Distributed simulation over Cloud environment is still a new subject. Cloud computing is expected to bring new benefits to conventional distributed simulation, including elasticity on computation resource, cost saving on investment and convenience on service accessibility. A few researches have been done on applying Cloud computing on distributed simulation. However, there are various drawbacks and limitations on those works. Lack of interoperability across Cloud platforms is one of critical drawbacks among them. It can greatly limit the usability and flexibility of distributed simulation over Cloud environment. Based on the investigation on Cloud computing and existing distributed simulation systems over Cloud environment, a novel interoperable HLA-based (High Level Architecture) simulation system over a Cloud environment, ISSC (Interoperable Simulation System over a Cloud Environment), is proposed in this thesis. ISSC aims to address the interoperability issue of simulation system across various Cloud platforms. It employs OCCI and a set of technologies, including Ruby on Rails, OpenVPN and RESTful web services, to build the interoperability across Cloud platforms. It adopts a distributed architecture to construct flexibility and expansibility of the system. The prototype and related experiments performed provides an excellent demonstration that ISSC is a reliable and effective solution on interoperable simulation system over a diverse Cloud environment.

Achieving interoperability between digital libraries and visualization tools is a difficult problem. To solve this problem, a version of the Open Archives Initiative (OAI) Protocol for Metadata Harvesting called VIDI is proposed. It is a lightweight protocol, which contains only 5 request verbs -- Identify, ListMetadataFormats, ListVisdataFormats, ListTransformers, and RequestResultSet. It is extended from the OAI protocol, which enables its simplicity and wider acceptability. It is flexible, which avoids a rigid architecture in implementation. It is general, so it can apply to all kinds of Visualization Systems and Digital Libraries. But most importantly, it reaches our goal of enabling operability between Visualization Systems and Digital Libraries. The protocol design and implementation details are given. Two prototype systems are implemented to demonstrate the above features. Implementation details are given about ENVISION-ODL and ENVISION-MARIAN. Analysis, evaluation, and conclusions reinforce the discussion of the benefits of VIDI. / Master of Science

The uncountable number of tools for the creation of synthetic terrains poses as a challenge for simulation interoperability. The permutations of tools, elevation maps, and software settings leads to combinations of poorly correlated virtual terrains. An important issue in distributed simulations is the lack of line-of-sight correlation. For example, in military networked simulations, consistent intervisibility between simulated entities is crucial for a fair-fight, especially when simulations include direct-fire weapons. The literature review presented in the Chapter Two discusses a multitude of interoperability issues caused by discrepant terrain representations and rendering engines noncompliant to any standard image generation process. Furthermore, the literature review discusses past research that strived for measuring (or mitigating) the correlation issues between terrain databases. Based on previous research, this thesis proposes a methodology for analysis of line-of-sight correlation between a pair of terrain databases. All the mathematical theory involved in the methodology is discussed in the Chapter Three. In addition, this thesis proposes a new method for measuring the roughness of a visual terrain database. This method takes into account the 3D dispersion of the vectors normal to the polygons in the terrain's mesh. Because the vectors normal to the polygons are conveniently stored in most visual databases, the roughness calculation suggested here is fast and does not require sampling the terrain's elevation. In order to demonstrate the proposed method, twin terrain databases and a tool were created as part of this thesis. The goal of this tool is to extract data from the terrain databases for statistical analysis. The tool is open source and its source code is provided with this thesis. The Chapter Four includes an example of statistical analysis using an open source statistic software. The line-of-sight correlation analysis discussed here includes the terrain's geometry only (terrain's culture is not addressed). Human factors were not taken into consideration.

