Thesis (M.S.)--Brigham Young University. Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 65-69).

Since their breakthrough in the mid 1990's, web sites have become one of the most important channels for communication at Swedish universities. Drawing upon the analytical framework of "the production of culture perspective", the thesis investigates how the form and content of Swedish university web sites are influenced by the production milieu in which they are produced. Based on quantitative content analysis of the home pages of university web sites, the thesis documents changes in the form and content, such as links, headings, and body matter becoming more focused on marketing, as well as an increasing need for different kinds of navigation aids on the web sites. In addition to this, the thesis presents the results of fifteen in-depth interviews with informants working at various levels of the web organizations at Swedish universities. Using the production of culture perspective, together with previous research on media production in general, and literature on more specific areas, such as organization theory and communication, and media and technology, this presentation is followed by a discussion and analysis of structural, production related, factors, and their influence on the form and content of the web sites. The overall conclusion of the thesis is that the production of university web sites - their form and content - is about much more than available technology, web development processes, and different programming languages, to mention but a few examples. It is also about organizational routines, about the ways decisions are made, about policies for web publishing within the overall organization, about different stakeholders being put against each other, and it is about strategic choices about what to publish on the web and not. Furthermore, the thesis shows that structural factors function as constraints, as well as facilitators of web site production. For example, the width of web pages increases in correspondence with the increasing number of larger, high-resolution, displays used by the user; local policies and strategies decides the content to be focused; and a consistent form and layout of the university web sites are inhibited by the organizational structures and lines of command.

Open source eller öppen källkod innebär att vem som helst kan se, justera och dela koden. Företag, organisationer och individer investerar såväl tid som resurser att utveckla open source-projekt, där majoriteten av projekten inte genererar någon form av ekonomisk vinning. Pocketsize är en Malmöbaserad webbyrå som har utvecklat ett front-end ramverk vid namn Bolts samt ett automatiseringsverktyg vid namn Toolbelt som avses släppas som open source.Denna studie syftar till att bidra med kunskap om vad det är som driver småföretag, idella organisationer eller individer till investera tid i att utveckla open source-projekt. Därmed har en fallstudie på webbyrån Pocketsize i Malmö gjorts där en analys av ramverket Bolts och verktyget Toolbelt, utvecklat av Pocketsize, har genomförts. Detta för att erhålla kunskap om varför Pocketsize väljer att släppa de open source. Teori och tidigare forskning presenterar aspekter som motiverande faktorer och drivkrafter bakom utveckling av open source-projekt. Studien har har antagit ett kvalitativt perspektiv där observationer och semistrukturerade intervjuer har gjorts för att kartlägga handlingsmönster och för att återge hur en individ tänker och resonerar kring ämnet. Resultatet redogör för hur utvecklare ofta skapar en produkt utifrån sina egna behov samt hur känslan av altruism och att viljan att ”ge tillbaka” till open source-communityt är några av de största motiverande faktorer och drivkrafter bakom att bidra till open source-projekt. / Open source or open source-code means that anyone can view, adjust and share the code. Companies, organizations and individuals invest their time and resources to develop open source projects, where the majority of projects doesn’t even generate any kind of financial gain. Pocketsize is a Malmö based web agency that has developed a front-end framework called Bolts as well as an automation tool called Toolbelt intended to be released as open source.This study aims to contribute knowledge of what drives small businesses, non-profit organizations or individuals to invest time and resources in developing open source projects. Therefore, a case study has been made at the web development agency Pocketsize in Malmö, where an analysis of the Bolts framework and Toolbelt automation tool that Pocketsize has developed has been conducted. In an attempt to understand why Pocketsize chooses to release them as open source. Theory and previous research presents aspects as motivational factors and driving forces behind the development of open source projects. The study has adopted a qualitative perspective where observations and semi structured interviews have been made to map action patterns and to reflect how an individual contemplates on the subject. The result states that developers often create aproduct based on their own needs and how a feeling of altruism and the willingness to “pay it forward” to the open source community are some of the major motivatiors and driving forces behind contributing to open source projects.

