Web Usage Mining (WUM) can be used to determine whether the information architecture of a web site is structured correctly. Existing WUM tools however, do not indicate which web usage mining algorithms are used or provide effective graphical visualisations of the results obtained. WUM techniques can be used to determine typical navigation patterns of the users of organisational web sites. An organisational web site can be described as a site which has a high level of content. The Computer Science & Information Systems (CS&IS) web site at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU) is an example of such a web site. The process of combining WUM and information visualisation techniques in order to discover useful information about web usage patterns is called visual web mining. The goal of this research is to discuss the development of a WUM model and a prototype, called WebPatterns, which allows the user to effectively visualise web usage patterns of an organisational web site. This will facilitate determining whether the information architecture of the CS&IS web site is structured correctly. The WUM algorithms used in WebPatterns are association rule mining and sequence analysis. The purpose of association rule mining is to discover relationships between different web pages within a web site. Sequence analysis is used to determine the longest time ordered paths that satisfy a user specified minimum frequency. A radial tree layout is used in WebPatterns to visualise the static structure of the organisational web site. The structure of the web site is laid out radially, with the home page in the middle and other pages positioned in circles at various levels around it. Colour and other visual cues are used to show the results of the WUM algorithms. User testing was used to determine the effectiveness and usefulness of WebPatterns for visualising web usage patterns. The results of the user testing clearly show that the participants were highly satisfied with the visual design and information provided by WebPatterns. All the participants also indicated that they would like to use WebPatterns in the future. Analysis of the web usage patterns presented by WebPatterns was used to determine that the information architecture of the CS&IS web site can be restructured to better facilitate information retrieval. Changes to the CS&IS web site web were suggested, included placing embedded hyperlinks on the home page to the frequently accessed sections of the web site.

No description available.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is the organization that provides the technical support for the Internet. ICANN is a nonprofit organization based in California and is under contract to the United States Department of Commerce. It has come under attack from many sides because it is contracted through the U.S. government and it is a private entity. One of the main components of the controversy surrounding ICANN is whether it can represent a global society as a private entity and whether that private entity can represent Internet users. I focus my study on ICANN's Board of Directors. I evaluated the Board on the dimensions of descriptive, substantive, and formal representation (Pitkin 1967). Evaluation of ICANN's descriptive representation focused on the Board members' sex, educational backgrounds, and nationalities and compared the geographic representation on the Board to the global distribution of Internet users. The assessment of substantive representation looked at the Board members' votes to determine if patterns could be viewed based on members' descriptive characteristics. Finally, the evaluation of ICANN's formal representation examined its Bylaws, its 2006 contract with the U.S. Department of Commerce, and the California Nonprofit Public Benefit Corporations Code. The analysis found that the descriptive representativeness was low. The ICANN Board does not mirror Internet users: few women have served on the Board, those with technical educational backgrounds dominated, and the regions were not represented proportionate to their use of the Internet. Analysis of substantive representativeness was inconclusive and further investigation is needed. The formal representation analysis suggests that the ICANN Board has been formally representative. / Master of Arts

M. Tech. Business Administration / The purpose of this study is two-fold ; to establish how different demograhic profiles utilise the internet and classifies internet functions mostly used across demographic characteristics. Data was collected through a self-completion structured questionnaire from a sample of 131 households at Menlyn Park Shopping Centre in the City of Tshwane.

No description available.

Thesis (D. Min.)--Columbia International University, 2007. / "December, 2007." Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 159-169).

Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-03T16:34:53Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Vanessa Pasvenskas .pdf: 820361 bytes, checksum: 8b2ba33b01d0ebe63e5d3d5384130f03 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-02-21 / This study aimed to assess the mental health of college internet users. This is a cross-sectional research and quantitative. The study included 150 internet users, genders, male and female, aged between 17 and 53 years old, students from several graduate courses at the college health, a single campus of a private university, located in São Bernardo do Campo on the São Paulo metropolitan area. The sample was selected by criteria of convenience, but it was considered by quota sampling to better represent the population. The instruments used were the Psychiatric Morbidity Questionnaire for Adults (QMPA) and an additional questionnaire designed to characterize the sample. After collection, the data were statistically treated and released. The results showed the prevalence of mental health in 58% of college Internet users. Among participants who had symptoms of psychiatric morbidity (42%) were the most prevalent symptoms of mood disorder, anxiety, somatization, depression and irritability, symptoms, commonly referred to as minor psychiatric disorders. Were considered heavy users by use the Internet for over 60 hours per month, 55% of Internet users studied. However these symptoms of psychiatric morbidity showed no differentiation between types of users (heavy and light), prevailed in both cases the mental health evaluation. The hours of Internet access were considered one of the signs of pathological Internet use, but insufficient to diagnose the pathological use. The pathological Internet use was present in 57% of Internet users, by using the Internet to the detriment of other aspects of their lives. The symptoms of psychiatric morbidity showed significant positive correlations with the issues on the pathological use of the Internet. These results suggest that the pathological use of the internet reveals itself as a new field of expression of psychiatric morbities known. Thus, the Internet does not appear as a risk factor for mental health of its users. It would be an amplifier, a tool that would facilitate the expression of such pathological behaviors, that come from existing disorders as well as the use of various other social practices, which can become pathological manifestations of different disorders by the individual. / O presente estudo teve como objetivo avaliar a saúde mental de internautas universitários. Trata-se de uma pesquisa com delineamento transversal e quantitativa. Participaram deste estudo 150 usuários de internet, dos gêneros, masculino e feminino, com idade entre 17 e 53 anos, estudantes universitários de diversos cursos de graduação da faculdade de saúde, de um único campus, de uma universidade privada, localizada na cidade de São Bernardo do Campo, na região metropolitana de São Paulo. A amostra foi selecionada por critério de conveniência, porém considerou-se a amostragem por cotas para melhor representatividade da população estudada. Os instrumentos utilizados foram o Questionário de Morbidade Psiquiátrica para Adultos (QMPA) e um questionário complementar desenvolvido para caracterização da amostra. Após coleta, os dados foram lançados e tratados estatisticamente. Os resultados mostraram prevalência de saúde mental em 58% dos internautas universitários. Entre os participantes que apresentaram sintomas de morbidade psiquiátrica (42%) prevaleceram os sintomas de exaltação do humor, ansiedade, somatização, irritabilidade e depressão, sintomas comumente referidos como transtornos psiquiátricos menores. Dos internautas estudados 55% foram considerados usuários pesados por utilizarem a internet acima de 60 horas mensais. A média de horas de acesso à internet apresentou correlação com os sintomas de morbidade psiquiátrica avaliados. Contudo estes sintomas de morbidade psiquiátrica não apresentaram diferenciação entre tipo de usuário (pesado e leve), em ambos os casos prevaleceram a avaliação de saúde mental. As horas de acesso à internet foram consideradas um dos indícios do uso patológico da internet, porém insuficiente para estabelecer qualquer diagnóstico. O uso patológico da internet mostrou-se presente em 57% dos internautas, por utilizarem a internet em detrimento de outros aspectos de suas vidas. Os sintomas de morbidade psiquiátrica apresentaram correlações positivas e significativas com as questões sobre o uso patológico da internet. Os resultados desta pesquisa sugerem que o uso patológico da internet revela-se como um novo campo de expressão de morbidades psiquiátricas já conhecidas. Deste modo, a internet não se mostra como um fator de risco para saúde mental de seus usuários. Ela seria um amplificador, uma ferramenta que facilitaria a expressão de tais comportamentos patológicos, que são provenientes de transtornos já existentes, assim como a utilização de diversas outras práticas sociais, que podem se tornar patológicas pela manifestação de diferentes transtornos do indivíduo.

