Quality of service-based service level agreement management framework for hydrocarbon exploration and discovery operation

 The major contributions presented in this thesis are twofold. Firstly, it presents the research towards a unique services-based Hydrocarbon Exploration and Discovery Model that demonstrates the feasibility of using advanced ICT technologies in the reproduction of stages involved in an oil and gas discovery, processing and analysis process. Secondly, the research demonstrated a solution of the problems in providing agreed level of quality of service (QoS) and formalizing of appropriate Service Level Agreements (SLA) within such complex environment where different services within the model can be delivered by a variety of service providers

Evaluating health services with point of service feedback: perspectives and experiences of patients, staff and community volunteers in an inpatient rehabilitation facility

PURPOSE: To determine patient, staff and community volunteer opinions and experiences of point of service feedback (POSF) in an inpatient rehabilitation facility. METHOD: Participants were recruited by purposeful sampling. Two researchers conducted in-depth semi-scripted interviews with patients, staff or volunteers until no new issues emerged. Manually transcribed interview data underwent thematic analysis that grouped information into categories of related information. RESULTS: Twenty patients, 26 staff from 10 different professional groups, and 2 community volunteers were interviewed. Patient and volunteer data were grouped into five main categories: patients wanted their voice heard and acted on; patients could be positively and negatively affected by POSF; patients could be reluctant to evaluate staff; patients preferred POSF to post-discharge mailed questionnaires; and patients' feedback was influenced by the data collector. Staff wanted: feedback to help them improve the patient experience; and feedback that was trustworthy, usable and used. Staff believed that the feedback-collector influenced patients' feedback and affected how feedback could be used. CONCLUSIONS: Patients, staff and community volunteers identified issues that determine the appropriateness and usefulness of POSF. Policy and practise should address the preferences, needs and experiences of health service users and providers so that POSF produces maximum benefits for both patients and health services. Implications for Rehabilitation POSF can enhance patients' experiences of inpatient rehabilitation by providing a mechanism to be heard and communicating that patients are valued; care must be exercised with patients who find giving feedback stressful. Collecting POSF is most beneficial when coupled with methods to efficiently and effectively respond to feedback. POSF requires interpretation in light of its limitations including patients' ability to accurately and unreservedly communicate their experiences. Who collects POSF requires careful consideration; community volunteers have both advantages and disadvantages.

An analytical model for optimal spectrum leasing under constraints of quality of service in CRNs

Cognitive radio improves spectrum efficiency and mitigates spectrum scarcity by allowing cognitive users to opportunistically access idle chunks of the spectrum owned by licensed users. In long-term spectrum leasing markets, secondary network operators make a decision about how much spectrum is optimal to fulfill their users' data transmission requirements. We study this optimization problem in multiple channel scenarios. Under the constrains of expected user admission rate and quality of service, we model the secondary network into a dynamic data transportation system. In this system, the spectrum accesses of both primary users and secondary users are in accordance with stochastic processes, respectively. The main metrics of quality of service we are concerned with include user admission rate, average transmission delay and stability of the delay. To quantify the relationship between spectrum provisioning and quality of service, we propose an approximate analytical model. We use the model to estimate the lower and upper bounds of the optimal amount of the spectrum. The distance between the bounds is relatively narrow. In addition, we design a simple algorithm to compute the optimum by using the bounds. We conduct numerical simulations on a slotted multiple channel dynamic spectrum access network model. Simulation results demonstrate the preciseness of the proposed model. Our work sheds light on the design of game and auction based dynamic spectrum sharing mechanisms in cognitive radio networks.

An examination of service quality dimensionality and positive word-of-mouth intentions in a Chinese telecommunication context

Word-of-mouth is a powerful force in today’s marketplace. However, few researchers
examine how the dimensions of SERVQUAL relate to positive word-of-mouth, particularly in
the Chinese market. This study attempts to fill this gap. The context is Chinese
telecommunication market. A survey was conducted with a sample of 241 respondents. The
results showed that Reliability and Assurance encouraged more positive word-of-mouth
intention, while Tangibles, Responsiveness, and Empathy did not have any significant effect
on one’s word-of-mouth. These findings have useful implications to international service
companies, particularly those operating in a Chinese environment, by identifying factors that
are salient to the generation of positive word-of-mouth.

Health services should collect feedback from inpatients at the point of service: opinions from patients and staff in acute and subacute facilities

OBJECTIVE: Point of service feedback (POSF) enables patients to give health services feedback about their experiences during or immediately after care. Despite the increasing use of POSF, little is known regarding patients' and staffs' opinions of this practice and whether they consider it acceptable or useful. The study aimed to determine patient and staff opinions regarding POSF. DESIGN: A cross-sectional survey. SETTING: Acute and subacute healthcare facilities. PARTICIPANTS: Two hundred and forty-seven patients and 221 staff. RESULTS: Participants indicated that patients should be invited to evaluate health services when they are in hospital or subacute care and improving services was the most important reason for doing so. Staff indicated that:• collecting patients' feedback during their stay was an important part of providing care and not an interruption to it (n = 187 of 221, 85%).• collecting patients' feedback was best done with a variety of methods; talking directly with patients during their stay was the preferred option (n = 161 of 219, 74%).More patients preferred to:• give feedback during their stay (51%) than after discharge from care (15%).• give feedback by talking with someone (45%) than completing a questionnaire (31%).Some patients (14%) were concerned about reprisal from staff if they gave negative feedback. CONCLUSIONS: POSF can be acceptable and useful for evaluating health services and should be incorporated into a person-centred approach that allows patients to choose from a variety of feedback options both during and after their stay. To be most useful, feedback should be incorporated into a quality improvement system.

