely on. Principles that can be employed to mitigate the effects are further discussed in detail throughout the thesis.

Data collection is one of the important components of public health systems. Decision makers, policy makers and health service providers need accurate and timely data in order to improve the quality of their services. The rapidly growing use of mobile technologies has increased pressure on the demand for mobile-based data collection solutions to bridge the information gaps in the health sector of the developing world. This study reviews existing health data collection systems and the available open source tools that can be used to improve these systems. We further propose a prototype using open source data collection frameworks to test their feasibility in improving the health data collection in the developing world context. We focused on the statistical health data, which are reported to secondary health facilities from primary health facilities. The proposed prototype offers ways of collecting health data through mobile phones and visualizes the collected data in a web application. Finally, we conducted a qualitative study to assess challenges in remote health data collection and evaluate usability and functionality of the proposed prototype. The evaluation of the prototype seems to show the feasibility of mobile technologies, particularly open source technologies, in improving the health data collection and reporting systems for the developing world.

Vi lever i ett datadrivet samhälle där individer och tjänster ständigt loggar, spårar och behandlar information om sina egna eller andras beteenden. Informationsteknologi för datadriven beteendeförändring är centralt inom områdena Personal Informatics, en klass verktyg som hjälper individer att samla och undersöka personligt relevant information i självreflekterande syfte, samt Persuasive Design, som handlar om att känna till de bakomliggande orsakerna om vad som motiverar användare att agera och designa för att uppnå detta. Trots denna gemensamma huvudfokus bedrivs forskning kring områdena delvis separat. På grund av det stora överlappet mellan de två områdena behövs en översikt över vad som anses särskilt viktigt inom både Personal Informatics och Persuasive Design. Därför har vi genomfört en litteraturstudie för att på ett samlat sätt presentera den forskning som finns samt vilka generella lärdomar som belyses av forskare inom området. Resultatet visar mönster och skillnader i den gemensamma basen av litteratur, vilket möjliggör för djupare insikt i området. Vi diskuterar dessa mönster och möjligheter för vidare forskning av de resultat vi fått in samt vilka aspekter som anses särskilt viktiga. / We live in a world where products and services constantly try to affect our behavior. Data driven information technology for achieving behavior change is a central concept in Personal Informatics, a class of tools for assisting individuals in collecting and reviewing personally relevant information in self-reflective purposes, as well as Persuasive Design, which concerns the underlying factors behind motivating users into action and designing to achieve this. Despite these similarities in focus, these areas are partly researched as different fields. Because of the common grounds between the research areas, we believe an overview of the research literature concerning both Personal Informatics and Persuasive Design is important. For this reason we have performed a literature study so that we, in an organized manner, can present the aspects which are studied as well as insights highlighted by scientists in the area. We discuss patterns and possibilities for future research by the results we have collected as well as which aspects are considered especially important.

Rapid urbanization brings an increasing pressure on current waste collection and transportation methods to cope with ever-increasing waste streams in urban environments. Pneumatic Waste Conveyance Systems or PWCS is often seen as an alternative for replacing open-handling of waste in narrow and congested town environments.  This research intends to find out when, where and why such systems would be implemented, and the entirety of stationary PWCS implementation and usage is being investigated, from government, experts, developers, suppliers, system owners/ operators, users to the general public. The findings are reported and analyzed using a variety of methods including but not limiting to a case study for public- housing retrofit-projects in Singapore.  Results affirm that PWCS is useful for waste collection in densely populated urban areas while offering both advantages and disadvantages as noted in this study. That which is remarkable is however spotting more concerns than opportunities and some of these concerns are highlighted and discussed in this paper. Although some parts of the study proved to be challenging and thus inconclusive, strong consensus are found regarding the need for long-term planning and strategic conception to reap the intended benefits that PWCS can offer. / Den fortlöpande urbaniseringen bidrar till att dagens metoder för hämtning och transport av avfallsmängder blir allt mer utmanande och svårhanterlig i förorter och stadsbebyggelse. Sopsugssystem betraktas därför allmänt som en alternativ lösning i urbana miljöer eftersom tekniken tillåter att byta ut rådande öppen sophantering i skrymmande och trafikerade stadsmiljöer.  Denna forskningsinsats avser att få bättre visshet om när, var samt varför sopsugssystem bör användas utifrån ett vidvinkelsperspektiv som försöker belysa och klarlägga helheten kring implementeringen och användandet av dylika system. För att uppnå detta syfte har statliga myndigheter, experter, bostadsbyggare, entreprenörer, ägare/ operatörer för system samt användarna kontaktats och hörsammats. De viktigaste inläggen har därefter rapporterats och analyserats med underlag av ett flertal metodologier som även innefattat en fallstudie för allmännyttiga fastigheter där sopsug installeras i en befintlig stadsarkitektur i Singapore.  Resultaten verifierar att sopsugssystem är användbara för avfallshantering och transport i tätbebyggda stadsområden samt att systemen offererar både fördelar och nackdelar. Det som är anmärkningsvärt är att fler aktsamhetsområden än möjligheter har upptäckts för vilka ett urval av dessa har tagits upp samt diskuterats mer ingående i denna rapport. Trots att delar av studien inbjöd till diverse utmaningar, vilket har föranlett till att resultatbilden inte kan ge klara och tydliga svar, så fanns fortfarande stor samstämmighet beträffande behovet av långsiktig planering och strategisk insiktsfullhet för att säkerställa de åtråvärda nyttor som sopsugssystem i stort kan erbjuda.