This research aimed to investigate the uses of the written language in the Internet chat rooms and in similar virtual discourses, examining the heterogeneity, affluence and complexity of the language in those means as well as demonstrating as the traditional dichotomy between spoken and written discourse has been unmade regarding the peculiar features of these new discursive forms. The virtual chat came up trough Internet advent and its written code has revealed a new relation of the man with writing once it has brought up linguistic innovations, has detached language as a phenomenon of linguistic diversity and differences and has made linguistics to realize how theoretically irrelevant has been the acclaimed spoken/written dichotomy. For the initially described aims, this research based its theoretical perspective in the language uses, which points out language as a heterogeneous and dynamical phenomenon. / Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico / Este trabalho objetivou investigar o comportamento da língua escrita nas salas de bate-papo da Internet e em gêneros afins, tanto para mostrar a heterogeneidade, riqueza e complexidade da língua no meio, quanto para apresentar como a dicotomia oralidade/escrita encontra-se diluída dentro das especificidades e características peculiares desta nova forma discursiva. O bate-papo on-line é um gênero que emergiu com surgimento da Internet e seu código escrito acabou revelando uma nova relação do indivíduo com a forma de escrever por trazer inovações lingüísticas, privilegiar a heterogeneidade e a diversidade lingüísticas e ter mostrado a tênue fronteira entre oralidade e escrita, desconstruindo perspectivas dicotômicas sobre o assunto. Para os objetivos inicialmente descritos, este trabalho baseou-se na perspectiva dos usos lingüísticos, que aponta a língua como um fenômeno dinâmico e heterogêneo.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-12-23T14:33:43Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao de Eduardo Rocha Monteiro.pdf: 2785467 bytes, checksum: 577f7503c72e792b907de5a0eb99ec58 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009-06-19 / Dentro do conjunto de transformações ocasionados pela evolução da internet, há uma que nada tem a ver com tecnologias de processamento e apresentacão de informaçãoes, mas nem por isso é menos importante do que as outras mudanças: É a transformação do comportamento do usuário perante a Internet. Se antes ele era um mero consumidor de informacão, agora ele participa ativamente, avaliando e criando conteúdo na web. Este cenário estimulou o desenvolvimento de novas tecnologias para apoiar a coletividade na web, que hoje possibilitam um amplo mecanismo de interação para diversos indivíduos, favorecendo a consolidacão de importantes espaços virtuais que promovemconstrução e socialização de conhecimento. Neste contexto, destacam-se as redes sociais virtuais. Redes sociais virtuais são espaços virtuais que incluem uma estrutura feita por indivíduos e organizações conectados por um ou mais tipos de interdependência, como valores, visões, idéias, amizade ou interesses comerciais. Este trabalho realizou um estudo sobre o estado da arte sobre as redes sociais virtuais e sobre os sistemas de recomendação, com o objetivo de criar uma rede social virtual que permite a publicação de conteúdo por usuários comuns, e um sistema de recomendação, para dirigir informações relevantes para os usuários. Também foi realizado um estudo sobre os agregadores de notícias sociais, que compõem uma categoria específica de redes sociais virtuais. Como produto principal deste trabalho, foi desenvolvido o sistema RSN: Rede Social de Notícias. RSN agrega características dos agregadores de notócias sociais a outras características de redes sociais virtuais com o objetivo de construir um espaço virtual com alto potencial de exibição de notícias interessantes aos seus usuários / Within the set of transformations from the evolution of the Internet, there is one that has nothing to do about processing and presenting information, but no less important than the other changes: the transformation of the behavior of the Internet User. If before it was a mere consumer of information, now he actively participates, evaluating and creating content in the web. This scenario has stimulated the development of new technologies to support the community on the web, which now enables a broad mechanism of interaction for many people, which promotes the formation of important virtual spaces with respect to the construction and socialization of knowledge. In this context, the virtual social networks stands out. Virtual social networks are virtual spaces that include a structure made by individuals and organizations connected by one or more types of interdependency, such as values, visions, ideas, friendship or business interests. This work conducted a study on the state of the art on virtual social networks and on the recommender systems, in order to create a virtual social network which enables content share by users, and a recommendation systemto direct relevant information for its users. Was also a study on the social news aggregators, that constitute a specific category of virtual social networks. The system RSN: Social Networking News was develop as the main product of this work. RSN adds features of social news aggregators to other characteristics of virtual social networks in order to build a virtual space with a high potential display of interesting news to its users

This thesis deals with security, privacy, and anonymity on the internet. In this thesis are described tracking mechanisms and approaches that are being used to collect and send away users' personal information. Information that leaks using this tracking approaches can be used to identify user, to monitor and analyze his behavior on specific web pages and several leaked pieces of information can be misused (for example the leaked credit card number or password). In this thesis is described and tested the functionality and reliability of several current web add-ons providing the protection on the internet. New security increasing web add-on has been designed and developed to demonstrate a technique, that redefines and wraps the original JavaScript implementation of several functions and objects, the wrapping is executed before the visited web page starts processing the source code. Running the wrapping code at this time will ensure, that no other code in loaded web page will ever have access to the original implementation. This add-on is also well-tested. The final thesis' stage provides a great amount of possibilities to improve implemented add-on.