Apresentação multimédia com garantias de qualidade de serviço: QoSMedEval (Quality of Service Media Evaluation Tool)

Orientador: Paulo Nazareno Maia Sampaio

Quality of service control for rt-VBR connections in ATM networks

Nowadays, networks must support applications such as: distance learning, electronic commerce, access to Internet, Intranets and Extranets, voice over IP (Internet Protocol) and many others. These new applications, employing data, voice, and video traffic, require high bandwidth and Quality of Service (QoS). The ATM (Asynchronous Transfer Mode) technology, together with dynamic resource allocation methods, offers network connections that guarantee QoS parameters, such as minimum losses and delays. This paper presents a system that uses Network Management Functions together with dynamic resource allocation for provision of the end-to-end QoS parameters for rt-VBR connections.

Wireless mesh networks planning based on parameters of quality of service

The use of QoS parameters to evaluate the quality of service in a mesh network is essential mainly when providing multimedia services. This paper proposes an algorithm for planning wireless mesh networks in order to satisfy some QoS parameters, given a set of test points (TPs) and potential access points (APs). Examples of QoS parameters include: probability of packet loss and mean delay in responding to a request. The proposed algorithm uses a Mathematical Programming model to determine an adequate topology for the network and Monte Carlo simulation to verify whether the QoS parameters are being satisfied. The results obtained show that the proposed algorithm is able to find satisfactory solutions.

Transandean railroads: the interruption of service and prospects for resumption

Building the infrastructure and then operating a railroad which starts on the Pacific coast of South America and which, a few score kilometres inland, must climb close to 4,000 metres above sea level in the Andes mountains has always presented challenges both for the civil engineers responsible for its construction and for the managers in charge of its operation.As at mid-2001, two of the four transandean railroads that ran 20 years ago are out of service, owing to adverse weather conditions, and a third is not operating as a result of institutional problems.Nevertheless, two of the three railroads that are now shut down could resume service soon. Furthermore, there is a possibility that a new transandean railroad could be built that would cross the Andes mountains further south, at an altitude of less than 1,750 meters.

Quality of Service in Distributed Stream Processing for large scale Smart Pervasive Environments

The wide diffusion of cheap, small, and portable sensors integrated in an unprecedented large variety of devices and the availability of almost ubiquitous Internet connectivity make it possible to collect an unprecedented amount of real time information about the environment we live in. These data streams, if properly and timely analyzed, can be exploited to build new intelligent and pervasive services that have the potential of improving people's quality of life in a variety of cross concerning domains such as entertainment, health-care, or energy management. The large heterogeneity of application domains, however, calls for a middleware-level infrastructure that can effectively support their different quality requirements. In this thesis we study the challenges related to the provisioning of differentiated quality-of-service (QoS) during the processing of data streams produced in pervasive environments. We analyze the trade-offs between guaranteed quality, cost, and scalability in streams distribution and processing by surveying existing state-of-the-art solutions and identifying and exploring their weaknesses. We propose an original model for QoS-centric distributed stream processing in data centers and we present Quasit, its prototype implementation offering a scalable and extensible platform that can be used by researchers to implement and validate novel QoS-enforcement mechanisms. To support our study, we also explore an original class of weaker quality guarantees that can reduce costs when application semantics do not require strict quality enforcement. We validate the effectiveness of this idea in a practical use-case scenario that investigates partial fault-tolerance policies in stream processing by performing a large experimental study on the prototype of our novel LAAR dynamic replication technique. Our modeling, prototyping, and experimental work demonstrates that, by providing data distribution and processing middleware with application-level knowledge of the different quality requirements associated to different pervasive data flows, it is possible to improve system scalability while reducing costs.

Enhancing quality of service in software-defined networks

Resource management is of paramount importance in network scenarios and it is a long-standing and still open issue. Unfortunately, while technology and innovation continue to evolve, our network infrastructure system has been maintained almost in the same shape for decades and this phenomenon is known as “Internet ossification”. Software-Defined Networking (SDN) is an emerging paradigm in computer networking that allows a logically centralized software program to control the behavior of an entire network. This is done by decoupling the network control logic from the underlying physical routers and switches that forward traffic to the selected destination. One mechanism that allows the control plane to communicate with the data plane is OpenFlow. The network operators could write high-level control programs that specify the behavior of an entire network. Moreover, the centralized control makes it possible to define more specific and complex tasks that could involve many network functionalities, e.g., security, resource management and control, into a single framework. Nowadays, the explosive growth of real time applications that require stringent Quality of Service (QoS) guarantees, brings the network programmers to design network protocols that deliver certain performance guarantees. This thesis exploits the use of SDN in conjunction with OpenFlow to manage differentiating network services with an high QoS. Initially, we define a QoS Management and Orchestration architecture that allows us to manage the network in a modular way. Then, we provide a seamless integration between the architecture and the standard SDN paradigm following the separation between the control and data planes. This work is a first step towards the deployment of our proposal in the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) campus network with differentiating services and stringent QoS requirements. We also plan to exploit our solution to manage the handoff between different network technologies, e.g., Wi-Fi and WiMAX. Indeed, the model can be run with different parameters, depending on the communication protocol and can provide optimal results to be implemented on the campus network.

Rate and predictors of service disengagement in an epidemiological first-episode psychosis cohort

To assess the prevalence and predictors of service disengagement in a treated epidemiological cohort of first-episode psychosis (FEP) patients.