We formalize the digital library (DL) integration problem and propose an overall approach based on the 5S (Streams, Structures, Spaces, Scenarios, and Societies) framework. We then apply that framework to integrate domain-specific (archaeological) DLs, illustrating our solutions for key problems in DL integration. An integrated Archaeological DL, ETANA-DL, is used as a case study to justify and evaluate our DL integration approach. We develop a minimum metamodel for archaeological DLs within the 5S theory. We implement the 5SSuite toolkit set to cover the process of union DL generation, including requirements gathering, conceptual modeling, rapid prototyping, and code generation. 5SSuite consists of 5SGraph, 5SGen, and SchemaMapper, which plays an important role during integration. SchemaMapper, a visual mapping tool, maps the schema of diverse DLs into a global schema for a union DL and generates a wrapper for each individual DL. Each wrapper transforms the metadata catalog of its DL to one conforming to the global schema. The converted catalogs are stored in the union catalog, so that the union DL has a global metadata format and union catalog. We also propose a formal approach to DL exploring services for integrated DLs based on 5S, which provides a systematic and functional method to design and implement DL exploring services. Finally, we propose a DL success model to assess integrated DLs from the perspective of DL end users by integrating 5S theory with diverse research on information systems success and adoption models, and information-seeking behavior models. / Ph. D.

Interoperability between heterogeneous software systems is an important issue to increase software reusability in the software industry. Many methods are proposed to implement interoperable systems using distributed computing infrastructures such as CORBA, HLA and SOA. Those infrastructures can provide communication channels between software systems with heterogeneous environments. SOA (Service Oriented Architecture) provides a more flexible approach to interoperability than do the others because it provides platform independence and employs platform-neutral message passing with Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) to communicate between a service and a client.The main contribution of this study is to design and implement an interoperable DEVS simulation environment using the SOA concept and a new construct called the DEVS namespace. The interoperable DEVS environment consists of a DEVS simulator service and an associated integrator. The DEVS simulator service provides both simulator level and model level interoperability. Moreover, using the DEVS namespace, DEVS simulator services can be interoperable with any services using the same message types.To demonstrate the utility of the proposed environment, we describe various applications of the interoperable DEVS simulation environment. The applications are drawn from real world development of automated testing environments for military information system interoperability. A radar track generation and display federation and a model negotiation web service illustrated the ability of the proposed middleware to work across platforms and languages. Its ability to support higher level semantic interoperability will be demonstrated in a testing service that can deploy model agents to provide coordinated observation of web requests of participants in simulated distributed scenarios.

In the democratic process, of discussion and decision making, there is a need of reliable and authentic information. Archives are authentic and reliable information and also provides long term accessibility. But the public archives potential isn´t utilized enough at a societal level. The public archives are organized in a decentralised manner, and there are no common accesspoint at a national level. In the thesis this issue of accessibility and use at a societal level, is discussed in terms of collective memory. In a digital environment, these organizational limits could probably be overcome, but there is a need for new goals, perspectives and frameworks for the management of public archives. In an e-government context, interoperability is often mentioned in the discussion of accessibility. Interoperability could be understood as the ability of diverse organizations to interact together towards common goals, and include technological, semantic, organizational, legal and political aspects. The hypothesis like assumption of the thesis is that interoperability could contribute to making the archives a more significant part of the collective memory.The thesis uses a case study methodology, and a critical discourse textual analyses. Records Continuum Model and archival perspective about collective memory, particularly Jimersons distinction of collective memory from other types of memory, is used as a theoretical frame for the analyses. The case is the project e-archives and e-diarium, which is a Swedish E-delegation project, driven by the National Archives. Central documents from the project is analysed, as is important documents for the work on e-government for the contextual understanding.The results indicate that interoperability may contribute to making the archives a more significant part of the collective memory, practically and discursively. Practically, it provides conditions to share information and remove barriers for interaction. Discursively, it contributes to an overall perspective of public administration, and switch the view from each single organization to the citizens and the society as a whole where the information is seen as a common societal resource. Interoperability is also an important factor in the development of a common information architecture for the whole of the public administration. This change in perspective could make the archives, when included in the e-government, change perspective from the archives creators to the end users and society at large, and give more effort in making the archives accessible in the collective dimension.