Shore zones of large rivers are hot spots of biodiversity and contribute significantly to riverine ecosystem functioning. Today, shore degradation and other structural impair-ments like river straightening and channelization are strong impact factors on river ecosystem health. However, we still lack a thorough understanding of how structural shore zone degradation affects benthic community composition and their inherent ecosystem functions. In this thesis I tested the influence of training structure induced environmental factors on benthic macroinvertebrate community composition and the share of non-native species. Moreover, I assessed the community-associated ecosystem functions in terms of secondary production and resource utilization. In the main channel, communities were composed of only a few specialized taxa with low abundances, which contributed little to riverine secondary production. This is probably due to the harsh conditions produced by constantly high flow velocities and relocation of the fine sandy sediment. Main channel habitats were hardly affected by the adjacent training structure. Hence, species compositions and productivities were similar at all investigated main channel sites. By contrast, each of the shore communities was diverse, highly abundant and productive in comparison to the main channel. However, variations between shore structure communities and their ecosystem functions were prominent. One particular training structure, i.e. the off-bankline revetment, bore the most diverse and by far most productive benthic community, which utilized vast total amounts of basal resources (1,323 g DM m-² y-1). Varying sediment compositions, availability of macrophytes and diverse flow velocities, including lentic conditions, were revealed as key factors for increasing biodiversity, secondary production and resource utilization. Allochthonous boulder habitats were generally highly prone to non-native species invasion. Neozoa proved less productive than many native community members and consumed minor relative and total amounts of the prevailing resource pelagic algae. The present quantitative comparison of shore type specific effects on biodiversity, biomass and productivity provides managers with a tool to improve the ecological attributes of large river ecosystems with an unchangeable, impaired macrostructure. In its entirety, this thesis constitutes a sound basis to increase the mechanistic understanding of the way in which shore zone manipulation can affect riverine benthic communities and their associated ecosystem functions. / Die Uferbereiche großer Flüsse sind für die Biodiversität und Funktion dieser Ökosys-teme von enormer Bedeutung. Uferdegradierung und Kanalisierung gehören zu wichti-gen Faktoren, die Flussökosysteme nachhaltig beeinträchtigen. Wie sich anthropogene Umstrukturierungen der Uferbereiche auf die Zusammensetzung benthischer Ge-meinschaften und deren Ökosystemfunktion auswirken ist jedoch weitestgehend unbe-kannt. In dieser Arbeit werden die Effekte von uferspezifischen Habitatfaktoren auf die Komposition des Makrozoobenthos und den Anteil an Neozoen getestet. Zudem wurden die gemeinschaftsassoziierten Ökosystemfunktionen in Bezug auf Sekundärproduktion und Ressourcennutzung erfasst und bewertet. Die benthische Gemeinschaft des Hauptstroms bestand lediglich aus wenigen spezialisierten Arten, welche nur geringfügig zur Gesamtsekundärproduktion des Flusses beitrugen. Dies war vermutlich auf die rauen Bedingungen im Hauptstrom (insbesondere hohe Strömungsgeschwindigkeiten und damit verbundener Sedimenttransport) zurückzuführen. Die Makrozoobenthosgemeinschaften des Hauptroms wurden von den jeweils angrenzenden Ufertypen nicht beeinflusst. Im Gegensatz zum Hauptstrom zeigte jeder der untersuchten Ufertypen hohe Dichten an benthischen Invertebraten wobei sich Zusammensetzung und Funktion der Artengemeinschaften zwischen den Ufertypen stark unterschieden. Dabei brachte das Parallelwerk die diverseste und produktivste Makroinvertebratenfauna hervor, welche enorme Mengen basaler Ressourcen ingestierte (1,323 g DM m-2y-1). Hauptfaktoren für eine Erhöhung von Biodiversität, Sekundärproduktion und Ressourcennutzung waren neben variablen Sedimentzusammensetzungen und Makrophytenbeständen sich oft ändernde Fließgeschwindigkeiten mit lentischen Phasen. Allochthone Steinhabitate waren generell anfällig für die Invasion nicht heimischer Arten. Diese Neozoen waren weniger produktiv als viele heimische Taxa und nutzten nur geringe Mengen pelagischer Algen, welche die meist verfügbare Ressource darstellten. Aus dem ökologischen Vergleich der verschiedenen Ufertypen lassen sich Managementempfehlungen zur Verbesserung des ökologischen Zustandes in Bezug auf Biodiversität und Ökosystemfunktionen ableiten, welche für große Flüsse mit degradierter und unveränderbarer Makrostruktur in Betracht gezogen werden können. In ihrer Gesamtheit liefert diese Arbeit ein fundiertes mechanistisches Verständnis über die Effekte von Ufermanipulationen auf benthische Gemeinschaften und deren assoziierte Ökosystemfunktionen in großen Flüssen.