The purpose of this study was to 1) provide a detailed examination of the criteria for preevaluation utilized to measure quality in a distance education course for the Virtual College of Texas (VCT) and consortium members, 2) examine the process of each VCT consortium member in order to determine the criterion for the quality of distance education courses being provided by a host or provider college, and 3) develop and validate a pre-evaluation instrument to pre-determine quality in distance education courses for the Virtual College of Texas and consortium members. This was a qualitative research study that utilized document analysis, semi-structured interviews questions and incorporated a modified use of the research and development cycle. The data was gathered from the member colleges that are part of the Virtual College of Texas Consortium. The entire 43 member college?s websites were searched for documents containing the criteria that they used to evaluate the quality of on-line courses. These documents were also used to formulate the questions used in the semi-structured telephone interview questions. During the course of this study it became evident that an educational research and development strategy would be utilized due to the development of a pre-evaluation instrument to pre-determine quality in distance education courses for the Virtual College of Texas. There are 10 major steps in the educational research and design (R and D) process however in this study it was modified since not all of the major steps were applicable. It is clear that determining quality criteria is not easily accomplished due to the differences in and of the decision makers, however the participants in this agreed on the final development of a pre-evaluation instrument to pre-determine quality in a distance education course. The use of a pre-evaluation instrument to pre-determine quality in a distance education course may aid distance education in promotion of its foundational purpose of connecting the instructor with the student for learning and in promoting the value of connecting human beings in a meaningful way through the use of distance education for human resource development (Swanson and Holton, 2001).

Elsystemen i Scanias fordon består av ett antal styrenheter, där varje styrenhet har en mjukvara som måste anpassas beroende på vilken fordon som tillverkas. Anpassningen sker med hjälp av parametersättning som handlar om att skriva parametrar (fordonsegenskaper) till styrenheterna. I dagsläget skrivs parametrar en i taget vilket medför till onödiga tidsfördröjningar på grund av många frågningar och svar som sker mellan PC-mjukvara och styrenheterna. Syftet med detta examensarbete är att finna ett protokoll eller en tjänst som effektiviserar parametersättningen så att tiden minskar då parametrar skrivs till en styrenhet. Ju mindre frågningar och svar som skickas vid prametersättningen desto effektivare blir produktionen av fordon eftersom parametersättningen är en del av tillverkningsprocessen. Resultat av undersökningar tog fram fyra olika förslag på lösning till problemet som detta examensarbete behandlar. De första tre lösningsförslagen handlar mer om att effektivisera kommunikationsprocessen mellan PCmjukvara och styrenheterna, det vill säga minska antalet förfrågningar och svar mellan de två enheterna. Dessa förslag gick inte att implementera på grund flera orsaker som till exempel att de kräver mycket tid och resurser. Den fjärde lösningen handlar om att beräkna parametervärdena innan de ska skickas till en styrenhet. En prototyp av denna lösning skapades och vid testning med en specifik styrenhet minskade den totala parametersättningstiden med nästan hälften. Lösningen som implementerades har inte direkt svarat på frågeställningen, men då behovet även fanns för av att minska beräkningstiderna kan en prototyp av detta slag abslolut vara till nytta för Scania och dess produktion. / The electronic systems in Scania’s vehicles are composed of a set of control units. All of these control units have different softwares that need to be customized depending on which vehicle it belongs to. The customization is achieved by a process called parameter setting, where parameters (vehicle characteristics) are written to the control units. The system that is deployed today executes this task by sending the parameters one at a time. This gives cause to some overhead because of the excess request and responses. The purpose of this thesis work is to suggest a protocol, or service that may reduce the time it takes to write the parameters for one control unit. If the amount of requests and responses are lowered during the parameter setting process, it will certainly benefit the production of Scania’s vehicles since parameters are written to each control unit inside the vehicle during the manufacturing process. The result of the analysis of the problem was that four different solutions were found. The first three solutions focused on making the communication more effective between the PC software and the control units, that is, lowering the amount of requests and responses. It was discovered that these solutions were not suited for this project since they either required too much time or they were not satisfactory. The fourth solution would instead focus on the time it took to calculate the parameter values before sending them to the control unit. A prototype was produced, and when testing the prototype the results for a specific control unit showed that the total time for the parameter setting process was cut down to almost half. The solution that was implemented has not exactly lowered the communication times between the PC software and the control units, but the prototype could still prove to be useful since every second counts in Scania’s production line.

Two studies were conducted to determine the effect of panelist participation frequency and specific aspects of questionnaire design on overall acceptance scoring in consumer central location tests. Regarding participation frequency, research subjects who participate frequently in some survey types are known to provide responses that differ from subjects who participate less frequently, known as panel conditioning. With respect to questionnaire design, overall acceptance (OA) question placement and usage of pre-evaluation instructions (PEI) in questionnaires for food sensory analysis may bias consumers' scores via carry-over effects. To investigate these concerns, data from consumer sensory panels previously conducted at a central location, spanning 11 years and covering a broad range of food product categories, was extracted, compiled, and analyzed. For the first study, data was analyzed to determine evidence of panel conditioning by measuring the effect of participation frequency on mean consumer OA scoring among frequent, moderate, and infrequent participants. Practical significance and occurrence of panel conditioning, defined as mean scoring differences of ≥ 0.50 on a discrete 9-point scale hedonic point, were examined. Results indicate that for overall acceptance, in general, mean scoring differences were not practically significant and did not signify occurrence of panel conditioning. For the second study, OA question placement was studied with categories designated as first (the first evaluation question following demographic questions), after non-gustation questions (immediately following questions that do not require panelists to taste the product), and later (following all other hedonic and just-about-right questions, but occasionally before ranking, open-ended comments, and/or intent to purchase questions). Additionally, each panel was categorized as having or not having PEI in the questionnaire; PEI are instructions that appear immediately before the first evaluation question and show panelists all attributes they will evaluate prior to receiving test samples. Post-panel surveys were administered regarding the self-reported effect of PEI on panelists' evaluation experience. OA scores were analyzed and compared (1) between OA question placement categories and (2) between panels with and without PEI. For most product categories, OA scores tended to be lower when asked later in the questionnaire, suggesting evidence of a carry-over effect. Usage of PEI increased OA scores by 0.10 of a 9-point hedonic scale point, which is not practically significant. Post-panel survey data showed that presence of PEI typically improved the panelists' experience. Using PEI does not appear to introduce a meaningful carry-over effect.