Context: Now a days Information technology has become a part of health-care delivery this makes life much easier for patients and health-care professionals. The increase in demand for communication among the different health information systems and health professionals has made interoperability complex and whereas interoperability is mainly focused at semantic and technical levels of communication. Yet, the social interoperability, an important part of communication between computerized systems and health professionals, is overlooked. Obje ctive s: In this study we explore the differences between interoperability and social interoperability. Furthermore investigate the social interoperability in practice and the problems that affect the health-care. Methods: We start with the literature survey to learn the definitions of interoperability and social interoperability. Later, case study approach is carried out to investigate the social interoperability in Interoperability. Interviews were also conducted as part of the observations in cases. Re sults: The similarities and differences in definitions of interoperability and social interoperability are sorted out from the literature study. Five cases have been investigated to identify the social interoperability in practice. Analyses of these cases have identified some of the major problems for health information systems that do not meet social interoperability. Conclusions: Interoperability definitions agree that interoperability is undoubtedly important for health data communication, but their goals in achieving interoperability is concerned only about computerized systems and very less focused on social interoperability. The case studies are used to find out the social communication using in health information systems. We realize that the communication between the users and the information systems are quite complex. The developed systems are witnessing the usability difficulties to the health-care providers that affect the patient care. / Healthcare is delivered by diagnosing diseases, prescribing medicines, prevention of illness. Doctors, nurses and medical organizations deliver the service to the patients. Most of the communication between patients, caregivers and computers are observed in the care setting. eHealth is the healthcare and delivery process that are supported by electronic and communication technology. Some of the eHealth applications used today are patient information system, ePrescription, lab systems, electronic health records etc. One or more times every eHealth tool (here tool represents a software application) will communicate with other eHealth tools for information exchange. The communication of these tools gave birth to interoperability that should actually make the information exchange easier. eHealth interoperability is the ability of one or more computers and software applications communicate with each other for health information exchange and make use of the information. More communication among the tools makes the communication complex and interoperability challenging. Furthermore, interoperability among the heath information systems is observed majorly at three levels and they are semantic, social, and technical. Semantic is about how two or more tools share information and make use of that information. Technical interoperability is about the technologies and networks used to communicate among those applications. Social interoperability is concerned about the environment and the human processes involved in the information exchange. In our study we explore through various definitions of interoperability and social interoperability in a focus to find the differences and similarities among those definitions. Furthermore we have observation of some cases from various primary care centers in order to find out how social interoperability is in practice. We apply our findings to figure out the social problems involved in the care environment. Though, technical and semantic interoperability is mostly concerned by the researchers, but here we find, social interoperability (along with the technical and semantic), is also playing important role in healthcare. The audience of this study can be healthcare professionals, like doctors, nurses and information technology people, Research workers, Academia and all the people who are interested in eHealth. / Rambabu Garlapati +91-9032248045 Rajib Biswas +88-01717144431

In the light of challenges the lack of interoperability in systems and services has long been recognized as one of the major challenge to the wider implementation of the eHealth applications. The opportunities and positive benefits of achieving interoperability are eventually considerable, whereas various barriers and challenges act as impediments. The purpose of this study was to investigate the interoperability among different health care organizations. The knowledge of this study would be supportive to health care organizations to understand the interoperability problems in health care organizations. In the first phase of literature review interoperability challenges in Sweden and other EU countries were identified. On the basis of findings interviews were conducted to know the strategies and planning about interoperability in health care organizations. After analysis of interviews, questionnaires were conducted to know the opinions of different medical IT administrator and health professionals. The authors find after the analysis of interviews and questionnaire that adopting eHealth standard, same system, insuring the security of patient’s health record information and same medical language could be implemented in Sweden and other EU countries health organizations. / Muhammad Azam-0046 760806528,Izhar Hussain-0046 700183425

Security policies are widely used across the IT industry in order to secure environments. Firewalls, routers, enterprise application or even operating systems like Windows and Unix are all using security policies to some extent in order to secure certain components. In order to automate enforcement of security policies, security policy languages have been introduced. Security policy languages that are classified as computer software, like many other programming languages have been revolutionised during the last decade. A number of security policy languages have been introduced in the industry in order to tackle a specific business requirements. Not to mention each of these security policy languages themselves evolved and enhanced during the last few years. Having said that, a quick research on security policy languages shows that the industry suffers from the lack of a framework for security policy languages. Such a framework would facilitate the management of security policies from an abstract point. In order to achieve that specific goal, the framework utilises an abstract security policy language that is independent of existing security policy languages yet capable of expressing policies written in those languages. Usage of interoperability framework for security policy languages as described above comes with major benefits that are categorised into two levels: short and long-term benefits. In short-term, industry and in particular multi-dimensional organisations that make use of multiple domains for different purposes would lower their security related costs by managing their security policies that are stretched across their environment and often managed locally. In the long term, usage of abstract security policy language that is independent of any existing security policy languages, gradually paves the way for standardising security policy languages. A goal that seems unreachable at this moment of time. Taking the above facts into account, the aim of this research is to introduce and develop a novel framework for security policy languages. Using such a framework would allow multi-dimensional organisations to use an abstract policy language to orchestrate all security policies from a single point, which could then be propagated across their environment. In addition, using such a framework would help security administrators to learn and use only one single, common abstract language to describe and model their environment(s).

