Developing smart services by Internet of Things in manufacturing business

Manufacturing companies have passed from selling uniquely tangible products to adopting a service-oriented approach to generate steady and continuous revenue streams. Nowadays, equipment and machine manufacturers possess technologies to track and analyze product-related data for obtaining relevant information from customers’ use towards the product after it is sold. The Internet of Things on Industrial environments will allow manufacturers to leverage lifecycle product traceability for innovating towards an information-driven services approach, commonly referred as “Smart Services”, for achieving improvements in support, maintenance and usage processes. The aim of this study is to conduct a literature review and empirical analysis to present a framework that describes a customer-oriented approach for developing information-driven services leveraged by the Internet of Things in manufacturing companies. The empirical study employed tools for the assessment of customer needs for analyzing the case company in terms of information requirements and digital needs. The literature review supported the empirical analysis with a deep research on product lifecycle traceability and digitalization of product-related services within manufacturing value chains. As well as the role of simulation-based technologies on supporting the “Smart Service” development process. The results obtained from the case company analysis show that the customers mainly demand information that allow them to monitor machine conditions, machine behavior on different geographical conditions, machine-implement interactions, and resource and energy consumption. Put simply, information outputs that allow them to increase machine productivity for maximizing yields, save time and optimize resources in the most sustainable way. Based on customer needs assessment, this study presents a framework to describe the initial phases of a “Smart Service” development process, considering the requirements of Smart Engineering methodologies.

Numerical estimation of Carbonate properties using a digital rock physics workflow

Digital rock physics combines modern imaging with advanced numerical simulations to analyze the physical properties of rocks -- In this paper we suggest a special segmentation procedure which is applied to a carbonate rock from Switzerland -- Starting point is a CTscan of a specimen of Hauptmuschelkalk -- The first step applied to the raw image data is a nonlocal mean filter -- We then apply different thresholds to identify pores and solid phases -- Because we are aware of a nonneglectable amount of unresolved microporosity we also define intermediate phases -- Based on this segmentation determine porositydependent values for the pwave velocity and for the permeability -- The porosity measured in the laboratory is then used to compare our numerical data with experimental data -- We observe a good agreement -- Future work includes an analytic validation to the numerical results of the pwave velocity upper bound, employing different filters for the image segmentation and using data with higher resolution

El cuento y la novela digital: estructura del texto e interactivdad

Resumen Desde hace algunas décadas la computadora, las tablets, los teléfonos inteligentes, los libros electrónicos, el internet y la conectividad irrumpieron en nuestras casas, cambiando de manera casi radical nuestra manera de aprehender el mundo. Es cierto que hoy en día, el fenómeno multimedia y su impacto sobre la sociedad fueron analizados desde diferentes perspectivas,tratando establecer los cambios en el comportamiento y hábitos que lo digital acarrea. Evidentemente, el mundo literario, como todos los ámbitos de la cultural, ha sido afectado por este fenómeno tecnológico y sus innovaciones. Varios autores y críticos literarios han analizado el tema desde varias ópticas, tales como Christian Vanderdrope y Roger Chartier quienes han estudiado los cambios que van desde las transformaciones físicas del libro hasta variaciones en la estructura del texto;Clément y Landow estudian, también la estructura misma de ciertos textos narrativos contemporáneos; escritores como Andrés Neuman, Leonardo Valencia, Vicente Mora o Fernando Escobar, entre otros,crean y reflexionan sobre el uso que ellos mismos hacen de la herramienta digital a través de susblogs. Estas nuevas textualidades es lo que nos proponemos estudiar en este trabajo, describiendo el impacto de su evolución y mutación artística, básicamente centrándonos en la estructura del texto ya sea del cuento o la novela; así como establecer la novedosa vinculación que estos textos mantiene con sus lectores.

Movimiento estudiantil en Chile, aprendizaje situado y activismo digital. Compromiso, cambio social y usos tecnológicos adolescentes

A partir del movimiento estudiantil que surge en Chile en 2011 el artículo reflexiona sobre la escuela como espacio de aprendizaje situado de tecnologías digitales audiovisuales y el modo en que este proceso puede impactar sobre la dimensión político-comunicacional de un movimiento social. Para ello, se describe y analiza el caso de una escuela donde la educación formal en lenguajes y tecnologías digitales se imbrica con el uso que hacen, estudiantes secundarias que se convierten en dirigentas estudiantiles, de aplicaciones y recursos de la web social y los llamados “social media” (youtube, blogs, redes sociales). Se trabaja con datos generados a través de entrevistas a informantes claves y una selección de videos creados por el estudiantado y subidos a internet. El contenido de las entrevistas es abordado desde el concepto de aprendizaje situado (Lave y Wenger, 1991) y los videos desde el concepto de videoactivismo (Askanius, 2013; Mateos y Rajas, 2014). Los resultados muestran que el uso concreto de herramientas digitales obtenidas en contextos educativos formales y dentro de procesos de movilización, genera a su vez nuevas experiencias de aprendizaje no-formal, que permiten tanto a estudiantes como docentes reflexionar sobre sus prácticas y mejorar su potencial comunicativo. Asimismo, muestran un uso acrítico de las herramientas digitales, lo cual constituye un llamado de atención respecto a la necesidad de incorporar los tópicos de privacidad y autocuidado en internet dentro de los contenidos a desarrollar por la escuela como espacio de aprendizaje digital.