The notion of learner autonomy is one of the major theoretical constructs studied in L2 learning. Drawing on Deci and Ryan's (1985) Self-Determination Theory (SDT), I sought to investigate and describe L2 learner autonomy and how an educational intervention influences it. The SDT conceptualizing human motivation for learning as existing on a continuum from extrinsic to intrinsic motivation provides ways of measuring learner autonomy and a rationale for educational interventions for developing it. First, Japanese adult EFL learners' characteristics were described in terms of learner autonomy-related psychological constructs (motivation, affect, and strategy use) according to levels of learner autonomy based on SDT. Second, the adapted VSS yielded significant effects on the participants' vocabulary learning and L2 learning anxiety (for the high and low autonomous motivation groups) and social strategy use (for the low autonomous motivation group). Third, the implementation of the adapted VSS into the adult L2 English classes was considered in terms of the development of linguistic and autonomous forms of learning quoting from the participants' quantitative and qualitative responses for this approach. / CITE/Language Arts

<p> In this thesis we mainly give a characterization of dual frames of Gabor subspace frames. We give necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence and the uniqueness of a function h (called window) in the closed linear span of a Gabor subspace frame {EmbTnak}m,n∈Z such that the Bessel collection {EmbTnah}m,n∈Z serves as the dual frame of the original frame {EmbTnag}m,n∈Z. We solve the problem for three cases, first ab = 1, second ab = p ∈ N, and third ab = p/q, gcd(p, q) = 1. In each case, we first find the conditions for upper frame bound (known as Bessel collection). Secondly, we characterize the functions which are orthogonal to {EmbTnag}m,n∈Z in terms of the Zak transform, and then obtain necessary and sufficient conditions for lower frame bound. Here we state obtained conditions for normalized tight frame as a corollary. Finally, using all this information we solve the duality problem.</p> / Thesis / Master of Science (MSc)

GENERAL ABSTRACT The Laurentian Great Lake wetlands are highly productive and complex systems. The net loss of wetlands since European settlement has been dramatic. The remaining coastal wetlands continue to be threatened with obliteration or severe environmental degradation. Therefore, the overall objective of this study was to provide information on the ecology of the remaining coastal wetlands within the lower Great Lakes. This study describes a coastal wetland fish community along the north shore of Lake Erie within Long Point Marsh complex over a 24-h period and catch characteristics of three common fishing techniques. The fish community was sampled at two hour intervals over a 24-h period in June, and used three types of gear to determine possible sampling biases from the different collection techniques. A total of 497 fish encompassing 11 taxa were collected. A 2-h interval, four hours prior to sunset, netted the largest number of taxa (including 3 functional feeding groups: ornmvores, planktivores, and piscivores ), as well as highest abundance and biomass values. Seine netting demonstrated a biased towards sampling the smaller planktivores, while fyke nets were biased towards larger omnivorous fish, and boat electrofishing was biased towards the large piscivores. These results will assist scientists and lake managers to develop standardized fish sampling protocol in order to accurately assess differences in wetland fish communities. Seven coastal wetlands within Lake Erie and Ontario along both the Canadian and United States shorelines were studied to verify predicted relationships from the literature and determine the relative influences of various habitat features on zooplankton community structure. Water quality, aquatic macrophyte, zooplankton, and fish community information were collected from the wetlands between July 4th and August 2nd of 2001. The predicted relationships from the literature concerning water quality and macrophyte species richness were verified by the results of this work. Water quality and macrophyte species richness were the most accurate predictors of wetland zooplankton community structure. Identifying the wetland characteristics that play primary roles in structuring zooplankton communities will also assist lake managers to make informed decisions of how to most effectively improve zooplankton habitat, to foster larger-bodied zooplankton populations, making the habitat more suitable for larger populations of larval and juvenile fish. / Thesis / Master of Science (MS)