Interoperabilitet är ett fenomen som har existerat i flera år, redan innan digitaliseringen tog fart. Begreppet har dock blivit allt mer omtalat sista tiden, främst på grund av hur samhället blir mer och mer digitaliserat. Definitionen av interoperabilitet kan skilja och dess existens kan delas in i tre olika kategorier i form av teknisk, semantisk och organisatorisk interoperabilitet. Teknisk interoperabilitet är den aspekt som ses som mest komplicerad och fokuserar främst på teknologiska samband mellan informationssystem. Organisatorisk interoperabilitet har en inriktning på organisationen i sig och semantisk på betydelsen av data. Syftet med denna uppsats har varit att belysa vilka de tekniska kraven är samt vilka utmaningar en organisation står inför för att uppnå god teknisk interoperabilitet.Inriktningen i uppsatsen har således varit på teknisk interoperabilitet. För att besvara syftet genomfördes en undersökning inom en organisation och hur deras informationssystem samverkade och samarbetade när de arbetade med avvikelser. Genomförandet av en kvalitativ ansats resulterade i insamlade empiri genom semi- strukturerade intervjuer med sex olika informanter. Ramverket ISIMM applicerades i syfte till att utforma intervjufrågor som ämnade till fyra subkategorier inom teknisk interoperabilitet. Vidare presenterades resultatet inom de fyra subkategorierna mjukvara, data, kommunikation och fysisk interoperabilitet, samt informanternas generella åsikter om informationsflödet. Analysen blev en form av tematisering, där teman framkom inom respektive subkategori. De specifika teman diskuterades tillsammans med resultatet från undersökningen och teorier från litteraturstudien. Vidare identifierades fem faktorer som behöver ta hänsyn till när målet är att förbättra teknisk interoperabilitet. De finns en tydlig koppling mellan de fem faktorerna genom att ha ett unifierat informationsutrymme. Följande faktorer som identifierades i studien är struktur, standarder, navigering, tillgänglighet och kompetens. Identifieringen av dessa faktorer leder till att organisationer kan ha en större förståelse till varför teknisk interoperabilitet är så viktigt samt hur de kan ämna att förbättra den / Interoperability is a phenomenon that has existed for several years, even before digitalization took off. However, the concept is right now more popular than ever, mainly due to how society is becoming more and more digital. The definition can differ, and its existence can be divided into three different categories in the form of technical, semantic and organizational interoperability. Technical interoperability is the aspect that is seen as most complicated and focuses mainly on technological connections between information systems. Organizational interoperability has a focus on the organization itself and semantically on the meaning of data. The purpose of this thesis has been to explain what the technical requirements are and what challenges an organization face to achieve good technical interoperability. The focus of the thesis has therefore been on technical interoperability. To answer the purpose, a survey was conducted within an organization and how their information systems interacted and cooperated when working with deviations. The implementation of a qualitative approach resulted in collected empirical data through semi-structured interviews with six different informants. The ISIMM framework was applied in order to design the interview questions that were intended for four subcategories within technical interoperability. Furthermore, the results were presented in the four subcategories software, data, communication and physical interoperability, as well as the informants' general views on the flow of information. The analysis became a form of thematization, where themes emerged within each subcategory. The specific themes were discussed together with the results of the study and theories from the literature study. Furthermore, five factors were identified that need to be taken into account when intending to improve technical interoperability. There is a clear link between the five factors by having a unified information space. The following factors identified in the study are structure, standards, navigation, availability and competence. The identification of these factors means that organizations can have a greater understanding of why technical interoperability is so important and how they can intend to improve it.