Developing an Enhanced Model for Combined Heat and Air Infiltration Energy Simulation

The need for efficient, sustainable, and planned utilization of resources is ever more critical. In the U.S. alone, buildings consume 34.8 Quadrillion (1015) BTU of energy annually at a cost of $1.4 Trillion. Of this energy 58% is utilized for heating and air conditioning. Several building energy analysis tools have been developed to assess energy demands and lifecycle energy costs in buildings. Such analyses are also essential for an efficient HVAC design that overcomes the pitfalls of an under/over-designed system. DOE-2 is among the most widely known full building energy analysis models. It also constitutes the simulation engine of other prominent software such as eQUEST, EnergyPro, PowerDOE. Therefore, it is essential that DOE-2 energy simulations be characterized by high accuracy. Infiltration is an uncontrolled process through which outside air leaks into a building. Studies have estimated infiltration to account for up to 50% of a building’s energy demand. This, considered alongside the annual cost of buildings energy consumption, reveals the costs of air infiltration. It also stresses the need that prominent building energy simulation engines accurately account for its impact. In this research the relative accuracy of current air infiltration calculation methods is evaluated against an intricate Multiphysics Hygrothermal CFD building envelope analysis. The full-scale CFD analysis is based on a meticulous representation of cracking in building envelopes and on real-life conditions. The research found that even the most advanced current infiltration methods, including in DOE-2, are at up to 96.13% relative error versus CFD analysis. An Enhanced Model for Combined Heat and Air Infiltration Simulation was developed. The model resulted in 91.6% improvement in relative accuracy over current models. It reduces error versus CFD analysis to less than 4.5% while requiring less than 1% of the time required for such a complex hygrothermal analysis. The algorithm used in our model was demonstrated to be easy to integrate into DOE-2 and other engines as a standalone method for evaluating infiltration heat loads. This will vastly increase the accuracy of such simulation engines while maintaining their speed and ease of use characteristics that make them very widely used in building design.

TWITTER IN SCHOOL: REFLECTIONS ON DIGITAL LITERACY

The present study seeks to weave together reflections on the role of the school in the development of activities of digital literacy. We consider, principally, the relation to the relevance of the critical use of social networks, and we chose, in this article, an analysis of Twitter. Twitter is a mixture of social networking and microblogging and, apparently, is made up of bits of several genres like news story, leaflet, advertising, citation, which were modified to suit the needs of communication found in social networking. The research is justified owing to the importance of relating an ascendant genre with the concept of multi-modality and with school practice. The objective of the study is to verify how the school can utilize twitter in activities of developing digital literacy. Dionysius (2011), Bazerman (2007), Street (2014), Soares (2004) and Buzato (2009) are the principal theoretical referents of this study. First, we define literacy and digital literacy so that, secondly, by means of an analysis of tweets collected on February 22, 2014, we can verify what literacies are used in twitter. We verified that this genre offers several possibilities for the development of literacies and teaching of genres integrated to new social demands. The school has a social responsibility with the citizens it is forming and, therefore, it should deliver to everyone tools to act and interact in the real world and therefore critical work with digital literacy is essential.  KEYWORDS: Digital literacy. Teaching. Twitter.

PROPOSTA DE UNIDADE TEMÁTICA PARA O ENSINO DE INGLÊS EM AMBIENTE DIGITAL

Based on a sociocultural perspective (LANTOLF, 2000; 2010), the present article aims at presenting a thematic unit especially designed for an advanced leveled English group. This thematic unit has been elaborated in the virtual learning environment  http://pbworks.com , proposing twenty hours of collaborative tasks for the students, and it counted with varied textual genres and diverse digital tools. The objective of this thematic unit is to stimulate the collaboration between the students, focusing on the culture of English speaking countries in relation with crafts, setting up relations with the History of crafts in Brazil and working with the oral and written comprehension and production.  By creating a thematic unit that proposes the study of cultural aspects of other countries, an opportunity for the students to experience the culture of others is created, and for them to notice that culture is not apart from language. Such aspects are noticeable in foreign language classes due to the fact that by dealing with language, individuals also deal with cultural, identitary, and social aspects. Taking into consideration that oral and written comprehension and production are inseparable abilities, the proposed tasks in the thematic unit have been designed considering the students’ context, their necessities, the groups’ interests, and also the three types of knowledge according to Parâmetros Curriculares Nacionais (1998): systemic, world and genre knowledge, besides the Oxford strategies (1990).

The Coming of Post-reflexive Society: Commodification and Language in Digital Capitalism

Language is a unique aspect of human communication because it can be used to discuss itself in its own terms. For this reason, human societies potentially have superior capacities of co-ordination, reflexive self-correction, and innovation than other animal, physical or cybernetic systems. However, this analysis also reveals that language is interconnected with the economically and technologically mediated social sphere and hence is vulnerable to abstraction, objectification, reification, and therefore ideology – all of which are antithetical to its reflexive function, whilst paradoxically being a fundamental part of it. In particular, in capitalism, language is increasingly commodified within the social domains created and affected by ubiquitous communication technologies. The advent of the so-called ‘knowledge economy’ implicates exchangeable forms of thought (language) as the fundamental commodities of this emerging system. The historical point at which a ‘knowledge economy’ emerges, then, is the critical point at which thought itself becomes a commodified ‘thing’, and language becomes its “objective” means of exchange. However, the processes by which such commodification and objectification occurs obscures the unique social relations within which these language commodities are produced. The latest economic phase of capitalism – the knowledge economy – and the obfuscating trajectory which accompanies it, we argue, is destroying the reflexive capacity of language particularly through the process of commodification. This can be seen in that the language practices that have emerged in conjunction with digital technologies are increasingly non-reflexive and therefore less capable of self-critical, conscious change.